Famous Fumbles

As a follow-up to yesterday’s post about turnovers, I thought I would share a few examples of (in)famous fumbles in NFL history.  They feature a Brown, a Cowboy and an Eagle.  Enjoy!

Cleveland vs. Denver, 1987 AFC Championship

Our first famous fumble is courtesy of Earnest Byner, running back for the Cleveland Browns in their AFC Championship game against the Denver Broncos on January 17, 1988.  The game had been a series of stops and starts for the Browns.  Having trailed the Broncos 3-21 at halftime, the Browns came back to eventually tie the game at 31.  Denver went ahead 38-31 with four minutes left in the game, then the Browns drove to the Denver 8-yard line with 1:12 left.  Browns quarterback handed off the ball to Byner, who ran toward the end zone.  At the 2-yard line, he was stripped of the ball and fumbled.  The Broncos recovered the fumble and went on to win the game and advance to the Super Bowl.  This moment in the game has since been known as “The Fumble.”*

While this fumble is famous for its fatal outcome, and its overshadowing of an otherwise spectacular game for Byner, the next two blunders are known for their abject stupidity.

Cowboys v. Buffalo, Super Bowl XXVII (January, 1993)

In the last moments of Super Bowl XXVII, the Dallas Cowboys had a commanding 52-17 lead over the Buffalo Bills.  The Bills, playing for pride, were attempting to drive down the field when they fumbled near midfield.  Cowboys defensive tackle Leon Lett recovered the fumble and began running toward the Bills’ end zone for a clear touchdown.  As he got to the 10-yard line, however, he slowed down and held the ball away from his body in early celebration.  What he didn’t know is that Bills wide receiver Don Beebe had been chasing him and was quickly closing the distance.  Just before Lett’s hand reached the goal line, Beebe swatted the ball out of his hand.  The ball rolled through the end zone and out of bounds, resulting in a touchback, giving the Bills the ball on the 20-yard line.  Fortunately for Lett, his showboating didn’t cost the Cowboys the game, but he will forever be known for this classic blunder.**

Philadelphia vs. Dallas, September 15, 2008, Monday Night Football

Before a national television audience, and against their division rivals, the Cowboys, Philadelphia Eagles rookie wide receiver DeSean Jackson committed an error that was perhaps more moronic than Lett’s.  After catching a 60-yard pass from quarterback Donovan McNabb, Jackson was racing for the end zone to score an easy touchdown when he spiked the ball in celebration . . . at the 1-yard line!  Fortunately for Jackson, the official at the spot signaled a touchdown and none of the Cowboys players in the area jumped on the ball.  Therefore, when the Cowboys successfully challenged the touchdown, the result was that the Eagles had the ball on the 1-yard line, where they were able to run the ball into the end zone on the next play.

One might forgive Jackson, to an extent, for being a young, inexperienced player overly excited about scoring on national television.  However, he did almost the exact same thing in a high school all-star game!  Check it out:

*This is not the first time that the Broncos crushed the Browns’ hope for a Super Bowl appearance.  Faithful Naptime Huddle readers will recall that it was one year earlier that John Elway led the Broncos on “The Drive” against the Browns in the last moments of the game to win the AFC Championship. 

**This wouldn’t be Lett’s last, or even worst, lapse in judgment.  The very next season, on Thanksgiving Day, the Cowboys were leading the Miami Dolphins by one point with 15 seconds left in the game.  The Dolphins tried to kick a field goal, but the kick was blocked.  Lett tried to pick up the loose ball but muffed it, and the Dolphins ended up recovering the football.  They made their second field goal attempt and won the game.  If Lett had only fallen on the ball instead of trying to pick it up, the Cowboys would have won.

Greatest NFL Dynasties

Your education of NFL history continues today with a discussion of the NFL’s top team dynasties.  Generally speaking, any sports dynasty is one that dominates its sport and wins multiple championships in either consecutive years or in a short span of time.  Though this seems like a fairly simple formula, what can be considered a dynasty may be the subject of debate among experts and fans.  For example, people might say that a team was dominant only because of one star player that carried the team.  Or, a team might be considered a dynasty even though it never won a championship (one of these will be discussed below).  As with my post on great QBs in history, I don’t claim to be the final judge on the status of these teams as “dynasties.”  However, there is not much debate on most of these teams, and you should be able to recognize them if the subject arises.

NFL DYNASTIES THROUGH HISTORY (by decade)

1.       1940s Chicago Bears (champions in 1940, 1941, 1943 and 1946):  Under coach George Halas, the Bears dominated the ‘40s while also helping to develop passing in football.  In the 1940 championship, the Bears walloped the Washington Redskins 73-0.

2.       1950s Cleveland Browns (champs in 1950, 1954 and 1955):  Coached by Paul Brown, the Browns didn’t join the NFL until 1950 (until then they were in the now-defunct All-America Football Conference), so this doesn’t count the championships they earned before that season.

3.       1960s Green Bay Packers (champs in 1961, 1962, 1965, 1966 and 1967):  The Packers of the ‘60s benefitted from a stash of superb talent, such as QB Bart Starr, and a coach who is widely regarded as the greatest ever:  Vince Lombardi.  He is known for his vast wealth of football knowledge and wisdom which he combined with his tell-it-like-it-is, no-holds-barred rhetoric.  You can’t go into a sports memorabilia store or flip through a motivational products catalog without seeing a bevy of posters and coffee mugs with his quotations on them.

4.       1970s Miami Dolphins (champs in 1972):  OK, so the Dolphins only won one championship in the ‘70s.  However, they must be mentioned because they had three straight Super Bowl appearances (’71, ’72 and ’73).  More importantly, though, the ’72 championship capped off the NFL’s only perfect season, a feat that has not been repeated since, though the New England Patriots came very close in 2007, losing only in the Super Bowl to the New York Giants.  A core group of ’72 Dolphins players famously drink a champagne toast each season when the last undefeated team in the League suffers its first loss.

5.       1970s Pittsburgh Steelers (champs in 1974, 1975, 1978 and 1979):  The Steelers might also be able to tout itself as the team with the greatest concentration of personalities to play football.  Just to name a few, the Steelers were led on offense by Hall of Famers QB Terry Bradshaw and wide receiver Lynn Swann.  On defense, the Steelers fielded the punishing “Steel Curtain” anchored by the legendary Hall of Famer “Mean” Joe Greene.  Greene, you may recall, is the football player featured in the iconic Coca-Cola commercial in which he was handed a Coke by a young fan who received Greene’s jersey in return (“Hey, kid.  Catch!”).

6.       1980s San Francisco 49ers (champs in 1981, 1984, 1988 and 1989):  Coach Bill Walsh dominated the League during the ‘80s with the support of Hall of Famers QB Joe Montana (architect of “The Catch”) and Wide Receiver Jerry Rice. 

7.       1990s Buffalo Bills (no championships in the 1990s):  This is one of those debatable additions to the list.  The Bills didn’t win a championship in that decade, but under coach Marv Levy, they appeared in four straight Super Bowls in the early ‘90s (1990-93), the only team to have ever done so.

8.       1990s Dallas Cowboys (champs in 1992, 1993 and 1995):  Built, in part, by trading away college great RB Herschel Walker, the Cowboys built an unstoppable force in the ‘90s led by Hall of Famers QB Troy Aikman and running back Emmitt Smith.

9.       2000s New England Patriots (champs in 2001, 2003 and 2004):  Coached by Bill Belichick, widely regarded as the greatest coach currently in the League, the Patriots have built a dynasty around future Hall of Fame QB Tom Brady.  The supporting cast on offense and defense has changed considerably from year-to-year, but this coach-QB combination makes the Pats hard to beat every season.

Well, there you have it.  The greatest NFL dynasties in history.  Now go forth and impress your friends with your knowledge!