They usually bring up the six Super Bowl championships (most by anyone ever), the fact that the Rooneys are the greatest owners of all time, and that Steeler Nation exists.
Sure, the 49ers and Cowboys have five Lombardis each, but San Francisco has sucked for most of this decade, the Yorks have their heads up their asses, and most fans in the Bay Area are too obsessed with wine tasting and pride marching to care about football. Dallas has a proud tradition, but Jerry Jones is a loose cannon and there have been as many criminals, potheads, and crack addicts in the history of the Dallas Cowboys as Hall of Famers.
But, let he who is without sin...
Prior to the Super Bowl era (when Dan Rooney took over), Art Rooney, Sr (God rest his soul) was a terrible owner that didn't devote any money to things like scouting or coaching or player development.
During the Super Bowl era a healthy percentage of our offensive and defensive lines were juiced up throughout the 70s and 80s. Ernie Holmes was a criminal. Several of the modern pass interference, illegal contact, and holding rules for the defense could be called "Mel Blount Rules." We strongarmed Mike Merriweather, then traded him after the 1987 strike happened, which obviously didn't teach the Steelers any lessons. Bam Morris was no saint. Rumors have swirled about Cowher's extracurricular activities (not with Kordell in Schenley, but with the ladies). And, of course, there's the fact that some of the primary stakeholders in the franchise were heavily involved in gambling for years.
I mention the negatives because everyone knows about the positives: 14 conference championship games, seven Super Bowl appearances, six titles, only three coaches since 1969, the Rooney Rule, Steeler Nation, the Terrible Towel, all the Hall of Famers, TV analysts, and iconic players that have come out of the team, best record in the NFL since the 1970 merger, and the fact that we're a plucky franchise in a small market that just keeps on winning.
Since everyone has skeletons in their closet from a subjective perspective, I figured that I'd solve this with numbers. I included every team that has been to five or more Super Bowls and passed out points according to their successes since 1970.
1 point for every season where they finished over .500 (for the most part, if you have a winning record, you have an excellent chance of making the playoffs... as we've discussed, once you make the playoffs, anything can happen).
1 point for every playoff victory (the more postseason games you win, the better your chances of getting to and winning the Super Bowl).
2 points for making the Conference Championship game (if nothing else, you're one of the best teams in your conference and that should count for something. Plus which, you need to win at least one postseason game to get to that point, so that is a measure of postseason success).
3 points for winning the Conference Championship game (getting to the Super Bowl should count for almost as much as winning it, since, as history has shown, it's not the easiest thing in the world to even get there).
4 points for winning the Super Bowl.
I was surprised by the fact that eight teams have made it to five or more Super Bowls (the cutoff was at five because the 49ers made it to five, they just happened to win all five.)
Cowboys (8)
Steelers (7)
Broncos (6)
Patriots (6)
49ers (5)
Redskins (5)
Dolphins (5)
Raiders (5)
A few things that I thought were interesting:
- The Steelers and Cowboys have appeared in 14 Conference Championship games each. That's out of 78 possible (remember, we're going from 1970 and two teams from each conference are in the championship game). Oakland had ten appearances and San Francisco had 11. That means that there was a 32% chance that the NFC Championship game featured either the 49ers or Cowboys since 1970 and a 30.8% chance that the AFC Championship featured either the Raiders or Steelers. Not surprisingly, those four teams finished in the top four in the Ultimate Standings.
- The Dolphins have had only four losing seasons since 1970. Sure, they had five 8-8 seasons, but when you consider that two of those losing seasons were back-to-back (in 2006 and 2007) and one of them was a 1-15 season, it's that much more impressive.
- Miami also had the most seasons over .500 with 30, but the Steelers were second with 29.
- The 49ers had the most losing seasons with 16. Interestingly enough, they also had zero seasons in which they finished 8-8 since 1970. Everyone else had at least two and the Broncos had six.
- New England has the best record in Conference Championship games at 6-1, with their only loss coming against the Colts following the 2006 season.
- The Raiders were the only team to put a team in the Super Bowl in four decades: 60s, 70s, 80s, 00s.
Denver Broncos, eighth place, 71 points:
Winning Seasons: 24
Playoff Record: 17-15
Conference Championship record: 6-2
Super Bowl Record: 2-4
Washington Redskins, seventh place, 75 points:
Winning Seasons: 23
Playoff Record: 23-17
Conference Championship record: 5-1
Super Bowl Record: 3-2
Miami Dolphins, tied for sixth place, 77 points:
Winning Seasons: 30
Playoff Record: 20-20
Conference Championship record: 5-2
Super Bowl Record: 2-3
New England Patriots, tied for sixth place, 77 points:
Winning Seasons: 24
Playoff Record: 21-13
Conference Championship record: 6-1
Super Bowl Record: 3-3
Oakland Raiders, fourth place, 84 points:
Winning Seasons: 22
Playoff Record: 25-18
Conference Championship record: 5-5
Super Bowl record: 3-2
San Francisco 49ers, third place, 96 points:
Winning Seasons: 23
Playoff Record: 26-18
Conference Championship record: 5-6
Super Bowl record: 5-0
Dallas Cowboys, second place, 115 points:
Winning Seasons: 27
Playoff Record: 32-24
Conference Championship record: 8-6
Super Bowl record: 5-3
Pittsburgh Steelers, first place, 119 points:
Winning Seasons: 29
Playoff Record: 31-19
Conference Championship record: 7-7
Super Bowl record: 6-1
All in all, the fact that the Cowboys are 1-2 against the Steelers in the Super Bowl and the fact that Dallas hasn't won a playoff game since 1996 are the two things that swung things in Pittsburgh's favor.
The 49ers were really good from about Super Bowl 16 to about Super Bowl 29, but not so much before that or after that. That's why they won five Super Bowls but finished behind the Cowboys and Steelers by a healthy margin.
You could make a serious case for Dallas being the team of the 70s even though they only won two Super Bowls and the Steelers won four. They appeared in more Super Bowls (five to four) and more conference championship games (seven to six).
I mean, we won, they lost, we were the team of the 70s. I'm just saying if they had won one of those games, they'd be the team of the 70s, not us. Dallas was that good.
The Steelers win out, though, because they went 2-1 against the Cowboys in Super Bowls and were more consistent in the regular season and the postseason. As a matter of fact, if you take a look at their records in the 80s, they're not as bad as everyone remembers them being. And they weren't as good in the 90s as everyone remembers, either.
So, it's officially official. The Pittsburgh Steelers are the best NFL franchise of the Super Bowl era.
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