Divisional Playoff Notes
By Bruce Marshall
It might surprise those of the ESPN generation that there was a time when there was no postseason knockout format featuring multiples of teams, or that the pro football season would conclude before the New Year's bowl games. But aside from the odd conference playoff game necessitated by a tie in the standings, the NFL (and the pre-1969 AFL) used to have no playoff tourney per se, the postseason consisting of only the league title game, always held in late December. The only pro football played after January 1 in those days were the league All-Star games, including the NFL's Pro Bowl, annually held at the Los Angeles Coliseum...not an exotic venue like Honolulu.
Last week we spoke of how former commissioner Pete Rozelle helped usher in a new era of the NFL postseason when dividing the league into four divisions for the 1967 season, adding a conference title game before the league championship battle and Super Bowl date vs. the AFL winner. Thus, in a sense, the pro football playoffs as we know them really began in 1967. And from the outset, this week's round of games (which qualified as the conference title games between 1967-69) have had a familiar theme.
As competitive as these games look on the surface, they often become one-sided affairs.
We'll be talking more about the playoff "blowout" phenomenon in the coming weeks, as unexpected lopsided scores were also occurring in the NFL's more-abbreviated postseason (one game) long before Rozelle hatched his expanded playoff idea 43 years ago. But 1967 proved something of a road map for playoff results that we have often seen repeated through the years. Indeed, these matchups often disappoint in terms of tense, down-to-the-wire affairs.
Rozelle's first game of the "new" playoff generation was the '67 Western Conference final, held at, of all places, Milwaukee's old County Stadium, where the Packers hosted the Rams. It was a quick rematch from a thriller two weeks earlier won by the Rams at the Coliseum, 27-24, a result that kept L.A. alive in the Coastal Division and set up a showdown the following week vs. Johnny Unitas' Baltimore Colts, who took an unbeaten (but twice-tied) team into L.A. for the final week showdown. The Rams then won the Coastal in a gleeful 34-10 romp, but there was still a buzz about the Green Bay game two weeks earlier, a dramatic back-and-forth battle that featured a blocked Donny Anderson punt in the final minute by L.A.'s Tony Guillory. Claude Crabb's subsequent return to the 5-yard line and Roman Gabriel's 2nd-down TD pass to Bernie Casey were the final pieces to a classic that earned the cover in the following week's Sports Illustrated. The Rams' radio play-by-play man, a then-young Dick Enberg, has said that the "blocked punt game" was the most dramatic of his long broadcast career. No wonder there was such anticipation for L.A.'s playoff rematch against the defending champs!
George Allen's Rams, however, were a spent force in Milwaukee following that emotional conclusion to the regular season. After L.A. missed an opportunity early in the 2nd Q deep in Green Bay territory to add to a 7-0 lead, momentum swung to the Pack. The trigger was an unlikely source, rookie RB Travis Williams, who had set the league ablaze with his kick return exploits that season (a 41-yard average and 4 TDs, including one in the memorable penultimate regular-season game vs. the Rams). Williams broke a 46-yard TD run to level matters at 7 midway through the 2nd Q, and Green Bay had re-established control. QB Bart Starr, in one of his best postseason efforts, then put the Packers up 14-7 before halftime with an 18-yard TD pass to Carroll Dale. Starr continued his effectiveness into the 2nd half en route to completing 17 of 23 passes for 222 yards, but the real story was the Ray Nitschke-led Packer defense, which shut down Rams runners Dick Bass and Les Josephson (who gained only 64 yards on 23 carries between them) and began to harass a frustrated Gabriel, who could complete only 11 of 31 passes in a performance that was hardly reminiscent of the MVP campaign he had enjoyed. Green Bay put the game out of reach with short second-half TD runs by Chuck Mercein and Williams again for a dominating 28-7 win, one that HC Vince Lombardi said was one of the most satisfying of his storied career.
If Rams-Packers was a bit of a letdown, the following day's Browns-Cowboys Eastern Conference showdown didn't even qualify as that much. Dallas jumped out quickly at the Cotton Bowl on Christmas Eve, with short TDs by RB Craig Baynham (on a 3-yard pass from QB Don Meredith) and Don Perkins staking the Cowboys to an early 14-0 lead in a game that would soon become a rout. The avalanche really commenced with Meredith's 86-yard TD bomb to "Bullet" Bob Hayes in the 2nd Q that boosted Tom Landry's team to an insurmountable 21-0 edge. Cleveland could simply not keep pace in an eventual 52-14 Dallas romp, and the "new era" of Rozelle's expanded playoffs had begun, however one-sided the results had been.
(Browns fans, however, had the last laugh on Dallas before the merger, comfortably winning rematches in the next two Eastern title games in '68 and '69, the latter a lopsided 38-14 blowout in a return to the Cotton Bowl).
Not all division-round playoff games, however, have been wipeouts through the years. Indeed, some of the all-time pro football classics have been division-round battles, including what still stands as the NFL's longest-ever game in 1971, the classic back-and-forth on Christmas Day between the Chiefs and Dolphins that Miami finally won, 27-24. It would also be hard to top the dramatics in 1972, when Franco Harris' 60-yard "Immaculate Reception" TD in the final seconds gave the Steelers an improbable 13-7 win over the Raiders. A little-known sidebar to the "Immaculate Reception" was that it preceded the first-ever "booth review," sort of, as referees got on the phone to call league officials in the press box to make sure they correctly saw and interpreted Harris' miracle catch, which some Raider fans (plus coach John Madde and owner Al Davis) to this day believe should have been ruled incomplete if Terry Bradshaw's pass had indeed bounced off RB Frenchy Fuqua (which in those days would have made Harris' subsequent catch an illegal touch) and not off DB Jack Tatum. In 1981, Miami was involved in another OT classic, this time falling short to San Diego in a 41-38 thriller marked by the heroics of Charger TE Kellen Winslow in what is still what we believe might have been the best-ever pro playoff game.
Still, the lopsided "epidemic" has been recurring throughout the years, and it resurfaced last season when three of the four division-round games were one-sided affairs. That was particularly true in the NFC, where the Saints blasted the Cardinals 45-14 and the Vikings pounded the Cowboys, 34-3. Interestingly, none of those four NFC semi-finalists made it back as far this season. Indeed, more than half of the division-round games (72 of 140) since 1975 have been decided by more than 10 points.
Last year's success by three of the four home favorites in the division round also reversed a recent pattern that had seen road underdogs cover 10 of 12 games between 2006-08. For most of their history, Division Round games have been the territory of home teams and favorites (almost always one and the same), but that dominance is not as pronounced as it once was. Even with last year's subpar flameout by the road dogs, they've still held a 17-11 spread advantage over the home chalk in division-round games since 2003.
There are some dynamics worth mentioning that are unique to this round. Since 1990, when the playoffs were expanded from 10 teams to 12, all Division Round hosts have been off a "bye" and a week of rest. And almost all of the "powerhouse" NFL teams in recent memory are from that first-round "bye" group, including 51 of the last 64 Super Bowl participants since '78 (when the first-round "bye" was introduced). At least one top seed, however, had met defeat division-round action in the four seasons prior to a year ago, when the Saints and Colts both prevailed. The Falcons and Patriots are thus forewarned. But, recalling the often-lopsided nature of these games, don't be surprised by an absence of drama this weekend, either.
Whatever. Following are the point-spread results in various spread categories of NFL Division Round playoff games since 1975. Our "charting" begins with the '75 season because, prior to then, playoff home teams were predetermined in a divisional rotation, as opposed to the better won-loss record. A "margin of victory" chart for the games since 1975 is included as well.
CATEGORY... RESULT
Favorites vs. line...71-65-3 (1 pick)
Favorites straight up...97-42
Favored by 0-3 points...8-13-1
Favored by 3 1/2-6 1/2 points...25-22-1
Favored by 7-9 1/2 points...26-18
Favored by 10-13 1/2 points...10-8
Favored by 14 points or more...3-3-1
Home teams straight up...99-41
Home teams vs. spread...73-64-3
Home favorites vs. spread...69-62-3
Home underdogs vs. spread...3-2
Home picks vs. spread...1-0
Over/under (since 1986)...49-47
MARGINS OF VICTORY
1-3 points...34
4-6 points...11
7-10 points... 23
11-13 points...10
14 points or more...62