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January 25, 2004
NFL Pattern: Teams rotate to Super Bowl
By Lenox Rawlings | JOURNAL REPORTER
Howard Dean is going to South Carolina kicking and screaming, or so we heard. The Carolina Panthers are going to Houston's Reliant Stadium kicking and running.
News travels fast in the global village. So do Super Bowl commercials, their creative images propelled by a CBS price tag of $2.3 million per 30 seconds. At those rates, Jim Nantz could even afford to buy an original idea. Scratch that. Putting a Martian on the moon by 2005 sounds more plausible.
Without the ads, America would sink into football poverty. The game might last less than three hours. Commercials junkies might retreat to the kitchen, reducing the U.S. audience from 88 million to 80 million. Where have all the heroes gone? Back to Homer Simpson, every one.
Not all hypothetical questions require contemplation. The commercials aren't going away, nor is the audience, unless an unlikely blowout develops. Carolina's preserve-protect-contain philosophy keeps games close, even when they aren't.
The Panthers won eight times on their final possession. They marched down the field behind a crunching line, with quarterback Jake Delhomme and runner Stephen Davis and Mach-2 receiver Steve Smith either producing touchdowns or setting up John Kasay for left-footed field goals. Kasay has been around so long, he remembers playing home games at Clemson. Kasay has been around so long, he remembers when Clemson was a football school.
And if you stick around the NFL that long, the weather will change and change back again. NFL folks expect their number to come up at least every fourth football season. The rules almost dictate it, with a salary cap and free agency and college drafts titled toward thin rosters. If all else fails, injuries and scouting reports and arrest reports will churn the personnel vat anyway.
The pattern slaps you in the face. Just look at the past three Super Bowl champions: Baltimore Ravens, New England Patriots, Tampa Bay Buccaneers. The roll call hardly conjures up dynastic auras on par with the Green Bay Packers of Lambeau Field (frozen, not stirred).
The Ravens migrated from Cleveland in 1996 and failed to post a winning record until 2000. The Bucs fired their coach, Tony Dungy, mere months before new hire Jon Gruden won the Super Bowl over the Oakland team he fled.
People now talk about the Patriots as a budding dynasty. The talk arrives with the unspoken assumption that New England will smash the flash-in-the-pan Carolina intruders. Maybe. New England has won 14 straight games in the tougher AFC, the longest streak since Miami went undefeated six presidents ago. But any classic definition of a dynasty doesn't end with two championships sandwiched around a non-playoff interlude.
Carolina shares historic commonality with New England. The Patriots lost 15 games in 1990, the last 14 in a row. The Panthers beat the record, in a sick way, winning the opener in 2001 and then losing 15 straight. They weren't as bad as the record suggests. They were at least a four-win team, on paper.
The proximity of the ignominious episode prompts outsiders to finger the Panthers as lucky overnighters. Coach John Fox refrains from taking credit for bringing the miracle in on schedule and under budget just two years after leaving the New York Giants' staff.
"We were 31st in a 31-team league on both sides of the ball," Fox said. "Obviously, we had a lot of work to do. But I don't believe anybody is 1 and 15." He laughed. "I know that was their record. You can't take it away."
Nor can you take away impressions that Carolina doesn't deserve this trip. That slam is an odd sentiment, given the parallels. The Patriots never would have escaped the first round of their 2001 Super Bowl tournament without a bad call on quarterback Tom Brady's fumbled throw. Brady and Delhomme share another story line: the rapid rise of the previously anonymous quarterback.
The teams that reach the Super Bowl deserve it, regardless of circumstances. The same holds true for the Florida Marlins (twice), N.C. State's 1983 NCAA basketball kings, Ohio State's 2002 football bosses and Ben Curtis, champion of the world's oldest major golf tournament.
Other myths permeate the Super Bowl buildup, including the Eternal Football Myth that running teams keen on defense are automatically boring. Running and defense aren't boring, particularly if you appreciate what 11 guys must do to develop a rushing attack or pressure a quarterback. Losing is boring. Losing 15 straight is really boring.
After the Super Bowl ends, only one team will hold the trophy and only one team will hold a one-game losing streak. The oddsmakers, who want even betting on both sides of the number, favor New England by about a touchdown. Celebrity watchers favor Brady, the telegenic passer who attended the State of the Union speech as a Bush-league guest.
If you mention the State of the Union around Charlotte, older locals figure you're talking about Union County and the endless debate over whether Andrew Jackson was born in North Carolina or South Carolina.
If the Patriots fulfill expectations and win again, Brady presumably will announce, in full uniform: "I'm going to Disney World."
Big deal. The Panthers can go to Carowinds any old time, win or lose. They might even see Howard Dean there.
• Lenox Rawlings can be reached at lrawlings@wsjournal.com