By Julie Buehler
The word “parity” is flung around the NFL like crab legs at the Florida State football banquet.
Thing is: it’s not accurate.
Everyone claims that the NFL loves parity and apparently that’s evidenced in the fact that every year since 1990- the year the 12-team playoff seeding system was adopted- at least 4 teams have made the playoffs that missed it the year before.
This year, 5 teams made it into the tournament that missed out last year.
But 2 of the 5 teams that did that were 6 seeds, the Lions and Ravens. And the Ravens only got in because the Chargers gakked away an opportunity to earn a playoff bid with a regular-season finale win over the Chiefs. I know, you’re shocked. Putting the Chargers in a must-win situation is like watching The Bachelor: your faith in humanity is inevitably numbed.
How bout Arizona? Well, the Cardinals made it in this year with 11 wins when they missed out last year with 10 wins. So it was hardly a bad team flipping the script on the NFL, if anything, THIS season’s Cardinals team deserves a lot more credit than last year’s team for notching 11 wins with 4 different quarterbacks taking snaps over the season.
The other two teams that made the playoffs this year that missed it last year, both won their divisions: Dallas and Pittsburgh. And those two teams have more post seasons wins than any other franchise in the NFL. In fact with the Cowboys advancing to the divisional round and the Steelers losing at the hands of the Baltimore Ravens, the Cowboys are in sole possession of that category. Hardly fresh faces to the playoff race.
And of the 142 teams since 1990 that made that turn around to help the NFL believe that parity rules the league, want to know how many actually advanced all the way to play for a world championship: 13. Or 9%.
So congrats all those who claim the NFL is full of parity! You’re staking that claim on the idea that teams get to the playoffs and are given a chance to do something spectacular and since playoffs were expanded, thus allowing more average teams into the chase, only 9% have even advanced to the Super Bowl, only 3.5% won the Super Bowl.
Yup, only 5 of those 142 teams won the Super Bowl the year after missing the playoffs: The ’00 Ravens, ’01 Patriots, ’03 Patriots, ’09 Saints and ’11 Giants.
Parity?
Yeah right.
Truth is the NFL would shutter if the Super Bowl pitted the Detroit Lions against the Cincinnati Bengals. Good news for them though, the Bengals can’t seem to put together a competent postseason game plan and the league officiating has been far more disappointing than any of Detroit’s financial woes.
“But wait Jules!” You’re saying, “We see parity in the fact that the Seahawks won their first Super Bowl last year and the year before that the Ravens took it home for only the second time and the year before that the Giants were one of those teams that won it all after missing the playoffs! Parity is alive and well! ”
First of all, that’s cute that you’d lodge such a lengthy and well-structured argument. But here’s reality hotshot.
Six of the playoff teams this year have won at least 1 Super Bowl since the turn of the century and combined, they’ve won 10 of the past 13!
Let me say that again in hopes it will burst that little parity bubble floating in the sky… 6 of the teams that made the playoffs, or 19% of the league, have combined to win 10 of the past 13 world championships, or 77% of the titles.
That’d only be considered ‘parity’ in the Obama administration.
The top 5th of the league controls 3/4th of the success.
The AFC was basically a 3-team race until 2012 when Joe Flacco and company cracked the code, won in Denver, won in Foxboro and became the first team and only team since 2002 not hailing from New England, Pittsburgh or quarterbacked by Peyton Manning to represent the AFC in a Super Bowl.
The NFL will look to expand playoffs in the next year and potentially offer a 7th seed the chance to upset a 2-seed in hopes that more people will chirp “parity” when such an occasion arrives.
But don’t get swept up in an anomaly or an upset-special of the season, take a step back and realize that at the end of the day, the NFL is still dominated by a few key teams and that’s actually the way the league likes it.
Julie Buehler hosts the Coachella Valley’s most popular sports talk radio show, “Buehler’s Day Off” every day from 3-6 on 1010 KXPS, the valley’s all sports station. She can also be seen every morning between 6-7am on KMIR sharing the coolest stories in sports. She’s an avid gym rat, slightly sarcastic and more likely to recite Steve Young’s career passing stats than American Idol winners. Tune in M-F 3-6 pst at www.team1010.com or watch “Buehler’s Day Off” on Ustream and KMIR.com for her sports reports.
