The Patriots are Great. Just Not a Dynasty

The New England Patriots are being hailed as the greatest NFL dynasty of all time. We are being told that we are witnessing something that we have never seen before. Their proponents like to point out the Pats 5 titles in 18 seasons. (It could possible become six after Super Bowl 53). Still, 5 in 18 is pretty impressive. Until you consider history. If memory serves me correctly, the San Francisco 49ers won 5 titles in 14 seasons. And let’s totally ignore the fact that Vince Lombardi, Bart Starr and the Green Bay Packers won 5 titles in seven seasons. Let’s pretend like that never happened. Because what we are now witnessing is greater. Or so we are being told.

I wonder what noted Patriot lover Bill Simmons would say. Would he conjecture that the Packers back then were not as great as the Patriots of today? Of course he would. Notwithstanding that he would then have to dis-affirm the greatness of his beloved Boston Celtics of the 1960’s.

My contention is that the Patriots dynasty is simply a label to create a story lined and drive a narrative. It is a marketing tool to better promote and sell a product. There are three distinctions of multi title runs. There is:

• Great
• Dominant
• Dynasty

In prior posts I have talked about what it means to be a dynasty at length. No one has offered a counter argument. All they do is either say something really stupid or worse; they lower the standard of what it means to be a sports dynasty. We live in a day and age where we have no problem lowering the standard. When something is hard we simply move the goalposts. It would never occur to us to rise to the challenge and meet the standard. I guess it is hard.

#Superbowl53 #PatriotsNation