1972 Miami Dolphins: No Longer the Symbol of Perfection

Ah, the final unbeaten team in the league—the Kansas City Chiefs—just lost their first game prompting Chris Berman and ESPN to show footage of Don Shula and the 1972 Dolphins while playing a “cork-popping” sound to indicate that members of the team are celebrating being the last team to go undefeated throughout a season AND postseason.

Really?  They still “pop the champagne?”  Are the 1972 Dolphins really that obtuse that they still need the self-congratulatory praise of an obsolete accomplishment? 

Yes, they own the record for one stretch of consecutive games won in one season that remains unsurpassed—unless you include that streak that did surpass it.

Talk to anyone who’s paying attention and there’s really no more talk about the record of the Miami Dolphins 1972 “perfect” season (you have to put “perfect” in quotes because an asterisk is too discriminatory.  And their accomplishment still deserves praise, just with a dose of clarification).

For, you see, their fabric of greatness, of invincibility, has a tear in it.  Records were made to be broken and the etiquette of such a process features the “passing of the torch,” so to speak from the holder to the breaker.  Like when Roger Maris’ family was on hand as Mark McGwire was about to break their patriarch’s record (boy, I bet they wish they had that weekend back).  This is common practice.

But if the 1972 Dolphins still think they’re alone in their accomplishments, those that were once equated with the gold standard of excellence and perfection, they are now simply synonymous with spiteful men uncomplimentary of the talented young upstarts moving into their metaphorical neighborhood, desperately trying to cling to glory, reluctant to acknowledge they’ve become obsolete. 

Like the father who is reduced to cheating in an effort to continue beating his son in chess once the boy learns the deadly art of en passant. 

Yes, what the Dolphins did was impressive.  And for many years, it stood untouched.  Every year, they would toast themselves when the last undefeated team suffered a loss. 

For those of you unfamiliar with their achievements—and that may very well be anyone under 40—they won seventeen games in a row, in one season, without a loss.  Seventeen games!  Fourteen regular season games and three in the playoffs.  That’s pretty impressive.  At least, it was before the Patriots did it.  And that doesn’t include the Colts winning more games in a row over two seasons than the Dolphins or the Patriots have done. 

But the goal posts have been moved.  The NFL season was shorter then than it is now.  And yet, we continue to hear the media make mention of this team that has done what no other team has done, except that what these other teams have done is, in fact, more impressive than what the Dolphins have done.   

It’s the equivalent of Paul Hines, who was baseball’s first Triple Crown winner, snubbing Ted Williams because Teddy Ballgame didn’t win the award during the Dead Ball Era.  Hines was dominant in 1878, smashing four home runs—Yes, FOUR!—and a whopping 50 RBIs, while batting .358.  Now that’s a Triple Crown winner!

And, of course, the 2007 New England Patriots most famously won 16 games in a season, then continued to win another two before finally meeting the loss column.  Eighteen games in a row!  That's one more than the Dolphins, mind you.   

Yet instead of talking about the Pats not winning their nineteenth game, we should be wondering if the Dolphins could win eighteen or nineteen.  We’ll never know because outside of former Fins running back Mercury Morris’ mouth, they don’t have the speed to keep up with this decade's Colts. 

Yes, in 1972, they won 17 in a row.  And that 17th game was the Super Bowl.  The Patriots also, in 2007, won their 17th game in a row.  It just wasn’t the Super Bowl.  And they continued to win—17, 18.  It wasn’t until number 19 that they lost.  And that’s less impressive than the Dolphins?! 

The argument here, by the few supporters of the Dolphins' fading cause, is that the Pats didn’t win the Super Bowl that year.  It’s a matter of semantics. 

And if that's their point, then I present to you the 1985 Bears who won more games overall and demolished anyone in their path, save for the Dolphins in Week 12.

Similarly, the previous year's Niners in 1984 lost only in Week 7.  Both of them went on to win the Super Bowl with eighteen total wins, one more than the Dolphins.  They were not perfect, but they won more games than did Miami. 

The Pats don’t have a ring from their perfect regular season campaign, but they have three others from less “successful” runs.  

I don’t know about you, but I’d rather have eighteen than seventeen. 

The 1929 Green Bay Packers went 12-0-1 during their season.  How come no one talks about their perfection?  Because their season was...hmm, could it be because it was shorter than future seasons?

The 1972 Dolphins at one point showed dignity and class, as any Don Shula coached team would.  They were revered by the media who relished the opportunity to look to them when speaking of perfection.  But now they’ve become an inside joke, the punch line on many a media outlet.  “We’re going to talk to the ’72 Dolphins, who hold the fifth longest streak in the NFL for consecutive games won, about what it’s like to be dominant.” 

Could the Dolphins have won an eighteenth and nineteenth game?  Well, as we’ve seen, it’s pretty tough to do, so conventional wisdom would suggest no, but it’s entirely speculative. 

And the Colts took their foot off the gas pedal last season to save up for the playoff push—would they be labeled worse than the Dolphins after winning more regular season games in a row than any other team ever and just as many games as the Dolphins did in 1972?

I am undefeated in my fantasy football career.  A 1.000 winning percentage.  Sure, I’ve played only once, but I’m not bragging about it every minute...except for here.

It’s time to move on.  The Dolphins didn’t lose a game during their seventeen game season.  Nor did the Patriots.  Another team may do it as well (though by then, there may be 18 games in a regular season).  And the Bears and Niners won more games total than the Dolphins. 

Does Mercury Morris still want to toast his standing as the fifth-best team of all-time?  What’s the drink of choice there?  Seagram’s wine cooler?  How about a bottle of Charles Shaw wine, a.k.a. “Two Buck Chuck?”  Or just swig a bottle of tequila to make the hurt go away.  You’ve been surpassed. 

Be gracious and quit bogarting the torch.  Pass the dutchie.  The wonder ball goes round and round—It’s time to acknowledge there’s a new gold standard in the league, and it ain’t the gold of the Broncos throwback uniforms.  Yeech!