I don't think any of the teams that played in the conference championship games -- and that includes the undefeated Patriots -- would have been any better than 9-7 in the pre-salary cap days.
You’re always harping on that 9-7 thing and really it’s to your detriment. you always lose sight of the fact that most of the teams in the pre-cap era actually sucked eggs. Everybody thinks about the mighty days of the Niners and the Cowboys and the Giants and the Skins and talks about how great the games were. Everybody forgets about the Bay of Pigs games, the general suckiness of the entire AFC, the NFC Central, and most of the NFC west. Sure when the GOOD teams played each other there was some great football, but there were never more than 3 or 4 of them throughout the 80s. Power flocked to the big market teams with the fat cash.
Frankly all 4 of these teams could have won the AFC in the time of NFC dominance, where of course they’d have gotten their asses handed to them in the SB just like all the other AFC teams. But they would have done better than 9-7. And you missed some of the BEST playoff football that’s been played. It’s sad that you’re not a fan anymore, but that’s really your fault, not the league’s. The game is better now than it was back then, the more good teams, there are more contested games, there are no more boring assed super teams whopping the crap out of the league.
Spoken like a true L O S E R ! 9-7??? You are an I D I O T too!
“I don’t think any of the teams that played in the conference championship games — and that includes the undefeated Patriots — would have been any better than 9-7 in the pre-salary cap days.”
There was a lot of boring football in the pre salary-cap days. Unless you were watching a team that could afford to stack their rosters with big-name players, the games could get awfully boring. I remember snoozing through a lot of 17-13 Tampa Bay/New England games (when Tampa Bay and NE were awful) during the 1970s. It was like watching two teams both trying equally as hard not to win.