Credit: Mark J. Rebilas-USA TODAY Sports
Defense won this year’s championship, but is this a new trend, old trend, or an NFL anomaly? Sports debate hits the offseason as Dan Salem and Todd Salem tackle this topic and more in part two of this week’s TD Sports Debate. Two brothers from New York yell, scream and debate the NFL and sports.
DAN:
I think you’re missing the big NFL picture here. What the Seattle Seahawks and their Legion of Boom simply did was remind us that defense wins championships. I know that slogan usually applies to basketball, but it’s just as good for the NFL. You noted that defense isn’t quote totally forgotten thanks to the Seahawks. Name me one Super Bowl winning team in the last five years that did not have a great defense or defensive playmaker headlining the squad. The Baltimore Ravens last year are known for defense; the New York Giants before them stopped Tom Brady in his tracks on the back of their defense; the Green Bay Packers before them had big time defensive stars including AJ Hawk; and the New Orleans Saints before them were led by the infamous Greg Williams. I realize the NFL markets its offense and has skewed the game in its favor, but defense has won championships for quite some time.
I’d also like to point out that although Seattle was in fact dominant all year, they were also hot in December and January. Not only did they keep winning, they won in spite of an offense that seemed to shut down. If that’s not hot and lucky, I don’t know what is.
All of this makes me very happy as a New York Jets fan. They went to back to back AFC title games with dominating defensive units and a strong running game. They exceeded expectations this past season with a similar formula, lacking both the play making ability that the Seahawks have at the quarterback position and at wide receiver. But the future looks mighty bright. As a former defensive player myself, I love how it’s stealing the spotlight back a little bit.
TODD:
AJ Hawk and his family would be honored to hear you consider him a defensive star. Are you even sure if he’s still in the league? Seriously, if I made you pick one or the other, that he definitely IS or definitely IS NOT in the league still, would you feel at all confident with either selection?
Considering the Saints a great defense is laughable. The fact that Greg Williams became infamous doesn’t mean he was famous at the time. Before that, in Peyton Manning’s only Super Bowl win, the offensive Colts took down the defensive juggernaut Chicago Bears. This league is going in the direction of offense whether you want to admit it or not. A win for Seattle this year was just putting that off for the time being.
The more important point though, and the one you callously glossed over with an absurd implication, was that a hot team won the title again. This has been the NFL’s problem for a while now. Teams who are mediocre at best start playing exceptionally well heading through December and January. Sneaking into the playoffs and wreaking havoc used to be just a Major League Baseball problem until this decade.
But Seattle stunted that too. Considering them a hot and lucky team is silly. They played a brutal schedule first of all. They also lost two of their final four regular season games, including their worst game of the year, a home loss to Arizona. Rather than feeling confident heading into the postseason, fans were questioning whether the Seahawks playing at home was as big of a deal as everyone was making it out to be. Not to mention the fact that the offense had been sputtering for a few weeks and continued to up through the playoff rounds.
The 2013 Seattle Seahawks were a throwback champion through and through.