The NFL prides
itself on the supposed parity of play in its league. They constantly reinforce
the narrative that on any given Sunday any NFL team can beat another NFL team.
Every year is a new year and your favorite team has a shot at winning the Super
Bowl. Sports commentators eat this up and spew it right back out. They
constantly parrot the NFL's lines about parity. As I have written before all
this talk is just marketing hogwash when it comes to the bottom of the league, but it also applies to the top tier teams. The NFL is no more a of level playing
field than any other major American sport. By winning Super Bowl LI the New
England Patriots exposed the myth of NFL parity for all to see.
In the 16 years
since they beat the St. Louis Rams in Super Bowl XXXVI the Patriots been to 6
another Super Bowls and won another 4. That is just Super Bowls. If we look at
just the playoffs the Patriots have been dominate as well. They have made the
playoffs 14 out of 16 seasons. One of the seasons they missed was 2008 when
they won 11 games, but lost out on tie breakers to the Dolphins and Ravens.
Basically the Patriots have dominated the NFL for 16 years and made a mockery
of the concept of parity.
It is time to stop
repeating the same banal sound bites about the league being one of equivalent
talent where any team could win. It is time to admit that the NFL is as
lopsided and dominated by super teams, like the Patriots, as every other league.
It is time to find a new and original way to describe the power distribution of
NFL's teams.
What is the drop-off in dominance between the Patriots and the next best team in the same time span as the Tom Brady & Bill Belichik duo? Whatever your pick would be my guess is that it's a sharp drop off. So the Patriots are really an outlier and don't disprove the idea that the NFL is still an overall parity driven league to the median team.
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