I'll admit, doing a ten-part breakdown of the top-10 NFL teams of a Decade is ridiculous, considering only teams that won Super Bowls qualify. So, rankings 10 teams 1-10 is stupid. To abet this oversight, I'm doing a top-5, and here is a quick glance at the teams 10-6 that didn't make the final cut.
10.) 2001 New England Patriots (14-5) - Considering they lost the Divisional Game in a Foxboro-blizzard to a team from California (see what I did there), and then got outgained in both of the following playoff games, I'm ready to say that they were a fluke. The next two Patriots teams were legitimately worthy of winning the Super Bolw. The '01 bunch.... not so much.
9.) 2007 New York Giants (14-6) - Fun team, great upset, "road warriors". They are probably going to be the most mythologized team of the decade, if not the most memorable. But they weren't all that good. They barely outscored their opponents for the entire regular season, and won three close games against. Good team, not a great one, and in a list of all-Super Bowl winners, that matters.
8.) 2005 Pittsburgh Steelers (15-5) - Considering the refs won them that Super Bowl, and Ben Roethlisberger's tackle won them the Indy game, and Kimo von Olhoffen cheaply tearing Carson Palmer's knee (and kill Palmer's career) won them the Cincy game, you could make a case that they could have easily lost three of their four playoff games. So, what gives them a spot above those other two? Why, the fact that they were really good in the regular season (10-3 with Roethlisberger starting), and did play well in those playoff games.
7.) 2003 New England Patriots (17-2) - The WORST 17-2 Champion ever. The other teams to reach that hallowed record, the '84 49ers, '85 Bears, '86 Giants, '89 49ers, '91 Redskins, '04 Pats were all so much better. They won two of their postseason games by three (against a 12-4 Titans and 11-5 Panthers team), and the other where they kicked five goals (never a good thing). They also won tons of seriously close regular season games. Not nearly as good as their '04 version.
6.) 2008 Pittsburgh Steelers (15-4) - They would be higher if they didn't almost choke away that Super Bowl, and have one of the easier runs ever (playing two sub-10 win teams in the playoffs, and a sixth seed). They were a great defense, but in a decade with two other all-time defenses, that's not enough. They were essentially a slightly better, slightly less lucky and resourceful version of the team right above them.
AND NOW, THE DECADIUM STARTS!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
