1980 vs. 2021 AFC comparison

[GameBeforeTheMoney]

I always thought the Oilers would have had a better chance had they kept the team intact and not traded Pastorini. Then they released Curley Culp during the season. I could be wrong but continuity and leadership are often overlooked elements.

[Brian wolf]

I see your point Game Before but I just believe that Phillips had seen enough of Pastorini and wanted Stabler to beat the Steelers. Snake had a terrible game against them the first meeting in 80 but beat them the second time in a crucial game with Campbell doing the heavy lifting. Despite a terrible year stats wise, Snake still led them to 11 victories with a tough schedule and Phillips had always admired his ability to beat his Oilers and Steelers from the past. Losing Bum was one of the worst decisions Adams ever made and he has made lots of them. The big question is, even if Bum had kept Pastorini, could he have stayed healthy ?

[7DnBrnc53]

I see your point Game Before but I just believe that Phillips had seen enough of Pastorini and wanted Stabler to beat the Steelers. Snake had a terrible game against them the first meeting in 80 but beat them the second time in a crucial game with Campbell doing the heavy lifting. Despite a terrible year stats wise, Snake still led them to 11 victories with a tough schedule and Phillips had always admired his ability to beat his Oilers and Steelers from the past. Losing Bum was one of the worst decisions Adams ever made and he has made lots of them. The big question is, even if Bum had kept Pastorini, could he have stayed healthy ?

Allegedly (this is what Bum said to Tom Danyluk in his book The Super 70's), Pastorini wanted out, and Bum accommodated him, sending him to the Raiders.

[GameBeforeTheMoney]

I see your point Game Before but I just believe that Phillips had seen enough of Pastorini and wanted Stabler to beat the Steelers. Snake had a terrible game against them the first meeting in 80 but beat them the second time in a crucial game with Campbell doing the heavy lifting. Despite a terrible year stats wise, Snake still led them to 11 victories with a tough schedule and Phillips had always admired his ability to beat his Oilers and Steelers from the past. Losing Bum was one of the worst decisions Adams ever made and he has made lots of them. The big question is, even if Bum had kept Pastorini, could he have stayed healthy ?

Allegedly (this is what Bum said to Tom Danyluk in his book The Super 70's), Pastorini wanted out, and Bum accommodated him, sending him to the Raiders.

You make a good point about Pastorini staying healthy -- that's always a variable. It would have been great to see a fully healthy 79 Championship with Burrough, Billy White Shoes, Campbell, and Pastorini all 100 percent for Houston and Jack Ham and Lynn Swann 100% for Pittsburgh. It still was a great game but in the end Houston having Renfro, Caster, and Guido Merkins as their receivers rather than a much stronger lineup of Burrrough, White Shoes, Renfro, Caster. Winston had a super game for Pittsburgh in Jack Ham's place and Swann still played great for Pittsburgh.

As for the trade, that's the surface of the story, yes. I never got to talk to Coach Phillips, but Dan has been very gracious in speaking with me about it extensively for both my documentary "We Were the Oilers: The Luv Ya Blue Era" and my book "Red, White, and Columbia Blue: Chasing the Dream with the 1979 Houston Oilers." He also wrote about it in his autobiography "Taking Flak" which is also a great read. Bum also wrote about it in his autobiography "Coach, Cowboy, Christian".

It's difficult to encapsulate everything in a post but basically, after the 78 Championship blowout, Pastorini felt terrible and thought he might have cost the team the game. He told Bum to trade him if he was holding the team back. Bum said that he certainly wasn't but to make a long story short, they made a deal that they'd talk about it again after 1979. The deal got brought up again at a bad time and both of them felt bad about the trade later. I got the feeling that neither of them really wanted it to happen and things just fell they way they did. Dan went to Oakland, suffered a broken leg, and that was basically the end of his career (although he did sign with the Rams and Eagles later).

The writers in Houston still call the day that Bum was fired "The New Year's Eve Massacre". A 1980 with Bum and his staff with Pastorini and the core of that team -- that perhaps -- and I say perhaps -- I wonder if that perhaps could have been Houston's biggest window. Houston OC King Hill had tailored the offense to give Pastorini the ability to call plays at the LOS starting in 78 and that's when you saw Pastorini's best two years. Stabler was not the vintage Ken Stabler of his prime, but he was still good. I do think that leadership and especially continuous leadership often gets undervalued in evaluating pro football. The Oilers were Pastorini's team for a long time and the players certainly rallied around him. Not to say that Stabler wasn't a good leader, but when you play with a person for several years and then you have someone else at the helm, it's a bigger change than I think people tend to realize. There's that unspoken bond, trust, and knowing what everyone's going to do through a history of winning battles together.

[Bryan]

I see your point Game Before but I just believe that Phillips had seen enough of Pastorini and wanted Stabler to beat the Steelers. Snake had a terrible game against them the first meeting in 80 but beat them the second time in a crucial game with Campbell doing the heavy lifting.

That second game saw Snake "lead" the Oilers to six whole points. Stabler was a terrible fit for the Oilers. He couldn't throw deep, he was prone to turnovers, and he was completely immobile. The Raiders ate him alive in the 1980 wildcard game. By 1981, Stabler couldn't even throw short anymore. The Oilers would have been better off keeping Pastorini and rolling the dice, but I guess in hindsight no one figured the Steelers would be so mediocre in 1980. A trade that was even worse was Kenny King for Jack Tatum. King gave the Raiders an outside running threat, while Tatum basically took up a roster spot with Houston.

[Brian wolf]

The Steelers had a tough schedule in 1980 but what hurt them was losing two games to a bad Bengals team. Had they beaten the Oilers in that second game, they might have had more intensity for SD in the final game with a chance for the playoffs. I felt at the time they were just tired from all the postseason success of the past two seasons but 1980 was a year where their turnovers in games finally hurt them.

[Gary Najman]

I see your point Game Before but I just believe that Phillips had seen enough of Pastorini and wanted Stabler to beat the Steelers. Snake had a terrible game against them the first meeting in 80 but beat them the second time in a crucial game with Campbell doing the heavy lifting.

A trade that was even worse was Kenny King for Jack Tatum. King gave the Raiders an outside running threat, while Tatum basically took up a roster spot with Houston.

Tatum picked up 7 passes, good for 5th place in the NFL in 1980. King was expendable with Campbell and Carpenter healthy. However, he proved the POilers wrong.

[Brian wolf]

Though King was an outside threat and had that great play in the SB, he was basically a role player. It was nice to see Bob Chandler get that ring with the Raiders. He was a clone of Biletnikoff but a little faster ... Everyone has speculated whether Stabler could have won the SB like Plunkett had he stayed but having Chandler, along with a better defense than 79 would have helped his cause.

[7DnBrnc53]

Though King was an outside threat and had that great play in the SB, he was basically a role player. It was nice to see Bob Chandler get that ring with the Raiders. He was a clone of Biletnikoff but a little faster ... Everyone has speculated whether Stabler could have won the SB like Plunkett had he stayed but having Chandler, along with a better defense than 79 would have helped his cause.

I don't think the Raiders win in 80 with Stabler. He was on the down side of his career. I don't know how the 83 Saints were in contention with him. Bum Phillips had bad taste in QB's in NO. He wasted an 82 first-rounder (in the 81 Supplemental draft) on Dave Wilson, he brought a declining Stabler in (and made him the starter), and he traded for Richard Todd in 1984.

[74_75_78_79_]

We may as well revive the 1980 regular season Power Rankings thread that I proudly started years back, lol!

And as I opined on that very thread through my own rankings, Buffalo, the Chargers, and Oakland looked to be the stronger AFC playoff representatives going into the playoffs. Browns & Oilers were better than the Steelers in ’80 anyway, but what really helped them to those 11-5 records instead of 9-7 was not having to play those very three teams mentioned last sentence whereas Steelers had to play them.

Other than the 9-7 Vikings, the only playoff teams Browns & Oilers played against in '80 were each other; both did play the 10-6 Pats though. Oilers beat both Pats & Vikes while Browns didn't which made me give 'Luv Ya' the nod over 'Cardiac' in those very rankings.

Houston was a step down in 1980 if however slightly. I agree they would have been better with Pastorini at QB if only by a little, and if only for continuity reasons. And Browns were so "cardiac" living and dying by the big play. Does Pastorini guide Raiders to a Lombardi as well in '80 is, indeed, a good hypothetical.

A Merry Christmas to all of you in here!

Yes, maybe all AFC playoff teams in '21 will finish at 11-5 (I mean 11-6) as three teams in the NFC tie at 12-4 (I mean 12-5).