Surprisingly DISAPPOINTING teams

[Todd Pence]

1985 Seattle Seahawks
Following a breakout 1984 season in which Seattle won 12 games on the strengths of an opportunistic defense, which intercepted 38 passes and sacked opposing passers 55 times, Seattle seemed set for a Super Bowl run in 1985, which failed to materialize. Result was a mostly up and down campaign that resulted in a final 8-8 record. Interestingly, Seattle went the entire year winning two games followed by two subsequent defeats (wash, rinse, repeat). Back breakers were a pair of three point losses to the Broncos and a week 15 defeat to the Raiders with a post season birth on the line.

I think the 1987 edition of the Seahawks were just as much, if not more, of a disappointment. This was a team that was a popular favorite in all the preseason magazines as a Super Bowl pick following their strong finish at the end of '86. Plus, they had landed the rights to Brian Bosworth by lottery, and the Boz was seemingly the missing piece of the puzzle. Of course, Bosworth turned out to be a curse in disguise, and the media attention lavished on him created dissension on a defense which had already used two top picks on linebackers. And although Seattle fielded a decent strike team, the strike overall seemed to hurt the club. They never could get any consistently, looking every bit like the Super Bowl team they were supposed to be one week, and then playing lousy the next week. The Hawks, traditionally a strong Prime Time team, found themselves blown out in their two Monday Night Football encounters - to the Jets and then to the Raiders in Bo Jackson's infamous coming-out party - both embarrassing performances. In Week 15, they played brilliantly in beating the Broncos in a thriller, leaving them in seemingly good position to host a wild card game, only to lamely lay down in the season finale in KC. This meant they had to travel to Houston for the wild card game, where they again played poorly and were upset in overtime by the Oilers.

[74_75_78_79_]

1980 New Orleanes Saints after going 8-8-0 in 1979 they bounced back with a clunker of a season 1-15-0, bad defense and no rushing attack. Topped off with running up a 35-7 lead of the 49ers by halftime then blowing the lead and losing in overtime 38-35.

1977 St. Louis Cardinals coming off of 3 straight 10+ win seasons started off 7-3 then proceeded to lose the final 4 games of the season. One was getting throttled on Thanksgiving by the Dolphins 55-14 and in the final game losing to a one win Tampa Bay team. Some of this was attributed to Coryell's feud with Bidwell along with a bit of a drop off in offensive production along with a so so defense that normally plagued most of Coryell's teams over the years.

That loss in the final game was a clear indication that the team was in disarray. They had been eliminated the week before and some of the postgame furor from that game dealt with Coryell's family getting harassed in the stands and other chaos

Could the ’79 Cards be included in this? Bud Wilkinson now at helm, they start off 0-8 the year before only to end real well winning 6 of their last 8. Then in Week #3, ’79, they host Steelers while at 1-1; their loss being by 1-pt in the opener vs Dallas. Cards give Steelers a game, being up by more than a TD at one time. They end up losing and the rest of the season goes sour; concluding with Bidwell forcing Pisarkiewicz on Wilkinson hence ending his short run in StL.

Dick MacPherson’s time in NE is sort of similar, the ’91 campaign in-particular. They also finished 6-10 but with plenty of promise for the following season (a couple quality-wins, over Hou & Buf). But he was out after ’92 as well.

[Shipley]

1980 Redskins -- Came out of nowhere to go 10-6 in 1979 and barely missed making the playoffs due to an improbable turn of events (another interesting story). Unfortunately, thanks to the hangover from the devastating 35-34 loss to Dallas that cost them the 1979 NFC East crown and a playoff berth (great game even though we came up short thanks to an amazing Staubach comeback), combined with John Riggins' decision to take a one-year sabbatical, they dropped to 6-10 in 1980. One the plus side, they fired Jack Pardee at the end of the season and hired a guy named Joe Gibbs from the San Diego Chargers. The rest, as they say, is history.

[rhickok1109]

I guess my personal choice has to be the 1973 Packers. They had improved from 4-8-2 in 1971 to 10-4-0 and a playoff berth in 1972, so expectations for 1973 were pretty high. But they dropped right back down to 5-7-2 in 1973 and didn't make the playoffs again until 1982.

In a way, it wasn't that surprising, though. Scott Hunter, with his 43.2 completion percentage and 55.5 passer rating, was obviously not a QB who could take a team very far.

[slats7]

2008 and 2017 Cowboys. Both squads had HFA the previous year but failed to make the playoffs.