Professional Football Researchers Association Forum

Inspired by the 74_75_78_79 thread about the 73 Broncos/Raiders season finale I wanted to try one about another final week AFCW showdown with big implications featuring Denver

The last regular season game of the 1970s on Monday Night Football (off the heels of a dramatic final Sunday with heroics in Chicago, Tampa Bay, and Dallas)

It was the 10-5 Broncos vs 11-4 Chargers

Like 1973, it was a de facto AFC West Championship Game. Unlike 1973, both teams had playoff spots locked up so it wasn’t win or go home.

A Denver win would have given them a sweep (DEN blanked the Bolts in October at Mile High), a division crown, and the 2 seed

The Broncos actually scored first, intercepted Dan Fouts 3 times, and it was a 14-7 game into the 4th quarter that SD didn’t salt away until a late FG

But Craig Morton was worse, with 4 interceptions.

If Denver won, it would have been Chargers/Oilers one round earlier…. at the Astrodome!

Unlike what happened in real life, HOU would have played the Bolts with Campbell/Pastorini/Burrough.

But remember the Chargers at Houston the previous year in a game that meant everything for HOU (win and they host MIA) and nothing for SD…. smoked Houston 45-24!

Unlike the 73 situation the playoff scenarios aren’t cut and dry (no all division divisional playoff games until 1990)

Let’s say Vernon Perry still plays hero and HOU wins one week early. PIT/MIA still happens but that would have meant Oilers/Broncos a week later….. at Mile High! (HOU won at Denver the next year but that would have been post Pastorini/Stabler trade)

If however the Chargers duplicate 78 and don’t take a healthy Houston team lightly……. that changes things

The AFC Divisional Playoffs would have been Miami at Denver and…… Chargers AT Steelers

PIT would have been geared up to avenge 35-7, especially at 3 Rivers. Miami/Denver would be tough to assess since they hadn’t played since 1975 and played only once over the next 2 decades (1985)

Do we get Denver at Pittsburgh (not only a 78 playoff rematch but remember the MNF shellacking PIT but on the Orange Crush? Miami at Pittsburgh a week later than real life? Maybe Chargers/Broncos III?

Maybe we still end up with HOU at PIT but the Chargers having to go the WC route with 0 home playoff games and DEN hosting a game would have been fascinating

But factor in this...details vary, but Denver picked up on Dan Fouts giving away plays. Denver and Houston play the next week, Houston wins.
Denver passes on the "tell" and Houston uses it...Perry didn't have to come up on run support ... could focus on coverage be cause he
know run or pass.

So, Denver wins...and then all the other stuff is different because maybe the scouting report does not get passed along.

Houston, though at full strength, does not have info to beat Chargers...

Another angle: What if the Raiders beat the Seahawks, and the Chargers still win?

The Raiders would have been 10-6, and they swept Denver that year, so they would have been in the WC game. Do we see one more Raider-Steeler playoff game in the 70's, or do the Oilers win?

7DnBrnc53 wrote:Another angle: What if the Raiders beat the Seahawks, and the Chargers still win?

The Raiders would have been 10-6, and they swept Denver that year, so they would have been in the WC game. Do we see one more Raider-Steeler playoff game in the 70's, or do the Oilers win?

An OAK win also changes the other game: MIA/SD with different rosters compared to a few years later (I don’t see pre-Killer B’s Miami intercepting Dan Fouts 5x)

A Raiders-Oilers matchup for the 1979 WC round would have been intriguing. The Raiders defense had an off year but Campbell would have been tired ... I think it would have been low-scoring because of an excellent Houston defense but the Snake would have prevailed. SD would have beaten them though and given the Steelers a helluva championship game ...

Losses to the Seahawks kept the Raiders out of the playoffs in 78-79