Cheesehead
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- Mar 19, 2019
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More than most losing teams, the 1960s Dallas Cowboys got a lot of mileage out of their two down-to-the-wire defeats against the Green Bay Packers in back-to-back NFL championship games.
In 1966, they lost, 34-27, when linebacker Dave Robinson collared Cowboys quarterback Don Meredith on a fourth-and-goal rollout from the 2-yard line and forced an interception with 28 seconds remaining. A year later, in what's now remembered as the Ice Bowl, Bart Starr engineered a 12-play, 68-yard drive in a minus-46 wind chill that gave the Packers a 21-17 victory.
But the fact of the matter is the Eastern Conference (in which Dallas played) was vastly inferior to the Western Conference (in which Green Bay played) during Vince Lombardi's nine years as coach of the Packers. What's more, it also was inferior before and after his time in Green Bay.
From 1957 through 1969, a span of 13 seasons, a team from the West won 11 NFL titles. The only exceptions were Philadelphia, which beat Lombardi's Packers in 1960; and Cleveland, which upset Baltimore in 1964.
Until the Cowboys emerged as a contender in 1966, two franchises dominated the East. From 1950-65, the Browns and New York Giants won 15 of 16 Eastern Conference titles. The other teams, the Eagles included, were mostly patsies compared to their opponents in the West. Over the 20 seasons from 1950-'69, the Eagles compiled a winning record only seven times; the Chicago/St. Louis Cardinals, six times; Pittsburgh, four times; and Washington, three times, including Lombardi's 7-5-2 record in 1969.
As for the Packers, in the context of that period, Lombardi's five NFL titles and nine winning records in nine years were an aberration. In the 11 years before he was hired, they never finished above .500. In the 24 seasons after he stepped down as coach, they had five winning seasons.
But in the 1950s and '60s, the rest of the teams in the West were consistent winners for the most part.
The Lions won three NFL titles and, under coaches Buddy Parker and George Wilson, finished with a winning record in 10 of 14 seasons from 1951-64. The Bears won a championship in 1963 and under George Halas – also Paddy Driscoll in 1956-57 –finished with a winning record 12 times in 18 years until he retired for good as coach after the 1967 season. The Baltimore Colts won three championships under Weeb Ewbank and Don Shula. Ewbank inherited a second-year expansion team in 1954, but won back-to-back titles in his fifth and sixth seasons; whereas Shula never had a losing record from 1963-69. Together, Ewbank and Shula enjoyed 11 winning seasons over the 16 years one or the other served as head coach.
Even the Los Angeles Rams and San Francisco 49ers, the other two teams in the old six-team West, were rarely pushovers. The Rams had an abundance of talent and finished with a winning record seven times in the 1950s, including an NFL title in 1951, and then after a lean stretch in the early '60s rebounded to go 40-13-3 from 1966-69 under George Allen.
The 49ers never appeared in a title game – they lost a conference playoff to Detroit in 1957 – but still had 10 winning seasons over the two decades.
With that as backdrop, here's a "High Five" of the best teams that Lombardi's Packers faced in his nine seasons.
1. 1959 Baltimore Colts (9-3) – In the NFL championship, the Colts erupted for 24 points in the fourth quarter to beat the Giants, the best defensive team in the league in both points and yards allowed, 31-16. During the regular season, the Colts' three losses were by a combined 15 points. They won six of their 12 games by two touchdowns or more, including a 38-21 victory over Lombardi's first Green Bay team. In the second meeting, the Colts hung on for a 28-24 triumph, a vast improvement over the previous year's rematch, when Scooter McLean's Packers were humiliated 56-0. Fourth-year veteran Johnny Unitas, a legend in the making, threw what was a career-high and then NFL record 32 touchdown passes that season. Future Hall of Famer Raymond Berry led the league with 66 receptions and 14 TDs. Hybrid halfback-flanker Lenny Moore, another future Hall of Famer, combined for 1,268 rushing and receiving yards. There was no more dominant blocker in the league than left tackle Jim Parker, yet another future Hall of Famer. And the defensive line included two more Hall of Famers to be, end Gino Marchetti and tackle Art Donovan, along with tackle Big Daddy Lipscomb, a Pro Bowl starter that year.