1975: Super Bowl IX

During yesterday 1975's Hudson Brothers Razzle Dazzle Show episode and/or last night's laughs on CBS would've been excellent times to play out Super Bowl IX, between the Pittsburgh Steelers and Minnesota Vikings, on NFL Strategy.


Maybe I'll still do that this weekend. In real NFL, meanwhile, Pittsburgh beats Minnesota, 16-6, on today 1975.

Though they often end up providing primarily other answers, NFL seasons typically start out with one or maybe two dominant questions: Will the AFL finally beat the NFL? Which of these first-round quarterbacks is going to pan out? Can the 49ers/Cowboys keep winning without Bill Walsh/Jimmy Johnson? Will Peyton Manning ever win one? Will Brett Favre come back? Are the Eagles a "dream team"?

In going back and reviewing the in-the-moment/we-don't-know-how-it's-going-to-end coverage of the day, NFL '74's dominant question seems to have been, Whose ship is going to finally come in? The Dolphins had just won two championships, but, with World Football League defections set to ravage that roster, there was a strong sense that a new somebody's day was about to dawn. Indeed, the Patriots (the Patriots?!?) upset Miami in Week 1, and it was the Cardinals (the Cardinals?!?) who raced out to the season's best start, 7-0.

In the NFC, the defending-champion Vikings started hot and got hot again at the end of the regular season. Los Angeles beat Minnesota in the regular season, but Chuck Knox attempted to keep the Rams challenging for a championship while simultaneously engineering a mid-season quarterback change.

Over the in the AFC, Pittsburgh's Chuck Noll ordered three such QB changes--from Joe Gilliam to Terry Bradshaw, from Bradshaw to Terry Hanratty and from Hanratty back to Bradshaw. As late as Week 12, Pittsburgh lost, 13-10, to the Houston Oilers, and ongoing offensive struggles and Joe Greene's "mind snap" threatened to short-circuit Noll's six-year, brick-by-brick construction project.


But, of course, the Steelers got it together. In the regular season, they held off the Bengals, Paul Brown's expertly devised expansion marvel, which one year before had won the division in just its sixth season of existence. In the opening round of the playoffs, they held 1974 Street and Smith's cover boy O.J. Simpson to 49 rushing yards in his postseason debut and stunted Lou Saban's rising Bills. In winning the AFC championship, 24-13, they rallied from seven behind at the opening of the fourth quarter to stun John Madden's home-standing Oakland Raiders, the team that had appeared most likely to become the league's next dynasty (the January 1975 Football Digest, which would've had to go to press before the Dec. 29, 1974, game asked on its cover, "WILL KEN STABLER AND OAKLAND WIN IT ALL?")

Finally, the Steelers simply befuddled the Vikings, runners-up in Super Bowls IV and VIII. It was the first time that the participant with less Super Bowl experience won.

While the Steelers targeted Jackie Wallace, the rookie Minnesota cornerback actually came through with what John Facenda described as the "finest game of his brief career." Instead, it was a 12th-year, record-breaking kicker (Fred Cox) who missed his only field-goal attempt early (and only extra-point try late). When the Vikings botched a running play near their own end zone, leading to a safety for a 2-0 Steelers halftime lead, the Minnesota players who touched the football on the play were a 13th-year center (Mick Tinglehoff), 14th-year quarterback (Fran Tarkenton) and 10th-year fullback (Dave Osborn). And when Roy Gerela mistakenly squibbed the second-half-opening kickoff, it was a 15th-year Viking (Bill Brown) who mishandled the ball, leading to Pittsburgh's recovery and first touchdown. I mean no disrespect to Mr. Cox, Mr. Tinglehoff, Mr. Tarkenton, Mr. Osborn or Mr. Brown 36 years later; as a 43-year-old who gets more nervous than he used to about putting his byline on stories, driving over bridges and taking his wife out on dates, I totally relate to the growing sense of pressure in middle age.


Moreover, the main story of NFL '74 turned out to be that the Steelers were really talented, really well-constructed and really young. And while other, seemingly more likely heirs to the NFL throne played as though they were trying to not let fleeting opportunities slip through their grasps, Noll's Steelers suddenly grew up and seized the greatness that their skills merited.

As Curt Gowdy correctly foresaw at the end of NBC's telecast, the NFL--just 12 days into the second half of the 1970s--had embarked on a whole new age.