Ranking the Super Bowl winners (#1 a surprise?)

[Battlelyon]

Ranking all 49 Super Bowl champions, from best to worst


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By: Chris Chase | January 27, 2016 2:58 pm

As the NFL hits its 50th Super Bowl, the sports world has been taking a look back at the history of America’s biggest, and greatest, game. FTW got in on the fun by going back and evaluating each Super Bowl-winning team and ranking them from best to worst. There are a few surprises, a lot of potential debate but no argument for which team should rank No. 49.

1. 1991 WASHINGTON REDSKINS (14-2)

(AP)

Yes, the 1991 Washington Redskins are the greatest team to win a Super Bowl. They’re also the poster children for how numbers always lie. Criminally underrated, the ’91 Skins were one halftime Hail Mary and a lineman-eligible drop in the end zone during a meaningless Week 17 game from being undefeated. They have the second-highest point differential of any Super Bowl champion. They had 50 sacks and Mark Rypien, who started all 16 games, was sacked just seven times. (Tom Brady was sacked four times on Sunday alone.) They played a tougher schedule than any team in the top 10 of this list (they’re the only team whose opponents had a collective record of .500 or better). They ran through the NFC playoffs by a score of 65-17 and were whupping up on Buffalo 37-10 in the Super Bowl when they took the foot off the gas and allowed Buffalo two garbage-time TDs. (At the same pint the ‘Skins were doing that, the ’85 Bears were running it up by giving The Fridge a Super Bowl touchdown.) Don Beebe, who played on four straight Super Bowl teams with the Bills, said this Redskins team was the best he’d ever seen. Paul Zimmermann, the great Sports Illustrated writer, once wrote this Washington team was as good as any. But because Mark Rypien was the quarterback, Earnest Byner was the running back and the defense was led up front by Charles Mann, people automatically assume Joe Montana, Jerry Rice and Deion Sanders were better. Maybe, but it all starts up front and The Hogs were the best ever. Either way, give me the ’91 Redskins and you take the field — I’ll win 25 or more.

2. 1984 SAN FRANCISCO 49ERS (15-1)

(AP)

Sure, Jerry Rice wasn’t around yet, but Joe Montana, Roger Craig, Randy Cross and Ronnie Lott were, along with an in-his-prime Bill Walsh. This squad missed perfection by a mere field goal (to a Pittsburgh team that snuck into the playoffs thanks to a fine defense coached by a young Tony Dungy). They also manhandled a 14-2 Dolphins team led by a record-setting Dan Marino in the Super Bowl. Title-game opponents are an odd criteria of this list. You can only play who makes it from the other conference, but there’s no doubt beating a 14-2 Dolphins team with a 48-TD Marino is more impressive than beating a 12-4 Bengals team quarterbacked by Ken Anderson (as the ’81 Niners did).

3. 1985 CHICAGO BEARS (15-1)

(AP)

One of the greatest defenses in history mixed with one of the three greatest running backs ever? How are the Bears not No. 2, let alone No. 1? For as great as Buddy Ryan’s 46 defense was (61 turnovers!) they didn’t set marks for fewest points allowed or turnover margin and the offense was solely dependent on Payton. Then, in the team’s biggest game of the year (not the Super Bowl, against a mediocre Patriots team, but the famed Monday night battle against Miami) the Bears had a 31-10 halftime deficit. Neither of the teams above faced a larger deficit all season — the Redskins were down double-digits just three times all season and cut that lead to single-digits on the next score each time.

4. 1989 SAN FRANCISCO 49ERS (14-2)

(USA TODAY Sports Images)

When we’re ranking teams in the top 10, we’re splitting hairs. And I feel like people rate this ’89 team as the best ever(it’s what ESPN’s Page 2 did back when ESPN’2 Page 2 existed) because of its dominant postseason performance (126-26 overall, 55-10 in Super Bowl). But quality (or lack thereof) of Super Bowl opponent makes not for greatness. The ’87 Redskins beat the same Broncos 42-10. The ’86 Giants beat ’em 39-20. Give me the ’84 version with the better point differential even though it was less star-studded. I mean, it’s great that this team had Charles Haley, but the defense finished third in points allowed. The ’84 team finished first.

5. 1978 PITTSBURGH STEELERS (14-2)
The third of Chuck Noll’s four Super Bowl teams was the pinnacle, with 10 members in the Hall of Fame (nine players and Noll). Their two losses were by 10 points and they won a tight Super Bowl battle with the reigning champs — Dallas — with some history on the line. Whichever team won would be the first franchise to get to three Super Bowl victories.

6. 1998 DENVER BRONCOS (14-2)

(AP)

The first back-to-back AFC champs in almost two decades and the one that sent out John Elway a winner. This team started 13-0 then lost its only two games after clinching home field. A Super Bowl matchup with the 15-1 Vikings would have been a dream, but beating the Dirty Bird Falcons wasn’t exactly a preordained victory.

7. 1992 DALLAS COWBOYS (13-3)
A soft schedule kept the Cowboys from showing how good they could be (a 4-2 record against teams at .500 or above didn’t help), but knocking off a 14-2 49ers team in the NFC championship game and routing a Bills team that was just beginning to realize it was destined to become a Super Bowl punching bag helped.

8. 2004 NEW ENGLAND PATRIOTS (14-2)

(AP)

The best Patriots team (and the best team in NFL history) doesn’t appear on this list thanks to its Super Bowl loss to the Giants. So of the other four title teams under Brady and Belichick, the 2004 team takes the cake, with its loss to a 15-1 Steelers team and a division loss to Miami, coupled with a playoff run that was easy until Donovan McNabb had the ball with a chance to tie or win in the final minutes, a situation that was far less problematic than it seemed at the time.

9. 1996 GREEN BAY PACKERS (13-3)

(AP)

One of the most overrated teams in NFL history. Brett Favre and Reggie White led the Packers to top rankings on offense and defense (a rarity) but the team was 5-3 against teams over .500 (and these weren’t narrow losses) and needed a Desmond Howard kickoff return to put away a mediocre Patriots team in the Super Bowl.

10. 1973 MIAMI DOLPHINS (12-2)
Yeah, the ’73 team with two losses was better than the undefeated ’72 team. The stats weren’t as gaudy (as you’ll see below), but the team rolled through the playoffs and played a far more difficult schedule en route to the title.

11. 1972 MIAMI DOLPHINS (14-0)

(AP)

The Dolphins played the easiest schedule of any Super Bowl team (winner or loser) and won its three playoff games by a touchdown or less. The team’s two starting QBs — Earl Morrall and Bob Griese — combined to throw for less than 2,000 yards with 15 touchdowns and 11 interceptions. Larry Csonka and Mercury Morris each had 1,000-yar d seasons though and the No-Name defense was spectacular. But, in full proof that records ain’t nothin’ but a number, the only undefeated team in league history doesn’t make it into our top 10.

12. 1999 ST. LOUIS RAMS (13-3)

(USA TODAY Sports Images)

Easily the most unexpected team in our top 15, the Rams are the only winner to not make the playoffs the year before their title. Not just that though, the Rams were 4-12 in 1998, but then got Trent Green from the Redskins and had high hopes with Dick Vermeil on the sideline. But Green got hurt and in one of the more fortuitous injuries in NFL history, Kurt Warner emerged from nowhere to become one of the great quarterbacks of the past two decades.

13. 2003 NEW ENGLAND PATRIOTS (14-2)
There’s this sense that the first three Brady/Belichick teams weren’t dominant, which probably stems from the close Super Bowl victories over guys like Jake Delhomme. But this is a team that won 31 of 33 games at one point. Who cares if they were doing it by 20 points or three points; style points are for all those awful, judged Olympic events. In football, it’s about the Ws.

14. 2013 SEATTLE SEAHAWKS (13-3)

The hardest team to rank on this list. Russell Wilson was in his second season and wasn’t nearly the quarterback he is now, but the defense was spectacular. That, a great trilogy against the San Francisco 49ers and CRABTREE, plus Richard Sherman making himself famous literally overnight and holding the best offense in NFL history to eight points in a 35-point rout makes No. 14 sound about right.

15. 1966 GREEN BAY PACKERS (12-2)

(AP)

Lombardi had better teams in Green Bay before the Super Bowl era, but this one was still pretty darn good, culminating in the first-ever Super Bowl win.

 

[Battlelyon]

16. 1994 SAN FRANCISCO 49ERS (13-3)


(Getty Images)

Steve Young had one of the best seasons ever at quarterback for the ’94 Niners and finally got that monkey off his back, as he said in the postgame locker room, referring to leading the franchise to a title sans Joe Montana. (Just think what Young could have done if he didn’t waste time in USFL and playing understudy to Montana until he was 31 years old.) But these 49ers had a 40-8 Week 5 loss to a Philadelphia Eagles team that didn’t finish over .500. Splitting hairs? Not as this level. Win that game 40-8 and Young’s Niners are probably top eight.

17. 1986 NEW YORK GIANTS (14-2)
Phil Simms’ 1986 was a lot like his 2016 — after a year of mediocrity, he capped it with a Super Bowl appearance. The Giants quarterback had more interceptions than touchdowns (to be fair, this was far more common 30 years ago) and the game is perhaps best known for what happened after, for the first time ever:


Simms got to Disney Word and, as Mike Carey nodded, promptly remarked how nice it was to be in sunny California, probably.

18. 1971 DALLAS COWBOYS (11-3)
Can Tom Landry still be one of the greatest coaches in NFL history and a bit overrated? This was his first Super Bowl team, but the Cowboys coach of 29 years would only win one more despite — get this — making the playoffs in 17 of 18 seasons from 1966 to 1983. Anyway, this team was full of future Hall of Famers and had a potent offense led by Roger Staubach, Bob Hayes and Mike Ditka. Oh yeah, the defense gave up 12, 3 and 3 points in the playoffs too.

19. 1976 OAKLAND RAIDERS (13-1)

(AP)

Much like the ’94 Niners losing a game by 32, John Madden’s lone Super Bowl team dropped a 48-17 game to a New England team that as least made the playoffs at 11-3. But much like the Dolphins of four years before, the Raiders won lots of close games and have the worst point differential of any team thus far on the list.

20. 1981 SAN FRANCISCO 49ERS (13-3)
Speaking of that stat, no team ahead of the ’81 Niners had a worse point differential (+109) but when you show up in pressure situations like “The Catch,” it doesn’t matter.

21. 1982 WASHINGTON REDSKINS (8-1)

(AP)

Making their way through a 16-team playoff thanks to a seven game players strike, Joe Gibbs began his mini-dynasty at the Rose Bowl. Powered by The Hogs and John Riggins, the ‘Skins were driving midway through the fourth quarter against the league’s best defense when they hit a fourth-and-1 in no man’s land — Miami’s 43. Gibbs went for it, calling for a 70 chip, and Riggins bulldozed over Don McNeal, stiff arming him while keeping his jersey neatly tucked in, and rumbling for the game-winning score. There went The Diesel.

22. 1993 DALLAS COWBOYS (12-4)
23. 1979 PITTSBURGH STEELERS (12-4)
24. 2000 BALTIMORE RAVENS (12-4)

(USA TODAY Sports Images)

The greatest defense in NFL history gave up the fewest points of any team in modern Super Bowl history and had the best turnover margin for any Super Bowl champion (+33, fourth all-time, but a mind-boggling 13 behind the record-holding ’83 Redskins, who would have been one of the top teams on this list if not for the small fact that they lost Super Bowl XVIII to the Raiders, 38-9). Yes, the Ravens had that insane five-game stretch in which they didn’t score a touchdown but only slightly less well known is this: After snapping that ignominious streak with a 27 point “outburst” in Week 10 (just three points less than the team had scored in its previous four games combined), Baltimore went on an 11-game winning streak and other than the second game of that streak, they were never really in any danger again.

25. 1977 DALLAS COWBOYS (12-2)
Landry’s second, and final, Super Bowl winner was tops in the league in both yards and yards allowed.

26. 1975 PITTSBURGH STEELERS (12-2)
27. 1987 WASHINGTON REDSKINS (11-4)

(AP)

Read this tremendous Les Carpenter story on Super Bowl XXII hero and the NFL’s ultimate one-hit wonder Timmy Smith, who still holds the game’s rushing record (204 yards — no one has come within 47 yards of it since) but was out of football two years later.

28. 2014 NEW ENGLAND PATRIOTS (12-4)

(EPA)

For a team that was getting left for dead in October of 2014, the Pats emerged, as they usually do, later in the season. Still, one can’t help but wonder what would have happened if Pete Carroll hadn’t had Russell Wilson throw the ball. Well, you don’t have to: He would have handed off to Marshawn Lynch and the 2014 Seattle Seahawks would have been in this spot instead.

29. 1995 DALLAS COWBOYS (12-4)
Call it a bias against any team coached by Barry Switzer. […] No, that’s all I have to say; why do you ask?

30. 1997 DENVER BRONCOS (12-4)

 

[Battlelyon]

31. 2007 NEW YORK GIANTS (10-6)
Beat the greatest team of all time and I don’t care what you did in the regular season.

32. 1969 KANSAS CITY CHIEFS (11-3)
33. 1983 LOS ANGELES RAIDERS (12-4)

(AP)

Before the New Giants beat the undefeated New England Patriots in the 2007 season, the ’83 Raiders were the Super Bowl champion who’d probably defeated the best team. Tom Flores and Jim Plunkett got their second titles in a playoff run that saw them score 30 points in each of their three playoff games.

34. 2009 NEW ORLEANS SAINTS (13-3)
35. 1990 NEW YORK GIANTS (13-3)
No one remembers the mediocre offense (with Phil Simms and Jeff Hostetler playing tag at the QB position) or the top-notch defense constructed with two of the greatest football minds in history (Bill Parcells and Bill Belichick), they only remember “wide right.”

36. 2006 INDIANAPOLIS COLTS (12-4)

(USA TODAY Sports Images)

Sorry, Peyton. Though your first Super Bowl was the NFL gods making a much-needed course correction, it was still with a team that felt like one of Manning’s fifth or sixth best in Indy. Edge was gone, Marvin was old, the defense was just holding on by its fingernails, as usual. Peyton had great numbers, but for him it was more an average season than anything else.

37. 2002 TAMPA BAY BUCCANEERS (12-4)
Another tough team to rank — Brad Johnson’s 2002 is one of the more underrated QB seasons in recent memory — but then you consider that the team they routed in the Super Bowl, the Oakland Raiders, hasn’t been back to the playoffs since. Suddenly it becomes easier to place Gruden’s team.

38. 2008 PITTSBURGH STEELERS (12-4)

(USA TODAY Sports Images)

39. 1974 PITTSBURGH STEELERS (10-3-1)
This is where the Steelers dynasty of the 1970s, and all the teenaged fairweather fans that came with it, began. One tidbit you probably didn’t know (or at least I didn’t): Joe Gilliam started more games than Terry Bradshaw in ’74.

40. 1988 SAN FRANCISCO 49ERS (10-6)
41. 1980 OAKLAND RAIDERS (11-5)
42. 1968 NEW YORK JETS (11-3)

(AP)

Name a player on offense besides Joe Namath (who threw 15 TD and 17 INT that season)? Name a player on defense. Maybe you got Don Maynard, but other than that, there’s a reason no one thought this team had a chance to win the most famous Super Bowl ever.

43. 2010 GREEN BAY PACKERS (10-6)
44. 1967 GREEN BAY PACKERS (9-4-1)

(AP)

Lombardi’s second Super Bowl team was one of the worst of his tenure in Green Bay, which says less about this team than it does about Lombardi’s greatness.

45. 2005 PITTSBURGH STEELERS (11-5)
Why such little love for the two Steelers titles of the past decade? They were two good, not great, teams who won their Super Bowls thanks to reffing (vs. Seattle) and two crazy plays (James Harrison’s return and Santonio Holmes’ catch). This is not to diminish the wins, just the team’s placement of a list of 49 of the best teams ever. It’s no insult.

46, 2012 BALTIMORE RAVENS (10-6)

(Getty Images)

47. 2001 NEW ENGLAND PATRIOTS (11-5)
You have to forget about what they became and remember what they were — a team with an unknown quarterback that shouldn’t have been in the game (thank you, Tuck Rule), needed miraculous field goals to get to the Super Bowl and were playing a juggernaut in the Rams. But Bill Belichick came up with a brilliant scheme to stop Marshall Faulk (you can see it on video if you’ve forgotten), Adam Vinatieri hit his second-biggest kick of the playoffs (the one in the snow against Oakland was No. 1 and the greatest kick ever) and the Patriots dynasty was born.

48. 1970 BALTIMORE COLTS (11-2-1)

(AP)

If unwatchability was the deciding factor this team would rank something like 75th out of 49. Super Bowl V is perhaps the worst played Super Bowl in history, with the Colts turning the ball over seven times before getting the first-ever game-winning field goal in the game. (At least the end was exciting?) The Colts had one of the easiest schedules a Super Bowl team has ever had, including a 1-2 record against teams above .500 (the losses were by a total of 37 points) and a number of wins by less than a touchdown over teams with records like 2-11-1. Baltimore also had a tie that year — against the 3-10-1 Buffalo Bills.

49. 2011 NEW YORK GIANTS (9-7)
Just think how’d we’d be regarding the Patriots right now if they’d lost last year’s Super Bowl, with a record of 3-3 in the Super Bowl with no wins since 2004. And it’d all have been because of this 9-7 Giants team that lost twice to the 5-11 Redskins. As it is, this paean to mediocrity goes down as the worst Super Bowl winner in history.

 

[Jakology]

What a laughable list. I swear. Around 95% of lists on the internet, no matter what they are about, are just completely off and laughable.

 

[johnson]

First off, it's hard to compare teams from two very different eras.

The list seems to lack credibility when the only undefeated team isn't in the Top 10. I mean...they didn't lose a game. That would seem to make them one of the best? The description makes it sound like they were just a bunch of scrubs and no names...but what was the NFL like back then if a team of not so special players went undefeated?!

They don't have to be #1...but Top 10 seems in order.

 

[Ricky Roma]

I stopped reading after #1. More clickbait garbage.

 

[sonnyblack65]

I was at the Wash/Buffalo SB in Minny. I'd rate the 85 Bears as #1 and same #2 SF

 

[jarntt]

It amazes me how many people love to come up with lists and worse when others use the lists as meaningful (not saying that happened here)

Personally I never get past like 2 names...

 

[cowboycolors]

with respect to the Redskins at #1

Well I call BS but its just somebodys opinion no more no less

 

[Broncos6482]

I think it's funny that he calls the 96 Packers overrated, and proceeds to completely overrate them in this list. And the 97 Broncos are way underrated, too. How can they be 21 spots below the 96 Packers, basically the same team they beat in the Super Bowl a year later?

Also, didn't that 2008 Steelers team go 14-2? I could've sworn they did. Their defense was dominant that year, I think they're underrated.

Edit: I looked it up, I guess they did go 12-4. I forgot the Titans had the best record in the AFC that year at 13-3. Still, I think they should be rated higher.

 

[ducky]

'91 was just a fluke year. Washington was far from a great team and you can see that by the lack of HOF caliber players on the squad and the fact that the team couldn't replicate the success the year before or after.

To give you an idea of how fluky '91 was: The two teams Wash beat to get to the SB were run 'n shoot teams. And one of those teams, Atlanta, was about as fluky as it gets as they were in the playoffs that year but the year before and the year after they would lose 10 or more games. And the other team they beat was Detroit who also didn't make the playoffs in the year before or after that '91 year. Just a fluke season all around.

 

[tducey]

Interesting list for sure, the 2011 Giants being last doesn't surprise me.

 

[Breed]

So besides Sonny, Ducky, who failed miserably with some ol' off the wall, the entire world was flukey in 1991 bullshit, and tducey. Y'all got nothin to dispute this keen and insightful article as you eat your butthurt sandwiches and wash that shit down with some piss-warm haterade.

 

[Clayton]

The problem I have with this list is that it compares the body of the work of the whole season. Not what would happen if these rosters went against each other in football games.

The recent teams that are underrated are the 2000 Ravens, the 2002 Bucs and 2013 Seahawks. Yeah, the Bears D was really good. Then people omit the other really good Ds for no good reason. Stupid.

I also find it hard to believe that someone could make a list where a team with one of the 2 most important players in NFL history and one of the 4 or 5 most important coaches in NFL history is ranked #47.

 

[handicappers]

What a laughable list. I swear. Around 95% of lists on the internet, no matter what they are about, are just completely off and laughable.

You're a full of shit.

 

[Hank Kingsley]

I dunno.

I remember that Skins team. Tough team.

Gotta respect Gibbs, 3 SB wins with 3 different QBs. That's a resume.

And now that I have a nice new Redskins towel and mug, who knows?

Could they rocket to my 3 slot? Or 4?

 

[Ricky Roma]

I remember that Skins team as well. I don't think they'd even crack my top 10.

Such a one year wonder....

 

[Hank Kingsley]

Such a one year wonder....

Except I don't recall this being about dynasties.

Just a Super Bowl winner.

 

[Rex Racer]

What a laughable list. I swear. Around 95% of lists on the internet, no matter what they are about, are just completely off and laughable.

Can't say I disagree. I'd put both Dolphin SB winning teams at 48 & 49 and I'd put all 3 Redskins SB winning teams way ahead of either Broncos winner.

 

[Rex Racer]

I remember that Skins team as well. I don't think they'd even crack my top 10.

Such a one year wonder....

Like Steve Young?