The End of Miami's Reign

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In the early '70s, the team of the decade seemed to be the Miami Dolphins. Mostly, that was due to the Dolphins' perfect season in 1972. It seemed to set them up for a long stretch of success, one that might extend through the entire decade.

As great as the '72 team was, though, I always thought the '73 team was better because it had to defend the '72 team's legacy. The '73 team came into the season with a gigantic target painted squarely on each player's chest. For every team that played the Dolphins in '73, that was the game of the year.

The '73 team stood up to that challenge, going 12–2 and returning to the Super Bowl and winning. Thus, over that two–year span, Miami won 32 of 34 games.

So, when the 1974 season began, Miami was a two–time defending Super Bowl champion with a .941 winning percentage over the previous two seasons. The Dolphins started the season with a loss to New England, then won 11 of the next 13 games. It looked like the Dolphins might get the chance to win their third straight Super Bowl.

Standing in their way, though, were the Oakland Raiders, the same bunch who snapped their legendary winning streak in the second week of the season after the history–making 17–0 campaign. In the AFC semifinals on this date in 1974, the 11–3 Dolphins took the field against the 12–2 Raiders in Oakland.

It was widely assumed that, with the winner slated to face either the Pittsburgh Steelers or the Buffalo Bills in the AFC championship game the following week, the winner of this game would represent the AFC in the Super Bowl. At halftime, it appeared it would be Miami. The Dolphins led, 10–7.

But the Raiders outscored the Dolphins, 21–16, in the second half and won on Clarence Davis' eight–yard touchdown run in the fourth quarter.

The Raiders advanced to the AFC title game against the Steelers. Everyone thought the Raiders would win. The Steelers had never been to a Super Bowl before. Of course, the Raiders had only been to one at that time, but they had come close frequently. Their time had come. That was what the conventional wisdom said.

But times changed. The Raiders lost to the Steelers, and Terry Bradshaw went on to lead Pittsburgh to the first of four Super Bowl titles in six years.

The Incredible Comeback

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Like many other Americans, one of my most cherished Thanksgiving traditions is watching football.

And what happened 40 years ago is as vivid in my memory as anything that happened five minutes ago — because it was the fulfillment of every young boy's fantasy, and I was a young boy.

The Dallas Cowboys have been playing home football games on Thanksgiving since the '60s. On this day in 1974, they had been doing it for less than a decade. In 1974, they had a really special matchup planned — with the Washington Redskins, a rival and the NFC's representative in the Super Bowl two years earlier.

There have been some great games played on Thanksgiving, but none had such an improbable story line.

The Cowboys were losing to the Redskins, 16–3, when quarterback Roger Staubach was knocked out of the game in the third quarter, and Clint Longley, a rookie, was summoned off the bench to fill in.

That particular Thanksgiving, my parents had invited some friends of theirs to come to our house in the country. They came, along with their son who was a few years older than I was. After we all ate dinner, the men gathered in front of the TV to watch the Cowboys and Redskins. I wasn't a Cowboys fan, but I was a Staubach fan as was our visitors' son.

However, when Staubach was knocked from the game and an unknown rookie was called in to run the offense, we lost interest and excused ourselves. I think we went outside to shoot some baskets, but we were soon drawn back inside by the sound of our fathers whooping. Clint Longley was leading a comeback.

He threw a 35–yard TD pass to tight end Billy Joe Dupree to cut the deficit to six points, then Walt Garrison's one–yard TD run gave the Cowboys a one–point lead going into the fourth quarter.

Ex–Cowboy Duane Thomas scored his second touchdown of the game, giving the Redskins the lead again, then Longley connected with Drew Pearson for a 50–yard TD pass to win the game.

It was probably the best Thanksgiving a rookie quarterback ever had.

Rumblin' in the Jungle

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"If you were surprised when Nixon resigned, just watch what happens when I whup Foreman's behind."

Muhammad Ali
October 1974

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"Forty years ago this month, the eyes of the world turned to Kinshasa [Zaire] to watch the 'Rumble in the Jungle,' the legendary boxing event that saw Muhammad Ali and George Foreman slug it out for the world heavyweight title," writes Thomas Yocum for The Guardian.

Muhammad Ali was a great fighter, one of the greatest of all time, as he frequently told anyone who would listen. He wouldn't stop there, though. Often, he would tell folks who did not want to listen.

He was also a master showman, and I guess he figured — correctly — that most people believed that a 32–year–old boxer who had been prevented from competing during his prime years because he refused to fight in Vietnam would be unable to stay with the heavyweight champ.

George Foreman was young and powerful. He had grabbed the title in 1973 with a hammering of Joe Frazier, and, in his second defense of his title, he brought down one of the top contenders for the title, Ken Norton, in similarly dominant fashion. Seemed he barely worked up a sweat in either. At times, you could have sworn he was actually bored.

Frazier and Norton, it is worth noting, were the only two boxers who had beaten Ali up to that time. Norton broke Ali's jaw.

In the three years prior to his bout with Ali, Foreman fought in 11 fights — all but one were done in two rounds or less, and that single exception was finished in five rounds. Foreman was used to fights that were scheduled for 15 rounds; he simply wasn't accustomed to fights that actually went that long.

Therein lay the key to Ali's upset victory. He knew that the longer he could keep the fight going, the more he would frustrate Foreman. Foreman would make mistakes, and Ali would wait for those mistakes, then exploit them. It was his "Rope–a–Dope" strategy.

Well, there was more to it than that, but that's a pretty good summary of the strategy. The "Rope–a–Dope" strategy was to force Foreman to use a lot of his energy pounding away at Ali, who would lean back on the ropes and cover his face with his gloves while Foreman hammered his midsection. Few, if any, observers thought Ali could take punches anymore, especially the powerful punches Foreman threw, but he surprised them all.

"They told me you could punch, George," Ali taunted Foreman in the early rounds. "Is that the best you can do?" An enraged Foreman tried to throw even harder punches — but with no apparent effect on Ali.

Foreman became visibly tired, and Ali was able to bring him down in the eighth round. It may have been a bigger shock to the sports world than his triumph over Sonny Liston 10 years earlier.

Originally scheduled for Sept. 24, the bout was postponed for five weeks because Foreman suffered a cut near his right eye while he was preparing for Ali.

When the men finally met 40 years ago tonight, their fight began at 4 a.m. local time to accommodate the closed–circuit audience in the Western Hemisphere.

The postponement gave Ali an opportunity to bond a little with the locals while he spent the extra time preparing for the fight.

I remember seeing footage of Ali running Rocky–like through the streets of Kinshasa, and the locals, young and old, running along with him or watching from the side, were chanting, "Ali, bomaye!" — which means, "Ali, kill him!" It quickly became one of the most recognizable sports–oriented phrases ever.

Killing people wasn't Ali's way, though. Any boxing expert will tell you that the fighters who take that mentality into the ring with them are the sluggers, and Ali was no slugger. He was a finesse fighter, more likely to win on points than on a knockout. The ironic part is that Ali did win most of his fights by knockout. That's the thing that people often forget. It's the thing that Foreman apparently forgot, and it cost him his title.

That was the key to the success of the "Rope–a–Dope" strategy. Ali had a reputation for outlasting opponents and winning on points, even though three–quarters of his wins up to that time were by knockout, so his approach likely made sense to Foreman, probably the best slugger of the time. He didn't expect Ali to go for the knockout after Foreman ran out of gas, though. He probably expected Ali to land a lot of punches in the later rounds in an attempt to pile up points — and Foreman walked right into the trap, landing punch after punch to Ali's midsection — proving repeatedly that Ali could take a punch.

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I suppose it would be natural for him to be bitter about the outcome.

"I hated Ali," Foreman told The Daily Express. "Hated him."

Understandable. Foreman was deceived. I guess everyone was.

Ali's "Rope–a–Dope" strategy wasn't evident in the first round. It was more evident in the second round — enough that Frazier, who was sitting ringside, remarked about it and wondered on the air, in response to British TV host David Frost's question, why Ali was leaning against the ropes so much.

By the end of the third round, Frazier was criticizing Foreman for being too wild in his punches and not thinking things through. He needed to be more deliberate and strategic. The champ was going to wear himself out, Frazier said prophetically.

Tellingly, when the fight was over and Ali was mobbed at center ring by admirers, Foreman and his entourage slipped quietly away almost without notice. Foreman's head was hanging in the dejection of defeat.

Nobody wants to mob a vanquished champion.

I'm Disappointed in You, Hank

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"We have moved in the right direction, and there have been improvements, but we still have a long ways to go in the country. The bigger difference is that back then they had hoods. Now they have neckties and starched shirts."

Hank Aaron

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Yesterday, I wrote about Hank Aaron's achievement, 40 years ago, when he passed Babe Ruth and became baseball's all–time home run king.

He remained the all–time home run king for the rest of the 20th century.

I watched, transfixed (thanks to my family's television), as he slugged home run #715. I was just a boy, of course, and there were many things I did not know or understand — but I did know about prejudice and racism. I knew there were racists who objected to a black man breaking a record that had been held for decades by not just a white man but perhaps the biggest idol the sport of baseball has ever had, and I regretted that. Still do.

It really wasn't a difficult conclusion to reach in 1974 — that nearly all of those who opposed Aaron were motivated by racism — but it was a different time. It wasn't far removed from the protests and riots in the streets or brutal attacks on blacks in the 1960s.

Even though I was quite young, I knew that there were people — most but not all (I have learned in my life that nothing is absolute) — who were opposed to Aaron because he was black. And I can understand why he would be bitter about that, even 40 years later. I've seen some of the letters that were sent to him — vile, disgusting.

I also know that we are all the products of our experiences, and his experience during the 1973–74 offseason was the kind of thing that no one should have to face. Again, I understand why he is bitter. I was glad then, and I am glad now, that the threats against his life were never carried out. He had my respect for the way he carried himself in the face of all that.

But he was wrong to assert, in an interview with USA Today, that little has changed. A lot has changed, particularly here in the South. Aaron is right. We do have work to do, but I hear kids talk of racism today in a way that tells me they really don't know what racism is.

That is one area where we need to do some hard work — educating our young people so they will be able to tell the difference between someone who is racist and someone who disagrees.

(I teach writing at the community college here, and I had a student last semester who accused me of racism when his final exam brought his grade down. He was expecting an A. He got a B. Why? Well, my final exam in this class — which is called developmental writing and is designed to make up for deficiencies in students' written language education — is to write what I call an essay — on a topic that I choose — so I can see if the students are applying what they have learned in the class to their writing. I mark off three points for every element that was covered in class but the student in question does not use in the essay, and I mark off one point for each word that is misspelled or should be there but isn't.

(This particular student left out three things that we discussed in class during the semester, and he had a grand total of 19 words that were either misspelled or left out completely. That made his grade on the exam 72.

(Without even seeing the marked–up essay, he accused me of making 10–point deductions — which I have never done — and, when I denied doing that, he accused me of racism.)

Aaron was wrong to suggest that Barack Obama's problems were due to racism. It's much more complicated than that.

Before anyone goes ballistic on me, yes, I know there are some people who are opposed to Obama because he is black. But I can't go along with blanket assertions of any kind. It is precisely that kind of mindset that is behind injustice of any kind — racial, sexual, religious, you name it.

I disagree with Obama on many things, but my dissension is not based on his skin color. It is based on the fact that I disagree with him. If Obama was white, I would still disagree with him on many things. (I agree with him on some things, but I disagree with him on far more.)

There are others who feel that way, too. Every president, even the popular ones, has had his detractors.

I am an American citizen, and I am entitled to disagree with Obama or anyone else — and that does not give anyone the right to dismiss my deeply held beliefs as invalid nor does it give anyone the right to falsely accuse me of anything.

My beliefs matter to me. Others are free to agree with me or disagree with me, but they have no right to belittle me if I don't agree with them.

Now if I cross that line and commit a violent act, that is a crime and should be dealt with as such, but it is not a crime for me to disagree.

At the time that Aaron was chasing the Babe, law enforcement in the South still often looked the other way when violent acts were committed against blacks. But that really has changed in the last 40 years.

Other things will change, too, as time passes.

Leapfrogging the Babe

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"A black man is getting a standing ovation in the Deep South for breaking a record of an all–time baseball idol. ... And for the first time in a long time, that poker face in Aaron shows the tremendous strain and relief of what it must have been like to live with for the past several months."

Vin Scully
Dodgers broadcaster

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Jackie Robinson was long before my time.

I've heard stories about him. I've read books about him. I admire his accomplishments, and I would have to say that my generation's Jackie Robinson was Hank Aaron. They both broke barriers.

I guess few people realized it at first. When I was a child, it seemed that most people assumed Willie Mays would be the one to break Babe Ruth's career home run record. That was to be expected, I guess. Mays' major–league career began a couple of years before Aaron's, so Mays got off to an early statistical lead, but Aaron kept plodding along.

At some point, Aaron passed Mays. I don't know precisely when. But I do know that 40 years ago today, he passed the Babe, too.

Compared to some contemporary sports heroes, Aaron must seem hopelessly quaint. He never took steroids. He never resorted to bluster or bragging. In fact, my memory is that Aaron was very soft spoken. He let his accomplishments speak for themselves.

(Speaking of which, Aaron had a somewhat meager postseason record. He appeared in the World Series twice, winning it once, before he was 25. He also appeared in the National League Championship Series the first year that major league baseball was broken up into divisions. That was it.

(But he made the most of his opportunities, batting .362 and clubbing six home runs in 69 official postseason at–bats.)

I can only imagine the stress he must have been under in the offseason between the 1973 season and the 1974 season. You see, he came within one home run of tying the Babe's all–time mark in 1973, and he had to go through an entire offseason knowing that he only needed two more home runs to become the all–time home run king.

During those months, he was subjected to the most vile and hateful treatment imaginable. Threats were made against his life. Unsupported, slanderous rumors were spread about him and his family. At times, he must have wondered if it was worth it.

Jon Friedman writes in TIME that Aaron "got off easy" because he didn't have to contend with social media.

That's a debatable point, I think. It may not have been an as technologically advanced time, but, as Ben Nightengale writes in USA Today, "it was an often joyless and lonely pursuit" for Aaron.

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Still, he persevered — in spite of the threats and the glare of the public spotlight.

And on April 4, in the first game of the season, Aaron hit a three–run homer off Jack Billingham at Cincinnati's Riverfront Stadium, tying Ruth. In hindsight, it is easy to presume that he was impatient to get the record chase behind him, but he did nothing in his other three at–bats that day.

The Braves were forced by the commissioner to play Aaron once more in Cincinnati; he went three for four but didn't break Ruth's record so the home run chase returned to Atlanta.

In 1974, NBC ordinarily did not broadcast a baseball game on Monday nights until summer, when the rest of the networks' schedules were in reruns, but NBC made special arrangements to televise Aaron's first home game of the season — and, hopefully, history as well.

Everything played out perfectly.

It might not have. Aaron hit only 20 home runs all year — his lowest output since his rookie season 20 years earlier — and he could have gone a couple of weeks before he hit another one. But NBC was fortunate.

Al Downing was on the mound for the Dodgers. The Braves trailed, 3–1, when Aaron came to bat in the bottom of the fourth. Third baseman Darrell Evans was on first following an error by Dodgers shortstop Bill Russell. Aaron drilled his record–setting home run and ignited a four–run inning that gave the Braves the lead — and, eventually, the win.

Aaron's parents came out to greet him at home plate as he rounded the bases. His mother held tightly to her son and refused, for the longest time, to let go. I heard later that she was afraid he would be shot; there had been threats made that he would be shot at home plate if he broke Ruth's record.

He wasn't shot, of course, but I don't think he got off easy.

It should be a much more relaxed atmosphere for Aaron at Turner Field tonight, though. A ceremony commemorating the 40th anniversary of his record–setting home run is planned before the start of the game. The first 45,000 fans will receive commemorative posters, and "[e]very 40th person to check–in will receive a $40 Racetrac giftcard."

And Aaron will be applauded and cheered by all tonight.

His Finest Hour

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"The only way it could have been better would have been for Henry to hit the very first pitch, the one thrown by Gerald Ford."

Red Smith
April 5, 1974

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On a sun–drenched Thursday afternoon in April 1974, Hank Aaron hit the home run that everyone had been waiting for since the last regular–season game of 1973.

It was the 714th home run of his career, pulling him even with Babe Ruth on the all–time list.

He had been one home run behind the Babe since Saturday, Sept. 29, 1973, when he hit a homer off Jerry Reuss. He went three for four the next day, the last of the '73 season, but he didn't hit the tying home run.

What is remembered the most about the next six months is that Aaron was subjected to the most bigoted series of attacks since Jackie Robinson broke the color barrier a quarter of a century earlier. That is certainly true. By the time Hank Aaron and the Atlanta Braves opened the 1974 season, the hype had reached a level that was unheard–of in my then–young life but has been exceeded several times since.

What is less remembered is another controversy that surrounded the Braves' season opener. Atlanta's first three games were in Cincinnati. The Braves' front office wanted him to tie and then break the record — as everyone, even those who still hoped he would not, believed he would do — and also wanted him to sit out that three–game road series.

When the Braves left Cincinnati, they would open an 11–game home stand in Atlanta. Aaron was 40 years old, but, surely, the Braves' management reasoned, he could hit two home runs at home.

Baseball's commissioner, Bowie Kuhn, ruled that he had to play in two of the three games in Cincinnati.

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"When they said, 'Suppose the commissioner orders the Braves to play you,' he said that in that event he guessed the commissioner would have to make out Cincinnati's batting order, too. This smart–aleck line must have been fed to him for Henry isn't a smart aleck."

Red Smith

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And he did. He played on Thursday, April 4, with Vice President Gerald Ford on hand to throw out the ceremonial first pitch, and he played on Sunday.

He quickly pulled even with the Babe, hitting a home run on his first swing of the season. He went hitless when he played in the Sunday game, but he had eliminated half of the Braves' marketing ploy with his home run.

The next day, as the Braves and Reds took the day off before resuming the series on Saturday, sportswriter Red Smith wrote, "What really counts is that when Henry laid the wood on Jack Billingham's fastball, he struck a blow for the integrity of the game and for public faith in the game."

Smith observed that "there was nothing contrived about the locale or the timing of the event. ... It was witnessed by a standing–room–only crowd of 52,154 who weren't lured in by Aaron but rather by the local tradition that dictates that every ambulatory citizen of Cincinnati must attend the opening game even if he doesn't show up again all summer."

It was a great opening–day story, all right.

"The way Henry did it removed all taint of commercialism," wrote Smith. "For this day, at least, the business of baseball made way for sport."

The End of UCLA's National Title Streak

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It's hard to explain how much things have changed in college sports since this day 40 years ago.

When this day dawned in 1974, the UCLA Bruins had won seven consecutive national basketball titles. They had won 38 straight NCAA Tournament games under coach John Wooden since their last national tournament loss, to Arizona State in the spring of 1963, and they had won national championships every year but one — they didn't qualify for the 1966 tournament.

The Bruins were about to play North Carolina State in the 1974 Final Four. If they won, they were likely to be favored to win their eighth straight national championship against the winner of the Kansas–Marquette game. There was no reason to think they wouldn't.

The Bruins owned the NCAA Tournament in those days. When they were in the field — which, admittedly, was smaller in those days, but it excluded teams that were borderline so the talent wasn't spread as thin. Every game was challenging — you could pencil them in for the Final Four every year. Heck, you could go ahead and pencil them in for the national championship game. They had only missed one in 10 years, and they won all the rest.

The only mystery was which teams would join UCLA in the Final Four city — which, in 1974, was Greensboro, N.C., about 70 miles from the North Carolina State campus.

I don't recall anyone from UCLA expressing concern at the time about the game being so near N.C. State's campus. Between 1971 and 1974, UCLA won 88 consecutive games, many of which were road games. You just don't win that many straight games by worrying about playing on someone else's turf.

The Bruins didn't just beat teams. They overwhelmed them. In the late '60s, they were led by 7–foot–2 Lew Alcindor (later known as Kareem Abdul–Jabbar), then, in the early '70s, by 6–foot–11 Bill Walton, who had perhaps the most amazing national championship game performance ever against Memphis State in 1973.

As great as his performance was (21 of 22 from the field), Walton, playing in his final NCAA Tournament, was about to participate in what Mike Douchant of The Sports Xchange, in 2002, rated the 13th–greatest NCAA Tournament game ever played.

On the surface, it was about as close as a game can be. The score was tied, 35–35, at halftime, then it was tied again, 65–65, at the end of regulation. But, in fact, N.C. State scored in spurts. The Wolfpack had to battle back from an 11–point deficit in the first half and a seven–point deficit in the second half. It wasn't a tight game all the way through.

And, remember, this was more than a decade before college basketball started using a shot clock or added a three–point shot.

Walton wasn't as dominating as he had been against Memphis State, but he was still effective, hitting 13 of 21 from the field and hitting all three of his free throw attempts.

The eventual Most Outstanding Player (MOP) of the tournament, N.C. State's David Thompson, was nearly as effective. He hit 12 of 25 field goal attempts and made four of six free throws.

Their duel 40 years ago today really was the stuff that legends are made of. N.C. State won by three in double overtime. In hindsight, N.C. State's 76–64 triumph over Marquette in the championship game two days later was rather anticlimactic.

Before the Wolfpack claimed the national title against Marquette, UCLA got back on the winning track with a 78–61 victory over Kansas in the third–place game.

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Wooden and the Bruins came back the following year to claim the national title one more time.

But an era, as Sports Illustrated proclaimed, was over. In the 39 years since Wooden's last national championship, the Bruins have won only one national title. In fact, what once was a routine trip to the national championship game has only happened three times for the Bruins since Wooden retired.

Perhaps that explains how much times have changed.

But who knows what will happen in the future — perhaps the near future? The 2013–14 Bruins won their NCAA Tournament opener in San Diego Friday night. They will face Stephen F. Austin in today's second–round game.

They might win their second national crown since the Wooden era ended. But two national titles in 39 years is a far cry from seven titles in seven years.

The Fight of the Century, Part II

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Muhammad Ali and Joe Frazier fought three times.

The first was known as the "Fight of the Century." Frazier was the defending world champion, and he defeated Ali on that occasion. It was Frazier's only victory in three bruising confrontations.

The third fight, the "Thrilla in Manila," was fought a year and a half after the second fight, which took place in New York's Madison Square Garden 40 years ago tonight.

Neither man was champion on this night 40 years ago. Frazier had lost his title a year earlier to George Foreman, and the winner of the second fight figured to get a shot at Foreman's crown.

In boxing lore, the second fight between the two men is seen as the least significant of the three, but I disagree with that assessment. It was scheduled for 12 rounds, and it went the distance — no quick decision. Ali was the winner by unanimous decision, but that does not mean it was a lopsided fight.

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It is an exercise in futility to rank the Ali–Frazier fights. It was a great rivalry, and each fight had its unique traits.

I always believed Ali–Frazier II was not the least significant of the three fights. True, no title was on the line, but the winner was expected to get a shot at the heavyweight championship — and, in fact, it did lead to a title shot for Ali later that year.

What's more, Ali cashed in on his opportunity, defeating Foreman in the famed "Rumble in the Jungle" in October.

But that was still nine months in the future. On this night in 1974, Ali got off to the kind of start that was typical for him — scoring enough points to be the unanimous winner of the first two rounds. That came as no real surprise to veteran fight watchers. Frazier always was a slow starter.

Frazier — who was thought to be seriously hurt near the end of the second round — began to score some points with the judges, winning the third round and doing well enough in the fourth to get two of the judges to score the round a draw.

The fifth and sixth rounds went to Ali, then the seventh and eighth went to Frazier. Ali was the unanimous winner of the ninth and 11th rounds while Frazier won split decisions in the 10th and 12th rounds.

It was a unanimous decision — all three judges had Ali winning — but it was far from unanimous as far as all observers were concerned. Sports writer Red Smith of the New York Times, for example, thought Frazier had won a narrow victory.

The rivalry had what any good rivalry should have — a healthy dose of good old–fashioned hate. At least, it appeared to have plenty of hate coming from the Frazier corner. Prior to their rematch, the men reviewed the tape of the first fight at the ABC studio, during which Ali called Frazier "ignorant," and a fight broke out in the studio.

That might have been a show. Ali was known to be a showman, and Frazier might have been persuaded to play along.

But, if it was a show, it was mighty convincing.

Defending Perfection

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Over the years, people have come to speak of the Miami Dolphins' perfect 1972 season in hushed tones.

I don't quibble with that. The 17–0 season was a remarkable achievement, accomplished, to a great extent, with a backup quarterback (starter Bob Griese went out with an ankle injury midway through the season) and a "no–name defense" that put the clamps on the best quarterbacks of the day — Len Dawson, Fran Tarkenton, Joe Namath, Johnny Unitas — and then beat an emerging Hall of Famer, Terry Bradshaw, in the AFC championship game.

But I have long believed that what the Dolphins did 40 years ago, in their followup season of 1973, was even more impressive. (Incidentally, until next month's Super Bowl in New Jersey, Super Bowl VIII stands as the third–coldest Super Bowl ever played.)

Heading into the 1973 season, the Dolphins had an enormous bull's eye on their chests. In the eyes of all their rivals, they were the 17–0 Dolphins of the previous year who hadn't lost in a game that counted since Super Bowl VI, when Roger Staubach and the Dallas Cowboys beat them, 24–3.

Every team that faced the Dolphins in 1973 was hoping to be the one to knock them from their lofty perch.

The '73 Dolphins managed to stay up there in the season opener, beating a declining San Francisco team, but they lost to Oakland in the second week. They only lost once more that year, in a meaningless game with Baltimore in the next–to–last week of the regular season, then hammered Cincinnati in the first round of the playoffs and avenged their second–week loss to Oakland in the AFC championship game.

Then, in Super Bowl VIII 40 years ago today, the Dolphins pounded the Minnesota Vikings to become the second team to win back–to–back Super Bowls.

(That's still a relatively rare achievement, by the way. Pro football will play its 48th Super Bowl next month, and teams have won back–to–back Super Bowls only eight times.)

In spite of the constant pressure they faced all season, even after losing that game to Oakland, the Dolphins followed their 17–0 campaign with a 15–2 season. That's 32 wins in 34 games over a two–year period. That's a two–year record that few Super Bowl champions have come close to matching.

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For a long time, I thought I was the only one (or at least one of the few) who recognized the accomplishment of the '73 Dolphins.

I remember a conversation I had with my friend Steve. He was a great admirer of the '72 Dolphins, and we often discussed that team. Once, I mentioned to him that I thought the '73 Dolphins were better, and his jaw just about hit the ground. After I explained my reasoning to him, he seemed to agree with me — or, at least, he agreed that I had a convincing case.

Anyway, recently, I read a retrospective article in the New York Daily News by Joe Belock that said what I have been thinking all these years: "Is it possible," Belock asked in his opening paragraph, "for a Super Bowl championship team to be underrated? Underappreciated?"

It's hard to imagine a Super Bowl champion being underrated, isn't it? Yet, that is precisely what the '73 Dolphins were — and still are, to an extent, as Belock's article suggests.

As Belock observes, they were better than the bunch that went unbeaten. "The schedule was tougher," he writes, yet the defense yielded fewer points.

Many coaches have won Super Bowls, but only a few have won two or more — and fewer still have won them back to back. It is so difficult — more difficult now, it seems, than it used to be — to repeat as champions in any sport. (We don't know yet who will play in this year's Super Bowl, but we do know that last year's winner, the Baltimore Ravens, will not be in it.)

I believe the Super Bowl that was won by Miami 40 years ago today was what secured Don Shula's spot in football history.

What happened in the following years added to his reputation, of course — most career wins (347), most Super Bowl teams (six) — but he was already regarded as a coaching legend by sundown 40 years ago.

Shula never won another Super Bowl. His '73 Dolphins were the last to achieve that for him.