Kendyll Ferrall
Kferral1@uwyo.edu
The Denver Broncos defense won the Super Bowl Sunday night. The defensive line did everything a good defensive line is supposed to do and proved the age-old idiom that defense wins championships.
Yes, the Broncos have a good defense and at times, like Sunday night, a great defense. But do the Broncos have the greatest defense of all time?
No, definitely not.
Sure, the Broncos led the league in total defense, pass defense, sacks and fewest yards allowed per play and managed to not just contain Carolina Panthers’ quarterback Cam Newton, but completely shut him down. Newton ended Sunday’s game with no passing touchdowns, no rushing touchdowns and no dabs, but he did manage to fumble twice in his own red zone allowing the Broncos to score 15 points.
Newton completed the game with a pass rating of 16.9. Pressured on 21 of his 48 dropbacks, Newton’s pressured QBR was 2.6 on Sunday night. To put that in perspective, the average rating for a quarterback under pressure is 7.9, according to ESPN Stats & Info.
Denver’s aggressive and wildly effective green-dog blitzing held the league’s highest-scoring team to 10 points and the Panthers committed a season-high of four turnovers. Unable to overcome the additional pressure by linebacker Brandon Marshall, five defensive linemen on the line of scrimmage and one-on-one coverage by corners Aqib Talib, Chris Harris and Bradley Roby, the Panthers’ offensive crumbled.
Looking at Sunday’s game, it’s easy to see why Marshall, Harris, defensive end Derek Wolf and linebacker Danny Trevathan all believe their defense is the best to ever play. The only problem is that they’re looking at history through glasses distorted by the glare of their shiny, new Lombardi trophy.
To be considered one of the greatest defenses to ever play means joining the ranks of undisputed greats like the 1969 Kansas City Chiefs, the 1973 Miami Dolphins, the 1976 Pittsburg Steelers, the 1985 Chicago Bears – who should go down in history for the Super Bowl Shuffle and Mike Ditka’s sweaters alone – the 2000 Baltimore Ravens, the 2002 Tampa Bay Buccaneers and the 2013 Seattle Seahawks.
To be considered the greatest ever means to surpass these teams and while the Broncos’ defense may have accomplished a lot this season, it certainly didn’t accomplish that. It didn’t even crack the top three.
When it comes to raw defensive stats, like points allowed per game, yards allowed per game and yards allowed per play, the Broncos rank last in every category compared to the ’85 Bears, ‘00 Ravens and ’13 Seahawks with 17.9 pt/g, 293.5 yd/g and 4.4 yd/p. Expanding the field to all of the aforementioned teams, the Broncos still rank last even when adjusted for era-differences like higher points scored, increased yardage and decreased turnovers.
It’s one thing to make a blanket statement that your defense is the best to ever play, it’s another to call out the actual greatest defense to ever play – I’m looking at you Trevathan. The last time I checked, no one on your defensive line is nicknamed ‘the Refrigerator.’
Considered the gold standard for defense, the’85 Bears ’46’ defense gave up an average of 12.4 points per game in the regular season and 10 total in the playoffs, shutout four teams, including their first two post-season opponents, meaning the only points they surrendered in the postseason came from their jaw-dropping 46-10 Super Bowl XX victory over the New England Patriots. The Bears were the last team to win 18 games and the Super Bowl.
The Broncos never managed a shutout; the closest they came was their 17-3 win against the San Diego Chargers. The Broncos allowed 10 points or less in four games, eight games less than the Bears. Combining regular and post-season points, the Broncos gave up 340, 132 more than the Bears.
The 2015 Bronco defense was a great defense and probably the greatest defense in the Broncos’ history, but definitely not the greatest in history.
