Golden ages of sports cities

Miami has had a couple rosy periods, with the Dolphins in the 1970s and the Heat over the past decade, but never across the board success with all of their teams at once. There was also a lot of suck in between.

Detroit is the same way. There was a period in the 1980s (from '84 to '90) when the Tigers and Pistons were both good, but the Red Wings and Lions sucked. Then the Red Wings were dominant in the 90s, and everybody else was meh at best.

There's a corollary to the golden age, too, when one team is so popular and so successful that the others don't matter. I'd put Milwaukee (which claims the Packers as their own), Miami (Dolphins in the 70s, Heat in the 2000s) and Seattle (Seahawks in the 2010s) in that category.

 

The nearest thing to a true golden age for Detroit was the 1935-36 season:

The Tigers won the World Series in October, the Lions won the NFL title in December, and the Red Wings won the Stanley Cup in April.

Since the arrival of the NBA Pistons in 1957, it's been damn rare for all 4 teams to even make the playoffs at the same time, much less win titles.

In the early 2000s when both the Pistons and Red Wings were good at the same time, the Lions and Tigers sucked.

 

How about the Golden Age of OKC sports? Oh yeah. That ended last night.

 

Seattle agrees.

 

Portland concurs.

 

Miami didn't have a second pro team to go with the Dolphins until the Heat joined the NBA in the 1988-89 season. And with the way the Marlins basically dismantled after their two World Series titles, there was never any kind of sustained success.

 

Mag: Boston's decade of dominance

Boston has to be the only city (I hope) that ever earned a magazine headline as obnoxious as "Why Boston is better than you." Still, tough to beat Boston's run from 2001-2011, when the city won seven titles in four sports.

 

DC in the early to mid-80s with the Redskins and Ewing-era Georgetown was a highlight

 

True that. 1980 Astros ran into Pete Rose and the Phillies. 1986 Astros ran into the '86 Mets. The Love Ya Blue Oilers were pretty good but the road to the Super Bowl ran through Three Rivers, and that wasn't happening... although I still think Mike Renfro got a foot down in the end zone. Throw in the playoff game where Buffalo made the second half comeback on them, and the Superbowl where time ran out a yard short. University of Houston made three straight Final Fours with Phi Slama Jama, but could not finish. I loved Guy V. Lewis, but I'll never forgive him for taking his foot off the gas against NC State. He should have let those thoroughbreds run. The Run 'n Shoot Coogs under Jack Pardee were fun to watch and put up pinball numbers but that was it. There were so many NCAA violations under Bill Yeoman that Pardee paid for. Damn near no one saw the 1989 season, Ware's Heisman year, because probation kept them off of television, but that offense was insanely productive. Ware threw for 4900 yards, 46 TD's and 15 ints. Chuck Weatherspoon had a 9.1 yards per attempt all purpose, rush/rec/ret. Manny Hazard alone had 1689 yards receiving and 22 TDs.

If it wasn't for the back to back Rockets championships it would be unmitigated frustration in Houston.

Both of those U of H teams, football and basketball, were fun as hell to watch though.

 

That Super Bowl where they ran out of time a yard short was after they moved to Tennessee.

 

Shrug. Yeah, took a while for my Oiler to wear off. It was a throw in, I forgot that it was after the move. If I'd remembered I would not have included it. Bud Adams was a cocksucker.

 

And as an extra nut kick, right after the Rockets finally broke through, the Oilers left for Tennessee.