Who Is The Best NFL Team Of The Y2K Decade?

Then we are the team of the decade. As long as our D plays similarly to last year, we’ll also have the defense of the decade too.

In order to actually lay claim to Team of the Decade, the Steelers will have to beat the Pats in an important game. Say they do this next season, then that will leave three apiece for each franchise. The tiebreaker, in my opinion would be the fact that the Pats collapsed in the Super Bowl against the Giants, whereas the Steelers didn’t, even though the Pats will likely claim the crown from the media.

Here’s my shot…

QB – Peyton Manning
RB – Ladanian Tomlinson
FB – Lorenzo Neal
TE – Tony Gonzales
WR – Terrell Owens
WR – Randy Moss
T – Walter Jones
G – Alan Faneca
C – Kevin Mawae
G – Steve Hutchinson
T – Jonathan Ogden

DE – Michael Strahan
DT – Warren Sapp
DT – Casey Hampton
DE – Jason Taylor
OLB – Joey Porter
ILB – Ray Lewis
OLB – Derrick Brooks
CB – Champ Bailey
FS – Ed Reed
SS – Troy Polamalu
CB – Ty Law

K – Adam Vinatieri
P – Shane Lechler
KR – Dante Hall

And related to the write up, I think if we can tie NE for rings this decade we should win by default considering spygate.

as for the All Decade Team, if we’re going 4-3 on D, I don’t think Hampton makes it (in the 3-4 definately would). For KR, I would want Devin Hester.

Good list though. It’s also hard not to want to see Freeney in there, though.

The case I’m about to make may sound a bit ridiculous to many of you, but hear me out. I swear I’m not crazy.

There’s no doubt the Pats have the edge on us for Team of the Decade at the moment. Their three Lombardis trump our two, and they’ve beaten us in just about every big head-to-head matchup. However, if we were to beat them in the playoffs this year and win a third Lombardi ourselves I think our claim to Team of the Decade would be solid.

Now, I can’t believe I’m about to write this, but here’s why we might have an advantage on them should we meet this coming January: Bruce Arians. I know, I know, I just had to check my own pulse to make sure I’m lucid. But consider: if you go back to the early 90s when Parcells was coaching the Pats, we’ve consistently struggled with them. I was at a game at Three Rivers in ‘93 where we had to stop a Drew Bledsoe QB sneak from the 1 on the game’s final play to win 17-14. We were a playoff team that year and they went 1-15. Then they kicked our ass in the ‘96 playoffs and, under Belichick, had our number in all of the big games this past decade. One of the biggest reasons why they were able to neutralize us, particularly on offense, is this: the power run game that the Steelers used for all of those years was devised by Ron Erhardt, who was Parcells’s offensive coordinator throughout his glory years with the Giants. Belichick was Parcells’s defensive coordinator at the same time, so for years Belichick had inside knowledge of how that offense worked, and more importantly how to stop it. Of course, this isn’t the only reason the Pats beat us in all of those big games. Our quarterback play in most of them was awful. But we could never, ever run the ball against them, which placed too much responsibility on our QB’s who weren’t, at the time, ready to handle it. Their intimate knowledge of how our run game worked gave them an advantage we couldn’t compensate for.

Now, rewind to last year’s 33-10 ass-whoopin’ of the Pats up in Foxboro. We rushed for 172 yards out of the BA one-back zone scheme, something we were never able to do (outside of the win at Heinz in ‘04 when Jerome ran wild) under the old Erhardt scheme. I don’t love Arians by any stretch of the imagination, but the simple fact that with him as our coordinator New England no longer has that intimate knowledge of our system is significant. If we meet in the playoffs this year, there’s no doubt Belichick will have studied last year’s game inside-out and found ways to combat what we were doing. But in that one-back set, with the endless combination of shifts, motions and formations that BA uses, the defense will have a harder time game-planning than when there was a fullback in the backfield taking them to the ball. I’m not saying this guarantees that we’ll be successful. All I’m saying is that the Pats don’t know this system the way they knew the old Erhardt system. And that may level the playing field just enough to topple them should we meet this year, thus allowing us to claim Team of the Decade status.

So there you have it, my one and probably only public shout-out to Bruce Arians. And if it all goes to hell against New England come January, I’ll deny I ever wrote this…

That should strip them of their title. I would feel this way even if the Steelers weren’t a contender for Team of the Deacade. I don’t like cheaters and don’t think they should be eligible for this fictitional title. If it were any other contest they would have been disqualified a long time ago!

If the Steelers win it all this year it will seal the deal. Even without the cheating the Steelers will be team of the decade.

t only time it was applied, (soooorry for those officials) until that point. And also if u have seen all those NFL replays of that game almost all the audience were first resigned, because they at that point had lost that game, and also they were surprised of theresult of that assault. T result was Brady has tree, sorry 1 legit + 2 half helped rings, (I remember at the first of those wins over t Steelers, a see that the blockers from NE CHEATERS beatting the rockies with their fists, almost in all the returns of kicks, and kick-offs) then we can talk, that Brady is reaching the same level of Mr. Ben Roethlisberger, not the other way. So if u r going 2 remember putrid, sorry legacies then u have a point, but remembering them for the (only application) of t “patriot” tuck rule and also u have to add up they cheat, t best t nfl can do to clean up that mess is give t Steelers that last decade pick and the title of t Team of the Decade.

All that Belly(fullof)shet has done, make no sense to all that t NFL is doing in another areas, they r very preocupied of anybody doing almost nothing and they burn all those tapes, kind of justice.

Better we remember “The immaculate reception”, not the “maculated putrid conception”, sorry 4 t french.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WHEQtASq9BI

in that video you can see Brady walking out of field knowing it was his fault, and was indeed a fumble of he was responsible for.

Thanks for the props!
1) I stand by my statement that if the Steelers win a Lombardi this year over the bodies of the Pats* then they are the “Team of the Decade”
2) Pats* cheated but they are still the team to beat for the title. It’s not how you play the game, it’s whether you win. As they say “if you ain’t cheatin’ you ain’t trying”
3) Brady is a lock for the Hall. Maybe Belicheat* if the writers see past the tapes. Not sure any Steelers are locks outside of maybe Bettis. Ward is worthy but his stats are not what they could be. Cowher, Troy and Ben? We’ll see.
4) Tom Brady is a stud. He would be on my list of 10 greatest QB’s of all time and he would be my QB for the All Decade team unless Ben has a great season and leads the Steelers on another Elway like comeback to a Super Bowl title.
5) I hate the Raiders! The greatest Super Bowl of all time that the Steelers weren’t winning was the game in 02 featuring the Buc’s stamping the Raiders mercilessly. I never had more fun watching a game the Steelers weren’t playing in.

BB is clearly a mistake, Why? 1º)´cause We are the Steelers, We dont cheat, even knowing that for somebody else in the NFL it is their motto, but not here. In Pittsburgh We try as hard as we can but never have the goal of “try to cheat”, if it happend, it´s OK, but never is your goal. No one can build up a franchise like this thinking like Oakland or worst NE putrids. Put those words in any of the Rooney´s, mostly on “The Boss”, (now even Tomlin). 2º) BB won 15-1 in his first season, won a SB in his 2º, and if he does not suffer that accident, their stats should had been superhuman.That pile over BB, 8 loses, and even with those, BB has more W´s than Brady. Brady? maybe BB back up. Sorry man¡. Please review those tapes in those links. Mostly Brady´s body language, then we took. Its OK that everybody is putting all that **** over the putrids, but IMHO t NFL should have taken all this actions: take those 4 to 6 games, as lost for them, taken all their draft selections out that year, and Belly(fullof)shet out at least 2 to 5 years out of the game, so nobody doesn´t even think about cheatting, that situation put the NFL at the same level of the MLB, they cheat, and we accept, they cheat, we forgot, and so on…
This game is for MEN only, all the way men. If that includes cheat, better play marbles or else¡.