Michael Rowlands

Assignment Two

Introduction:
Everyone in life strives to be perfect, but rarely is it achieved. The NFL has been around
for over 60 years and only one team has been able to have a perfect season. The Miami Dolphins
have been the only team in NFL history to accomplish this feat. They won all 14 regular season
games and went on to win Super Bowl 7. The Dolphins had this amazing year during the 19721973 NFL season. This perfect season was set up the year before when the Dolphins lost to the
Cowboys in Super Bowl 6. After having the terrible disappointment of losing on the biggest
stage of the NFL the Miami Dolphins players and coaching staff were on a mission to destroy
every team they faced.
Being born in Miami, Florida I have always had a passion for following the
Miami Dolphins success. Unfortunately the Miami Dolphins havent had much success in recent
years but the team is still viewed as one of the best organizations in the NFL. There absolute
dominance during the early 70s was something that may never happen again. Being able to be
perfect in a professional sport has rarely been done. The Dolphins went to three super Bowls in a
row and won the last two. During the second year of their three year dominance they went
completely undefeated being the first and only team in history to do that.
Many believe that the Miami Dolphins would keep this record and be the only team in
NFL history to be the only team to go completely undefeated and win the Super Bowl during the
same year. It is a nearly impossible task but some believe that if it happened once then it could
happen again. Over 60 years of football and still only one team has done it but can it be done
again. The competition in the NFL has gotten a lot more intense so some also believe that this

record will never be broken and the 1972 Miami Dolphins will have had the greatest NFL season
ever.
Literature Review:
Physics is an important aspect of football that typically every fan looks over. The players
and coaches do not overlook the aspect of physics because they know they need every advantage
they can get to win. Ultimately, our running back must ensure two different conditions. To keep
the ball from rotating out of his grasp, he must apply a torque that counters the one being applied
by the defender. The sum of all the torques applied to the ball must be zero The other
unpleasant possibility is that it could simply be pushed linearly out of his grasp (Gay 2014, p.
210). Physics is an extremely important aspect of football because for example if a running back
knows how to hold a better way and it prevents fumbles then it gives his team a better chance of
winning games. The coaches and players take full advantage of these opportunities.

(Freeman 2012) The Miami Dolphins 1972-1973 Super Bowl season started on a cold
January night after losing Super Bowl 6 to the Dallas Cowboys. The locker room was dead silent
after a miserable loss. Don Shula the head coach walked into the locker room after the game and
told his team that what just happened was extremely painful but that each player should
remember this pain because it would making winning next years Super Bowl win even better.
He also told his team that they would win every game the following year so that they would not
have to feel the way they did then. Shula at the time was probably trying to cheer up his team but
no one would of every guessed that the Dolphins the following year would go a perfect 17-0.

Hall of Fame quarterback and long-time ABC college football announcer Bob Griese is a
living football legend. Now, on the 40th anniversary of the 1972 Miami Dolphins' incredible
championship season, Griese tells the behind-the-scenes story of the team both on and off the
field as it achieved a feat no other team has ever succeeded in matching: perfection (Griese
2012). Bob Griese was one of the best players on that Dolphins championship run during the
early 1970s and without his amazing talent and leadership that Dolphins team would have never
gone undefeated and probably never won a Super Bowl.
(Yepremian 2012) Yepremian was the Miami Dolphins kicker and he explains the perfect
season while for most of the game he was standing on the sideline watching the game. The third
game of the season Yepremian had three field goals with one of them coming with only three
minutes left in the game to give the Dolphins a chance to win the game. He explained the games
that were very close and difficult and he explained the games that were complete blowouts like
the game against the New England Patriots were the Dolphins won 52-0.
Despite being 16-0 the Dolphins went into Super Bowl VII as an underdog to the Washington
Redskins. The Redskins had won the NFC after an 11-3 regular season and had beaten the Dallas
Cowboys and Green Bay Packers in the playoffs. Washington didnt have a chance against the
Dolphins No-Name Defense in the Super Bowl (Giglio 2006, p.14). In Giglios book he
describes all the teams throughout history that have had perfect seasons in their respective sports.
(Rowlands 2015) The Miami Dolphins went 14-0 during the regular season of the 1972-1973
NFL season. During a span of three years the Dolphins made it to the Super Bowl three times
and won two of them. They were able to do this incredible feat with the help quarterback Bob
Griese, and running backs Larry Csonka and Mercury Morris. The Dolphins suffered a
heartbreaking loss to the Dallas Cowboys the year before going undefeated and beating the

Washington Redskins in Super Bowl 7. In Super Bowl 6 against the Cowboys the Dolphins were
the first team ever to not score a touchdown in the Super Bowl. They only scored 3 points
coming from a lone field goal.
(Larsen 2006) The competitive balance of the National Football League (NFL) using Gini
coefficients and the deviations of the Herfindahl-Hirschman Index. The authors present upper bounds for
both measures that are constructed using actual playing schedules. They model competitive balance as a
function of player talent, the incidence of strikes, the expansion of the NFL, change in the number of playoff
teams, schedule length, team relocation, the number of new stadiums, and the introduction of free agency
and the salary cap in the NFL using data from the 1970 to 2002 seasons. The authors find that free agency
and salary cap restrictions tend to promote competitive balance, whereas a concentration of player talent
reduces competitiveness among teams. Player strikes and the construction of new stadiums also affect
competitive balance.

Entering the Conversation:

During the 2007-2008 NFL season the New England Patriots were the closest NFL team
to breaking the Miami Dolphins record of being the only team to go undefeated. The Patriots
won all 16 regular season games but fell short of winning the Super Bowl by losing to the New
York Giants. Like the Miami Dolphins the Patriots previous year ended badly and fueled a rage
to come back the following year and get revenge. The Patriots were accused of cheating during
the 2006 season by spying on the opposing teams plays.
This accusation against the Patriots made them furious and they nearly had the
impossible accomplishment of going completely undefeated. Another example of a team that

nearly got the perfect season was the 2010 Green Bay Packers. They started the season 15-0 until
they benched there starters for rest purposes and ended up losing the last game of the season. The
Packers then went on to winning the Super Bowl and were one game away from going perfect.
The Green Bay Packers are the last team to be only one game away from a perfect season.
I believe that if in the last 10 years two different teams were able to get so close to the
nearly impossible task of going undefeated that it could happen. But it is also even harder to go
undefeated today than it was during the Miami Dolphins 1972-1973 because there are now two
more games to play. That number might go up even more because the NFL could make so much
more money if they added an additional game or two. So the chances of breaking the perfect
season record could start to get even harder than it has been in the past.
During the current NFL season there are currently four teams with undefeated records.
This is the first time ever that at least four teams have started an NFL season 6-0. This Sunday
two of these teams will play so at most there will be three undefeated teams remaining. I believe
with the talent on these remaining teams that it is possible that one of them could go undefeated.
The four teams left are the Green Bay Packers, the Denver Broncos, the New England Patriots,
and the Cincinnati Bengals.
I believe that the New England Patriots will go undefeated this season and become the
second team to do that in NFL history. The Patriots have one of the easiest schedules remaining
in the NFL and them playing spiteful against every team because they were accused of cheating
last year in the playoffs. Future tells us that when a team faces adversity in a previous season the
team the following year plays even better than in the past. Since the Patriots won the Super Bowl
last year, the only real way for them to have a better season is to go undefeated. It will be very

difficult but with Head Coach Bill Belichick and All Pro quarterback Tom Brady they might be
able to go undefeated.
Conclusion:
Many believe that the Dolphins will be the only team ever to go undefeated for an entire
season. Over 60 years and the only team in professional football to have gone completely
undefeated is the Miami Dolphins. Their dominance during the early 1970s was something
remarkable and nearly impossible. I believe that no team will be able to go undefeated in pro
sports in the foreseeable future. Between injuries and the increased level of competition it is just
too difficult. Due to the competitiveness increasing in sports will a team ever break the Miami
Dolphins undefeated record?

Assignment One (Rowlands 2015)

Beliichick, B. (n.d.). Football Physiscs. https://books.google.com/books?

hl=en&lr=&id=LKdElnAs7BoC&oi=fnd&pg=PR7&dq=larry+csonka&ots=oAEhNWZdMI&sig
=UIf68NvvAa06fuKp1Lq4B9adDMA#v=onepage&q=larry%20csonka&f=false
Giglio, J. (2006). Great teams in pro football history. Chicago, Ill.: Raintree.

https://books.google.com/books?
hl=en&lr=&id=cXD2fX6nvasC&oi=fnd&pg=PA1969&dq=mia6mi+dolphins+1972+season&ots
=F2zOoLXX18&sig=VjfyPlRnQLtXf2CSj8FWjoWW9tk#v=onepage&q=miami%20dolphins
%201972%20season&f=false

Undefeated: Inside the 1972 Miami Dolphins perfect season

Freeman, M. (2012). Undefeated: Inside the 1972 Miami Dolphins' perfect season. New
York: It Books :

https://books.google.com/books?
id=UHgBmCtOT00C&printsec=frontcover&dq=dolphins+going+undefeated+in+1972&hl=en&
sa=X&ved=0CCsQ6AEwAGoVChMI4c3P3_DPyAIVh9OACh1MEQO_#v=onepage&q=dolphi
ns%20going%20undefeated%20in%201972&f=false
Griese, B., & Hyde, D. (n.d.). Perfection: The inside story of the 1972 Miami Dolphins'
perfect shttps://books.google.com/books?
id=WVlBk5EOUXkC&printsec=frontcover&dq=miami+dolphins+undefeated+season&hl=e
n&sa=X&ved=0CD0Q6AEwAmoVChMI_s_Q9fXPyAIVkqiACh1jrgoe#v=onepage&q=miami
%20dolphins%20undefeated%20season&f=falseeason.
Larsen, A., Fenn, A., & Spenner, E. (2006). The Impact of Free Agency and the Salary Cap
on Competitive Balance in the National Football League.Journal of Sports
Economics, 374-390.
http://jse.sagepub.com/content/7/4/374.short

Yepremian, G., & Clayton, S. (2012). Tales from the Miami Dolphins sideline
reminiscences of the Dolphins glory years. New York: Sports Pub.

https://books.google.com/books?
id=vyNrCgAAQBAJ&pg=PA24&dq=miami+dolphins+undefeated+season&hl=en&sa=X&ved=
0CEQQ6AEwA2oVChMI_s_Q9fXPyAIVkqiACh1jrgoe#v=onepage&q=miami%20dolphins
%20undefeated%20season&f=false
Yepremian, G., & Clayton, S. (2012). Tales from the Miami Dolphins sideline
reminiscences of the Dolphins glory years. New York: Sports Pub.

https://books.google.com/books?
id=3whuAAAACAAJ&dq=miami+dolphins+undefeated+season+larry+csonka&hl=en&sa=X&
ved=0CEIQ6AEwA2oVChMI9f-A_fzPyAIVgY4NCh2iJQJx