"The Defense Never Rests"
1970 NFL Season for SOM Football - Original Publication Date: October 21, 2010 (et. seq.)
OTHER SOM PRO FOOTBALL POSTS:
1970 Design Notes:Apologies to F. Lee. Bailey, whose book of the same name was actually published a few years later. Bailey had a relentless style in representing his clients, and these teams share this approach on the defensive side of the ball. The 1970 season could also be referred to as “Strat-O-Matic Punting.”
1970 is the seventh football season that I have done, and the fifth that I have published through SOM, which now puts me solidly in second place behind Mike Kane’s nine seasons:
1983 USFL (unpublished on PC)
1957 NFL (Published 2006)
1958 NFL (Published 2008)
1959 NFL (Published 2010)
1984 USFL (Published 2011)
1974 WFL (unpublished on PC)
1970 NFL (Published 2011)
At 26 teams and 800 sides it is the largest season that I have attempted, and it took about five months and 500 hours to complete. I want to thank Stephen Beardslee for the tools he helped me with. These cut the time quite a bit from previous efforts. I also owe Dave Bowman, who was quite familiar with this season in real life, a vote of thanks for his insights.
1) Every season presents at least one interesting design challenge. The 1970 season packages two of them, League Balance and Offensive Design:
2) League Balance- the NFC, consisting of 13 of the NFL teams prior to the merger, won 2/3rds of its games against the AFC and this conference is much stronger than the AFC this year. Generally the stronger running games, run defenses and interception balances belong to the NFC. Most of its mid-range teams, like Washington, Chicago, and Atlanta, are still very competitive against the AFC’s best.
a) The list of the best teams in the AFC would include Baltimore, a hold over NFL team that swapped conferences during the merger. Cleveland and Pittsburgh, the two other teams that shifted conferences, are not in the lower ranges of the AFC. The AFC’s worst teams- Boston and Houston – are very bad teams indeed.
b) Even within the NFC, the Eastern and Central Divisions are very strong and these make for great teams and great cards. If the 1970 Vikings lack the fanatical leadership of 1969’s Joe Kapp, they can still make due with Gary Cuozzo and Bob Lee at QB with one of the greatest defenses of all time (more on this later). Detroit faces Minnesota twice and gets a lift from its schedule, one of the toughest of this season. Detroit manhandled SF, LA, the Raiders, and the Cardinals, winning teams all, while losing to the Redskins and Saints, the latter loss one of the most unusual outcomes of the year.
c) The Eastern Division sports three winning teams and, potentially, a great race to the finish. The Cardinals beat Dallas twice behind a tough defense and a great set of running backs and sailed into December at 8-2-1. They dropped their last three to finish third at 8-5-1, but they still have Jim Hart and a quick striking passing game and halfback MacArthur Lane to rely on. The Giants have a very nice offense featuring Fran Tarkenton and Ron Johnson, and they were tied with Dallas at 9-4 on the final weekend, dropping their last match 31-3 in LA while the Cowboys won 52-10 in Houston.
d) While good teams, Miami and Baltimore, the best of the AFC, are not as strong as their records would indicate. They each played and dominated weaker schedules. Both teams were respectable defensively and could pass well, rare for the 1970 AFC, and Miami also added a sound running game. Even still, the Dolphins were shut out twice in the middle of their schedule.
3) Offensive Design- my experience has been mostly with teams that ran for ~140 yards per game and where rushing was ~55% to 60% of the total offensive play-calling. Even the 1974 WFL, which is similar to 1970 in that it is an extreme defensive league, is still a run-first league.
a) Run first leagues are easy to card, since the runners are easier to model, and there are many ways to “deny” a team access to the air if they should not have this available to them for playability’s sake. For instance, if you have a strong run-first Cleveland team with an infrequent but very successful passer, you can raise his defense right interceptions, give him a limited number of powerful receivers, or detune his offensive pass blocking. These items force the Cleveland coach to “spot” the passing game and run first, and they are the primary design elements of most Strat-made seventies seasons. As players, we are all familiar with these design elements, for lesser teams, SOM has the tendency to “choke the passer”.
b) But 1970 is an extreme defensive league and a passing league. In the days of two platoon football only 1952 and 1965 rivaled the low 3.83 yards per carry posted in 1970. Both the AFL and NFL averaged more yards per play in 1965 than 1970, though, and the 1952 NFL averaged fifteen more yards per game on the ground. 1970 is thus unique in that there are not as many breakaway runners as there would be in surrounding seasons, and its teams run about 51.7% of the time, a low number that would not drop as far again until 1980, when the NFL finally dropped below the 50% mark.
c) Almost every team has a veteran caretaker type QB they can rely on, and they did. 1970 does have strong quarterbacks, where there are a lot of veteran signal callers who are in their prime or still productive. Almost every team has one- John Unitas, Bob Griese, Bill Nelsen, Charley Johnson, Daryle Lamonica, John Hadl, John Brodie, Roman Gabriel, Bob Berry, Bill Kilmer, Jack Concannon, Bart Starr, Greg Landry, Craig Morton, Jim Hart, Sonny Jurgensen, Norm Snead, Craig Morton and Fran Tarkenton all dot the rosters. Most of them collected at least twenty thousand yards passing in their careers. They are aided by the occasional productive backup passer – George Blanda, Roger Staubach, and of course, Earl Morrall. It makes sense that coaches leaned heavily on these veterans in a season of transition at running back.
d) There are a few youngsters, too- such as Dennis Shaw, the 1970 AFC Rookie of the Year, who threw very well but was also mistake prone. Sacked 112 times in his first three years, he failed to develop and was gone by 1975. The worst quarterback starter in the 1970 set, however, Terry Bradshaw, as a rookie would find much more success ahead of him.
e) An extreme defensive league coupled with a passing season presents design challenges not present in run-first models, since “choking” a running game also changes the passing balance. Each team’s design depends very strongly on its schedule, its runners, and QBs. These elements need to be designed and tested together. The model was - complicated. Probably the most satisfying aspect of this season was creating this model and solving this challenge.
f) The typical 1970 season run defense rates “average to good”. The typical pass defense is between “average” and “average to good”. In SOM’s defensive normalization, the 1970 defenses grade out fairly strong. (Some people claim that retro SOM seasons and teams are not designed to play with each other, and normalized from season to season, but mine are. I am using the same data to model the normalization for each year, it is SOM data. And I consider season to season playability to be secondary in a sense to within-season design, but an important design parameter nonetheless.)
g) 1970 has a lot of sub-par runners, in part because we do not see as many all-timers at the running back position as we would have in other seasons. The best runners are borderline Hall of Famers such as Floyd Little or very good types such as MacArthur Lane or Ron Johnson. We do not have the Jim Browns or Walter Paytons in this set, and some great runners, such as Larry Csonka and OJ Simpson, are not yet at their peak. Simpson was hurt and had his worst year as a pro in 1970; joining him on the sidelines were such players as Tom Matte, Gale Sayers, and Matt Snell.
h) The defenses and defensive ratings carry this set. Most other SOM sets feature great offensive talent, the high average wideouts, deep flinging QBs, or runners that can bull through keys. These types of performances are muted in this set, its qualities are more subtle. It will be tougher to score on the ground against defense after defense with 5’s and 6’s upfront and at least one 6 rated LB. The average cornerback is closer to a five than a four, they will tip away deep passes. The pass rushes and turnovers will frustrate coaches. You have to look at the interlocking effects of the season’s defensive cards very closely to appreciate 1970, and because they can be inscrutable, I would guess that this card set will be either loved or hated, with little emotion in between.
4) Visual Design, and SOM History - I am a big fan of the old white cards. Where possible, I use as much of the unusual yard patterns and splits of the original season as I can, both as a design element and to evoke the original gaming experience for those who have replayed those cards. If you see an unusual split or yardage on a card it is likely there for this reason. That said, when I redo a season, the quantitation is going to change the baseline for some teams. While I aim for fidelity to the basic original design I am not completely required to present to customers a mere “update” to the 1970 season. Some design elements are going to change for the better; here, I will explain what these are.
a) The original SOM 1970 season was limited to four running backs and it required backups at each position, that is, there was going to be two FB and two HB positions on those cards even if this strained the actual usage for those backs. This led to some quirky and unrealistic cardings- Lane was listed as a FB for the Cardinals, with Cid Edwards the HB. This is not correct, Edwards is a blocking FB and Lane through his career played HB.
b) There are numerous instances of these, and I’m not throwing rocks at the Game Co., c. 1970 – these were driven by the constraints of the four card system. With the new cardings and the addition of extra players I am freed from that constraint, and I am able to add an extra runner or two to fill out rosters. I have researched these positions and placed the runners where they belong.
c) Note that Pro Football Reference.com is not an authoritative source, instead I have gone back to researched materials in written sources including starter lists and lineup lists. This may aggravate draft leaguers who were counting on the lineups listed on the original cards, and this is the first such set that I have done where this could be an issue. But I spoke to men in numerous leagues and their input was unequivocal - it is better to have the runners “recarded” to where they actually belonged in the NFL and in this set than to adhere to a standard that is outdated.
d) I have kept the old offensive and defensive ratings as much as I could, only changing ratings for backups such as Cedrick Hardman, who was rated the same (four) as the nominal starters on the old cards but has a much higher pass rush rating. The old cards gave credit to players like Hardman who shared time by rating them as fours or sometimes fives, but in this recarding, he dropped to a zero to reflect the fact that he mostly played on passing downs.
e) Sack data was obtained courtesy of fellow New Mexican John Turney, the expert at pre-1982 play by play analysis. You can google his name and read about his prodigious efforts. John graciously allowed me to use his data for this set. (Note- Detroit was based from ~60% of complete play by play and Philadelphia ~55%, and so the complete record for these two teams is estimated).
f) The sack data highlighted an unusual aspect of the original SOM cards- they reflected the offensive and defensive rosters at season’s end and often did not include men who were injured, traded, or cut in mid season. For a couple of teams this leads to unusual results- lineman Willie Townes of New Orleans, one of only five men on the team who can sack for the Saints at all, was cut in mid-season and thus does not appear on the original card. He has been added here, as have similar other players – Joe Robb of Detroit, Bob Tatarek of Buffalo, etc. Again, nearly every team had a need for extra players, especially on the defensive line. Note also that the Cowboys get Lance Rentzel back, and the Jets now have Matt Snell, albeit for a limited number of carries. Note also per the Raiders themselves, but contrary to PFR or Total Football, guard Wayne Hawkins is on the team as a reserve.
g) Some mention has to be made of the 1970 QB starter files. There are six new QBs added to the 1970 season above the two per team. No QB over ten attempts is excluded. In naming the “starters” I took into account the number of attempts the QB had in the game in question, which means PFR might list a QB as a “starter” who had four attempts in the game over a reserve that comes in and throws twenty five passes, but I do not. I design both passing cards and defenses based more on who actually throws passes in a given game.
h) I have changed my approach to this somewhat at Bob’s urging, but in general, still, in order to get these QBs their appropriate attempts, I use a somewhat different standard to judge a starter in our game than PFR will use in their records. Since the fidelity of the results from the cards depends on my standard starter list, I encourage you to use it.
i) A few great efforts stand out- Greg Landry still can drive his team with his running, John Brodie has a card that reflects his stature as NFL MVP, Duane Thomas is one of the toughest runners in the set, and Larry Brown is an all around threat. The QB run cards from Landry down are interesting to look at.
j) No 1970 effort is better than that of the Minnesota Vikings defense. The Purple People Eaters were tops in total defense and scoring and posted 3.4 net yards per play allowed- 3.4 for opponent runs, and 3.5 for opponent passes. 3.5 yards per pass play is just absurd, they allowed only six passing TDs and had twenty eight interceptions in 14 games. The pass defense was almost two hundred yards better than in 1969, and three hundred and fifty yards better than 1971. Nobody achieved 200 yards passing against them all season and eight times they held opponents to less than a hundred yards passing for the game.
Looking at the best teams from 1950 on for net avg gain per pass play:
1970 Minnesota – 3.5
1973 Miami – 3.5
1969 Minnesota – 3.6
1974 Steelers – 3.7
1977 Dallas – 3.7
1967 Green Bay – 3.8
1977 Atlanta – 3.8
These are estimates based on yards lost passing for sacks, and these are the only teams I found below 4.0 net yards per pass play. In short, the 1970 Vikings have the greatest pass defense of all time, and this is reflected in their cards. 1970 Minnesota has SOM Pro Football’s first Supreme Pass Defense, and it allows very little yardage, sacks very well, and has brutal interceptions.
Fred Bobberts, Albuquerque, NM, October 21, 2010
