December 30th, 2008 04:00am
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It’s a sad and emotional time as the flickering torch of terribleness passes from the really really lousy teams of the 1970s, and lousier teams come along and assert themselves.
First it was the Detroit Lions going 0-16, eclipsing the Tampa Bay Buccaneers’ 0-14 record of 1976 as the NFL’s all-time worst.
Now the Oklahoma City Thunder, the team formerly known as the Seattle SuperSonics, are threatening the 1972-73 Philadelphia 76ers’ …
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December 29th, 2008 04:00am
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In 1968, the Raiders had a better record than the Jets, beat the Jets in their only regular-season meeting, and Oakland quarterback Daryle Lamonica had a statistically superior season than that of Jets QB Joe Namath. In the AFL title game, Lamonica threw for 401 yards and no interceptions; Namath threw for 266 yards and an interception that led to a Raiders’ touchdown. Namath did have three TD passes to …
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December 28th, 2008 04:00am
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We know about the heroics of Johnny Unitas. We know that Alan Ameche scored the winning TD. We know Frank Gifford was stopped (or maybe he wasn’t) inches from a first down on a crucial late-game sequence and the Giants decided to punt. We know that the Giants had a couple of assistant coaches named Vince Lombardi and Tom Landry.
But here is what we still don’t know.
With head coach Jim …
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December 27th, 2008 08:50pm
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So, Randy Johnson is now a Giant. He’s old (45), he’s a left-hander, and he’s a sure-bet first-ballot Hall of Famer. The Giants have been down this road before.
On July 19, 1965, in the heat of a fiercely contested pennant race with the Dodgers, the Giants signed the great Warren Spahn, 44 and no longer all that great, having gone 4-12 that season for the Mets. But just two years …
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December 27th, 2008 04:00am
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Somehow it’s easy to forget that just last season, from Jan. 29 to March 16, the Houston Rockets had a 22-game winning streak. And there was a lot of fanfare over the fact that on Christmas Day the Lakers ended the Boston Celtics’ winning streak at 19.
But when it comes to NBA winning streaks (which, by the way, might be the most difficult to maintain among the major sports because …
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December 26th, 2008 04:00am
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In a recent interview with the New York Times, Hall of Fame linebacker Sam Huff, recalling his glory years with the New York Giants, said: “I think it was 1963 or 1964. Jim Brown was the greatest running back. (New York Giants defensive coordinator Tom) Landry said ‘he’s your man.’ I hit him with all my might – he had only 8 yards on 13 carries.”
A couple of problems with …
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December 25th, 2008 04:00am
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Depending on your point of view, whether you think Christmas Day should be exclusively given over to family and/or religion or whether you think a really good NFL matchup breaks up the long day of forced socializing, pious hypocrisy and strained family connections, the Dolphins-Chiefs playoff game on Dec. 25, 1971 was either an awfully long distraction or an awfully good one.
The game was chock-full of future Hall of Famers. …
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December 24th, 2008 04:00am
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In “Frost/Nixon,” the new Ron Howard movie that opens this week in Sonoma County, the series of exclusive interviews between the disgraced former president and the British talk-show host are dramatically recreated, specifically those parts of the interviews in which Nixon, for the first time, publicly comments about Watergate, the illegal break-in and cover-up that his White House authorized.
It’s worth remembering that the office in the Watergate building that was …
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December 23rd, 2008 04:00am
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While pro football fans have heard plenty about the 50th anniversary of the NFL’s first overtime game, the Colts-Giants title tilt in 1958, often called “the greatest game ever played,” today is the anniversary of what might have been the AFL’s greatest game.
On Dec. 23, 1962, the Houston Oilers hosted the Dallas Texans for the American Football League championship. The Oilers had already won the upstart league’s first two title …
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December 22nd, 2008 04:00am
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It’s been said that this NFL season might be Bill Belichick’s best job of coaching, better than the Patriots’ Super Bowl seasons and better than last year’s regular-season perfection. That’s because the Patriots have placed 14 players on season-ending injured reserve since the start of training camp, including, of course, quarterback Tom Brady.
There’s a chance, though, that even with 11 wins, the Patriots might not make the playoffs. And how …
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Robert Rubino has been a daily copy editor for nearly 30 years and a weekly sports columnist for 15 years. 
