It isn’t often a season can be both successful and tumultuous all at once. The 1984 New England Patriots managed it. They went through internal turmoil and midstream changes at head coach and quarterback. But they also won more games than they lost, flirted with playoff contention in a tough AFC and set the stage […]
The 1984 Dallas Cowboys came into the season having made the playoffs each of the previous nine years and 17 of the last 18. That streak came to end when late-season failure against the league’s best ended a year steeped in quarterback controversy. GREAT 1980s SPORTS MOMENTSStart reading today. Danny White had been the Dallas starter […]
It was the second year for the tandem of head coach John Robinson and running back Eric Dickerson, as they brought power football to Hollywood. And the 1984 Los Angeles Rams continued the success, making the playoffs for a second straight year. GREAT 1980s SPORTS MOMENTSStart reading today. Dickerson, a future Hall of Famer, won his […]
The early 1980s aren’t a memorable part of Pittsburgh Steelers lore, not in a franchise that has won six Super Bowls. The early 1980s didn’t provide that, but the Steelers produced three respectable teams that made the playoffs in consecutive years. The 1984 Pittsburgh Steelers concluded that three-year run. GREAT 1980s SPORTS MOMENTSStart reading today. 1984 […]
The Bill Parcells era in New York would be the greatest in the franchise’s Super Bowl era, producing Super Bowl trophies in 1986 & 1990. But after a 3-12-1 start to Parcells’ head coaching career in 1983, the heat was on to produce. The 1984 New York Giants made it into the playoffs and paved […]
The 1984 Los Angeles Raiders were coming off a Super Bowl win and for a half-season it looked like they might pull off a repeat. But they were in a tough division and slipped to a wild-card, then to a quick playoff exit. GREAT 1980s SPORTS MOMENTSStart reading today. Marcus Allen had electrified the nation with […]
The 1984 Seattle Seahawks overcame some unexpected adversity on their way to a big year. Coming off a trip to the AFC Championship Game in 1983, the first under head coach Chuck Knox, Seattle had established itself as a run-first team. Then running back Curt Warner hurt his knee in the season’s opening game, the […]
Dan Marino was one of the great quarterbacks of all-time and maybe even the greatest of the modern era of the NFL. The one knock on him was that he never won a Super Bowl, though he certainly dragged some otherwise bad teams to respectability and the playoffs. And he did reach the Super Bowl […]
The San Francisco 49ers had won the franchise’s first Super Bowl in 1981 under the tandem of head coach Bill Walsh and quarterback Joe Montana. After a brief step back in the strike-torn year of 1982, the 49ers reached the NFC Championship Game. And one year later they made it all the way back, as […]
After winning the Super Bowl in 1982 and making it back in 1983, the 1984 Washington Redskins sputtered for a little more than half the season before finding their footing. They won another NFC East title in thrilling fashion, but a playoff loss marked a temporary step back from the NFL elite under head coach Joe Gibbs.
The Chicago Bears had spent the better part of the Super Bowl era being irrelevant, at least when the early 1980s dawned. Other than a playoff appearance and quick exit in 1977, the Bears had never even been on the national radar. The organization shook things up prior to the 1982 season by hiring one of its legends, Hall of Fame tight end Mike Ditka, to be the head coach.
Ditka went 3-6 in the strike-shortened year of 1982, but improved to 8-8 in 1983 and finished that year off with a win over the Green Bay Packers that kept the Bears’ archrivals out of the playoffs. The 1984 Chicago Bears were the team that took the next step, and put their franchise back into the postseason.
This post is part of a series of sports history articles commemorating under-the-radar teams and moments in a given year. The 1984 Denver Broncos marked the first year that John Elway was unequivocally the starting quarterback and he scaled great heights, before suffering a final disappointment that prepared him for the future.