Defining Dynasties

Sports dynasties are very alluring to many of us.  It's the notion of witnessing history that allows us to attach ourselves to something great, something bigger than ourselves.  Winning a championship is an incredible feat for a team and it's extremely exciting for their fan base, but a team wins a championship every year.  With that being said, we as a humans always like to raise the bar and need to create higher measurements of success.  Therefore in sports we like the concept of a "dynasty".  The discussion is a complicated one because there are no exact parameters of what a dynasty should consist of.  Should there be a certain number of championships involved?  Should it occur within a certain period of time?  Does the number of regular season wins or the number of playoff appearances over the years factor in? In my opinion, winning it all and consistency are most important.

People rush to call teams "dynasties" even after just winning a couple of championships or seeing that they might have the potential to do so.  I currently live in the San Francisco Bay area, so obviously there's much talk about a San Francisco Giants dynasty or even a possible Golden State Warriors dynasty with the way that team is set up for the future.  

There's much talk about the Patriots being a dynasty right now.  I disagree with this sentiment.  Let's take a look at some of the greatest dynasties of all time in each of the four major sports and compare with franchise dynasties of the more modern era.  Then the current Patriots can be truly broken down.

NHL- Montreal Canadiens (1953-1979)
The Canadiens have won 23 total Stanley Cups out of 34 finals appearances since the cup's inauguration after the 1917-1918 season. Within a 27 year span from the years of 1953 and 1979, the Habs appeared in an unfathomable 19 Stanley Cup Finals, winning an almost more unfathomable 16 of them!  This run also consisted of two blocks of four Stanley Cup titles back to back (1956-1960 and 1976-1979) and another run where they raised the cup 4 out of 5 years between 1965 and 1969. From  1961-1964 they were absent from the finals but they did make the playoffs.  Now keep in mind that in those years, only four teams made the playoffs! Playoffs were expanded to eight teams in 1969, twelve teams in 1975, and 16 teams in 1980. The 1969-1970 season was the only season within this time span that the Canadiens didn't make the playoffs at all.

NBA - Boston Celtics (1957-1969)

The Celtics hold the record for the most NBA Championships of all time with 17.  Eleven of those came within this 13 year time frame where the Bill Russell led Celtics were absent from the NBA Finals only one year, in 1967.  Their only loss was in 1958 against the St. Louis Hawks.  The sexiest part of this run is the block of 8 championships in a row, which is the longest championship streak ever seen in the four major sports' histories.  If you side with the argument that dynasties should include consecutive championships only, then this would be the greatest sports dynasty to ever exist!

MLB - New York Yankees (1936-1953)
Most will argue that the Yankees are the pinnacle franchise throughout sports.  They have appeared in 40 World Series, winning 27 of them!  Their main dynasty reigned from 1936 to 1953 where they appeared in 13 World Series, winning 12 of them.   A block of 4 in a row from 1936 to 1939 and 5 in a row from 1949 to 1953 highlight the time period.  Again, keep in mind that during these years, the playoff structure was much different than the current system.  In fact, during this time period there was no playoff structure. Simply, the top two teams would face off in the World Series. Not until 1969 did Major League Baseball implement a playoff system consisting of more teams.

NFL - Green Bay Packers (1961-1967)

Football is a little bit of a different animal.  The main difference in football is of course is the one loss and your done scenario.  This makes pulling off multiple championships extremely difficult, but the Packers, led by quarterback Bart Starr, did manage to win 5 NFL championships in 7 years.  They won 2 in a row in 1961 and 1962 then 3 in a row from 1965 to 1967.  Only the last two were Super Bowl victories but all were championships in the NFL.  There has never been another NFL franchise in history to win 3 championships in a row.  The Packers did it once before in the 1930's.

Close Second: Pittsburgh Steelers (1974-1979)
Led by Hall of Famers Terry Bradshaw, Franco Harris, and Lynn Swann, this team sort of mimics the current Steelers with a superstar at each the quarterback, running back and wide receiver positions.  This trio along with the Steel Curtain, which contained even more future Hall of Famers, helped the Steelers put together 4 Super Bowl wins in 6 years making them arguably the greatest Super Bowl-era dynasty of all time.

Many arguments can be made in crediting these dynasties.  The definition of a dynasty can change depending on the time period because of a myriad of reasons.  The birth of free agency and market expansion should be at the top of the list of what may deter a dynasty.  Free agency completely changed the landscape of sports and will forever make it more difficult to cultivate a dynasty in modern times.  This can be the reason why we have seen the death of the true dynasties such as the Canadiens, Celtics, Yankees, and Packers.  Markets have also expanded over time resulting in more teams saturating leagues making a dynasty more difficult.

Let's have 1980 be the beginning of the modern era for the sake of this article.  It was more or less the beginning of free agency and major league expansions.  Plus, it's a round number and who doesn't like round numbers?

NBA-Chicago Bulls (1991-1998)
The days of Michael Jordan, Scottie Pippen, and Dennis Rodman saw many championships in Chicago. They achieved 6 in this time frame doing it in a pair of 3-peats. Apparently Jordan found winning multiple championships a bit mundane so he left to play baseball before the 1993-1994 season returning to the Bulls in March of 1995. Imagine what could have been if he had stuck around and added a couple more back to back titles to make it 8 in a row!

Close second: L.A. Lakers
Sure, the L.A. Lakers could be in the discussion for best modern dynasty but their wins are very spaced out.  The Lakers had 5 year in between titles in the mid-2000's. There's definitely an argument for the Lakers as they were in 7 NBA Championships in 9 years from 1980-88 and 7 Championships in the 11 year span of the 2000's which is incredibly impressive, but the Bulls winning 6 titles in 8 years shows much more dominance in a short span than the Lakers winning 5 in 9 and 5 in 10 years respectively.  If we were talking about best franchises of all time then it would be a different story but that's a different discussion altogether.

MLB - New York Yankees (1996-2000)

Baseball went through some rough times in the late 90's and early 2000's, but that's through hind sight.  America's national past time was going through a popularity spurt thanks to the spike in homeruns around the league. Mark McGwire and Sammy Sosa had taken the country by storm and the Yankees were at their apex.  The core of Derek Jeter, Jorge Posada, Bernie Williams, Andy Pettitte, and Mariano Rivera were in their prime and it seemed as if nothing could stop them. Winning 4 out of 5, they go down as the greatest MLB dynasty in the modern era. The 3-peat from 1998-2000 was most impressive mainly because they did it by winning every single game except one (Game 3 vs Mets, 2000).

Close second: San Francisco Giants (2010-2014)
Winning 3 in 5 cannot trump what the Yankees did, but it's still worth mentioning here.  The only problem with calling this a dynasty would be that the Giants never won in consecutive years.  In fact, in the years between rings, the Giants didn't even make the playoffs!

NHL - New York Islanders (1980-1983)
The Islanders haven't come close to the glory of the early 80's since.  The roster was stacked.  Mike Bossy, Brian Trottier, Clark Gilles, were just 3 of the many stars that littered the lineups.  The Islanders are the only franchise within the 4 major sports after from 1980 forward to win 4 championships in a row.   The almost won 5 in a row but lost in the finals to the Edmonton Oilers in 1984.

Close second (1984-1990): Coincidentally enough, the Oilers come in as a close second.  These were Gretzky's Oilers. They managed to pull off 5 Stanley Cups in 7 years.  One can easily argue them the better dynasty being that they actually were able to beat the Islanders head to head in what was ultimately a dynasty showdown, but the most important aspect of a dynasty is unfettered consistency. Therefore, the Islanders putting theirs all together back to back allows them to take the proverbial cake.

NFL - New England Patriots (2001-2004)

Whether you like them of not, Tom Brady and Bill Belichick have accomplished some pretty incredible things together.  The Patriots have only missed the playoffs twice in the last 13 years and between 2001 and 2004 raised the Lombardi trophy 3 times.  In those 3 Super Bowl years they went a combined 39-9 during the regular season.

Close second: Dallas Cowboys (1992-1995)

Troy Aikman and Emmit Smith were leading the charge during this dynasty pulling in 3 Super Bowls in 4 years.  I put them behind the Patriots here solely because the Patriots surrounded the years of the dynasty with more winning than the Cowboys did.

As you can plainly see, modern day dynasties cannot compare to those previous. The definition of a dynasty in a sports aficionado's mind must be curbed to fit the times.

Comparing dynasties is not easy especially when it seems so even!  Regular season domination and playoff appearances in surrounding seasons sways a team one way or the other for me when deciding on which is a more successful run.  However, the main ingredient to a dynasty is winning championships. The current Patriots is a perfect example of a misidentified dynasty. Most people tie together the past 15 years and will all the whole thing an incredible run, but the only time they should actually be defined as a dynasty is in the early 2000's as mentioned above.  Since the 2004 season, the Patriots have only won a single Super Bowl. Many define the current Patriots as a dynasty based on their overall winning  and playoff appearances but dynasties are about winning it all,  Championships define dynasties.  Regular season wins and playoff appearances can aid in comparing dynasties, but championships need to be achieved first in order for any argument to hold water.

My interpretation of a dynasty may not be a perfect one, but if anything it should open the floor up to the discussion of the best dynasties of all time and if any modern day team can come close to being compared.

Resources:

<http://www.villanovau.com/resources/bls/history-free-agency-pro-sports/#.Vp2TKFlf3IU>

<http://www.hockey-reference.com> 

<http://www.baseball-reference.com>

<http://www.basketball-rerence.com>

<http://www.espn.go.com> 

<http://www.wikipedia.com> 

Images Resources: 
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<http://newsroom.mohegansun.com/wp-content/uploads/2013/12/BillRussell52.jpg> 

<http://si.wsj.net/public/resources/images/NY-AT406_SPRTS__G_20110202184941.jpg>

<http://assets.nydailynews.com/polopoly_fs/1.1611880!/img/httpImage/image.jpg_gen/derivatives/gallery_1200/derek-jeter-announces-retirement.jpg>

<http://ssreporters.files.wordpress.com/2012/02/tom-brady-sb.jpg>