Welcome to the MMQB’s Quarter-Century Week. All week we’ll be publishing lists, rankings and columns looking back at the past 25 NFL seasons. This post will be updated with links to those stories below as they are published.
The NFL was different in the year 2000. Do you remember how different?
For starters, the regular season began on Labor Day Weekend. Then the Super Bowl was wrapped up in January.
There were teams in San Diego, St. Louis and Oakland, of course, but not in Houston or Los Angeles.
The Cardinals played in the NFC East. The Seahawks played in the AFC West. The AFC Central had six teams. Because the league had 31 teams, the Bengals had a bye in Week 1!
Andy Reid was the coach in Philadelphia, Tony Dungy in Tampa and Tom Coughlin in Jacksonville. All would later win Super Bowls elsewhere. Reggie White played for—any guesses?—the Panthers.
It was the first year for Paul Brown Stadium, and the final one for Mile High and Three Rivers. The Seahawks played at Husky Stadium, and several teams regularly played actual NFL games atop the dirt of an MLB infield.
Dennis Miller was in the Monday Night Football booth, and there were only four Thursday games the whole season.
Ed McCaffrey, Joey Porter and Marvin Harrison were all in the league (the latter two were not yet called Sr.).
That’s before we even get to the stylistic trends and the way the game has changed on the field: more mobile quarterbacks, more aggressive fourth-down tactics and all sorts of player-safety rules.
The game has changed in ways, big and small. So join The MMQB’s staff of writers and editors this week as we look back on that season and celebrate the greatest NFL players, teams and moments of the 25 years in between.
MMQB Quarter-Century Week
Monday: The MMQB All-Quarter Century Teams
MMQB writers and editors voted on the best players of the past 25 years, filling out first-, second- and third-team ballots for offense, defense and specialists.
Monday: The 2000 NFL Season Was a Strange Year Between Two Eras
Albert Breer writes a retrospective on a season when two teams with middling offenses reached the Super Bowl, franchises were still learning how to navigate free agency and a comedian was hired to call Monday Night Football.
Tuesday: The 25 Best NFL Teams of the Past 25 Years
Matt Verderame sifts through the best of two dynasties, the champions with dominant one-year peaks and even some teams that fell short of the Super Bowl.
Wednesday: The 25 Best NFL Games of the Past 25 Years
Gilberto Manzano looks back at the legendary comebacks, shootouts and Super Bowls we still can’t stop talking about.
This article was originally published on www.si.com as Welcome to The MMQB’s Quarter-Century Week.