The Indianapolis Colts...The Atlanta Braves of Football

Football is my favorite sport. Baseball is a distant second but definitely above others. In all sports, though, there is only one champion each year. There are perennial contenders most years and new faces that emerge. Some years a team gets hot at the right time and other times a team dominates from Week 1 or Day 1 to the title game.

This past Sunday was Super Bowl Sunday. The Indianapolis Colts were facing the New Orleans Saints for the right to hoist the Lombardi Trophy and be Super Bowl XLIV Champions. Both teams got to December with undefeated records and it looked like the two would meet in the Super Bowl. At the end, the Saints did the necessary things to put away the game defeat Peyton Manning and the Indianapolis Colts. For most teams, losing in the Super Bowl was be a morale victory that you got that close and who knows if you will be back next year. The Colts are a bit different. You can almost book the Colts playoff ticket right now for next year's playoffs. They will almost certainly win the AFC South and be in the running for homefield advantage and will win at least 12 games. This might sound like bold predictions, but this has been the script in multiple years throughout this past decade.

I started to think about teams like the Colts yesterday as I pondered what could have been on Sunday. Peyton Manning could have gotten his second ring and added more to his legacy. The questions of what if they didn't throw those two games could this team have made history. But the biggest thing that came to mind is this team gets to the 10 yard line every year and only got it into the endzone once. Another team also came to mind. The Atlanta Braves won their division from 1991 to 2005. 14 straight division titles (1994 ended without a champion or division winners) is no easy feat. For the sake of this argument, we will frame the Colts success under Peyton Manning tenure, which began in 1998. Over his 12 seasons, the Colts won their division 6 times including 5 straight from 2003-2007 and for the last seven seasons they have finished with at least 12 wins.

Both teams stack up with stellar numbers, but during the Braves' run they only managed to win one World Series. Likewise, during the Colts' run during this decade they only won one Super Bowl. Division titles all over the place, but two titles between the two teams.

The Atlanta Braves won all those division titles, but what was their final results. In 1991, they got to the World Series before losing in 7 to the Minnesota Twins. In 1992, they got back to the World Series and lost again; this time to the Toronto Blue Jays. In 1993, they got back to another NLCS but fell to the Philadelphia Phillies. After a strike year in 1994, 1995 finally brought the Braves a world title as they defeated the Cleveland Indians. In both 1996 and 1999, the Braves would return to the World Series, but lost to the New York Yankees in both. In 2000, they lost to the St. Louis Cardinals in the NLDS and then the NLCS in 2001 to the Arizona Diamondbacks. The Braves would make the postseason in 2002, 2003, and 2004, but got knocked off in 5 games each time in the NLDS. They would fall in the NLDS in 2005 as well. And from 2006 to 2009, the Braves have missed the postseason, but inched closest last year. So, looking at their run: 7 NLCS appearances, 5 World Series appearances, and only one World Series win. 14 postseason appearances and 1 title doesn't seem very good.

The Braves' short comings however have been echoed by the Colts in the NFL during a similar span. In 1998, the first under Manning at quarterback the team didn't make the postseason, but the next year they rebounded and won their division, but fell to in the Wildcard Round to the Tennessee Titans. They lost in the Wildcard Round in 2000 and didn't make the postseason in 2001. In 2002, they got shutout 41-0 in the Wildcard Round to the New York Jets. In 2003, they got to the AFC Championship Game before losing to the New England Patriots. They would fall the next year to the Patriots again. This time in the Divisional Round. In 2005, they flirted with an undefeated season and dropped a winnable Divisional Round game to the Pittsburgh Steelers. Finally in 2006, the Colts got over the hump defeating their kryptonite in the Patriots in a comeback win in the AFC Championship Game before defeating the Chicago Bears in Super Bowl XLI. In 2007, they fell to their new kryptonite, San Diego Chargers, in the Divisional Round. The Chargers would trip them up again in 2008 in the Wildcard Round. With the Jets eliminating the Chargers, the Colts didn't have to deal with them in 2009 as they beat the Jets to reach Super Bowl XLIV before losing to the New Orleans Saints. To recap, 12 seasons of Peyton Manning at the helm led to 8 divisional crowns, 7 straight and counting 12 win seasons, 3 AFC Championship Game appearances, 2 Super Bowl appearances and 1 Super Bowl championship.

The Indianapolis Colts continue to dominate the regular season in a similar fashion as the Atlanta Braves during their run. Both entered the postseason with championship aspirations, but nearly every year they were sent home earlier than they wanted or just couldn't finish the deal. So, as a fan of the Indianapolis Colts and QB Peyton Manning it is only fair that they are compared to the Atlanta Braves as dominant teams in their respective sports who fail when it matters the most. Sometimes there are teams that are better for one year and that is all that matters. Or a team gets hot and are hard to beat. Or destiny comes into the play and things fall in place. Whatever the reasons, the loss to the Saints on Sunday was another in a string of disappointing losses for a team that started this year 14-0. The Colts have time on their side because they still might have a couple more years before their run like the Braves will hit a wall and their failures will be written larger than their successes. Such is the way of sports.