2007/09 New York Giants
We remember the ’07 Giants for the David Tyree catch and the Super Bowl victory over the undefeated New England Patriots; what we tend to forget is that those same Giants just barely snuck into the playoffs and were considered the furthest thing from a true Super Bowl contender when they took on the Buccaneers in the wildcard round.
In fact, in both of the Giants’ last two championship runs, you would have been hard pressed to find a single person outside of New York (probably within it) who would have picked the G-Men to walk home with the Lombardi Trophy. And at 10-6 in ’07 and 9-7 in ’11, they absolutely looked like less of a threat than the 10-2 Denver Broncos currently do.
These two Giants teams simply reiterate what football has always shown us: Anything can happen!
In both cases, the New England Patriots were clearly the better team. Heck, the Giants probably ran through a couple better teams in their run to the Super Bowl, too. But in the end, it didn’t matter. Today, we talk about Eli Manning‘s two Super Bowl rings, not Tom Brady‘s six.
In those games, we saw a dominant defensive line step up and make Tom Brady’s life a living nightmare; they grabbed their slingshot, and they took down Goliath.
So right now, the Denver Broncos may not look like the best team in the league, but neither did the ’09/’11 New York Giants after Week 13. The difference, though, is that at 10-2, the Broncos still have an opportunity to avoid Wild Card Weekend, only bettering their shot at making another trip to the Super Bowl.
