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Sun. Jan 03, 2010

Breaking A Four Decade Hex

The hex is over. No, not the “Hex of the ‘Naughts,” the decade of 2000-2009 that so recently ended. This is a much longer hex. Four years ago, I wrote about what was at that time The Thirty Nine Year Hex

Today, this hex turned the Atlanta Falcons into a sad puddle of loser. Again.

I need to make sure you understand the nature of this. This is not just some fan peeved because his team lost … again. This is a factual anomaly. It’s one thing to say “the Falcons have never ever been able to put two winning seasons together back to back in their thirty nine year history.” It’s another to note that in all of professional sports history in North America … baseball, basketball, hockey, soccer, anything … among hundreds of teams, no team comes close to matching this feat. If I recall, the closest was a 32 year run by some minor league hockey team.

Four decades is supernatural. A hex.

The hex has had a 43 year run, one that confounded the team owner, Arthur Blank, so much that at first he didn’t believe it: “I mean, to never have back to back winning seasons — they told me that in the middle of the transaction when I was buying the team and I didn’t believe them. I said, ‘That can’t be accurate,’ and then I looked it up.”

Over the next few years, he discovered not only was it accurate, it was painful:

The owner has compared it at various times to: 1., a Hester Prynne-like mark of shame, or 2., tooth decay. The former quarterback considers it “embarrassing,” a stain on entire generations of players.

There is nothing quite like this situation elsewhere in professional sport. No one else has played nearly so long without happening upon back-to-back winning seasons. In baseball, the Kansas City Royals are the furthest removed from consecutive winning seasons, last recording the accomplishment in 1988 and 1989.

In 2008 the Falcons had an improbably successful year under a rookie GM, rookie head coach, and rookie starting quarterback. That unique combination created an 11-5 record, a (short) trip to the playoffs, and some seriously inflated expectations for the 2009 season.

Those expectations were not met. For various reasons the Falcons hopes for the playoffs ended three weeks ago, when they had a 6-7 record, and three games left. But rather than slack away the rest of the season, the Falcons won all three final games. Including a 20-10 victory over Tampa Bay on Sunday that secured the deal.

11-5 last year, 9-7 this year. The hex is finally over.

Let’s go for three in a row. C’mon, how hard can it be?