The San Francisco 49ers averaged a plus-14.8 in the turnover department during their five Super Bowl winning seasons. Other interesting giveaway/takeaway facts: That's how you overcome an offense that gives the football away 44 times like the Silver and Black did that year, and that's how you make up for only out-scoring your opponents by an average of three-points a game. What was the X-factor? Maybe it was the whopping 52 turnovers the defense recorded in the regular season.
Indeed, Oakland missed the playoffs in '79 and '81, sandwiched around a trip to Super Bowl XV as a wild card team in '80. Speaking of those Raiders, their 1980 team is regarded by many as, perhaps, the weakest Super Bowl Champion of all-time. Again, though, it helps to have rosters with guys named Stabler, Biletnikoff, Branch, Tatum, Atkinson, Hendricks, Allen, Plunkett, Millen and Long. The Raiders won three Super Bowls from '76-'83, but they finished with a negative turnover number twice-minus-4 in '76 and an astounding minus-13 in '83. It also helps to have a defensive unit that takes the football away 42 times, like Pittsburgh did that year. Of course, in order to accomplish such a rare feat, you better have a roster filled with guys named Bradshaw, Swann, Stallworth, Harris, Greene, Lambert, Ham and Blount. Interesting fact: The '79 Steelers were one of the six Super Bowl Champions to finish with a negative number in the turnover department, leading the NFL with 52 turnovers and finishing the year at minus-10. Pittsburgh has averaged 37.75 takeaways during its eight Super Bowl seasons, with the lowest total going to the Super Bowl XLIII Championship squad that created 29 turnovers. No Super Bowl winner has recorded less than 25 takeaways in a non-strike season, and only six champions have ever finished with a negative number in the turnover category. The 47 Super Bowl Champions gave the football away an average of 28 times a season (right around Pittsburgh's average in three of the last four years), but the defense took the football away a shade under 37 times a season (almost double the Steelers' combined average of 19 takeaways in '09, '11 and '12).
Turnover football ref pro#
Thanks to Pro Football Reference, I researched the plus/minus ratio of all 47 Super Bowl winners and discovered the average number in that category was a very healthy plus-8.7. Without takeaways, a defense may be strong and efficient, but is it truly dominant? And furthermore, can a team with a poor plus/minus ratio go on to achieve championship success?Īfter taking a look at some Super Bowl history, I'd have to say the answer is, "not very often." Pittsburgh's defense did perform admirably, holding the Browns to 238 yards and keeping the team in the game until the very end, but was it a complete defensive effort? For my money, Cleveland's defense had the more superior performance because takeaways are every bit a part of a dominant defense as total yards and sacks. "Pittsburgh had the better defense because it had to make up for its offense giving the football away eight times!" Few fans would even give the Browns' defense any credit for actually creating the turnovers, and instead, placed the blame on the running backs, Charlie Batch and the rest of the inept Steelers' offense for "giving the ball away" so many times. Maybe it's not much of a surprise, but most Steelers fans argued that their defensive unit was the more superior one that day. Regarding the giveaway/takeaway debate, maybe the most heated arguments among fans and pundits in 2012 had to do with a Pittsburgh defense that managed to finish first in total yards for a second straight season despite, once again, finishing near the bottom in takeaways-the unit finished 25th in total takeaways with 20 after finishing dead-last in 2011 with only 15.īecause Dick Lebeau's unit finished high in several key defensive categories, many people wanted to dismiss the lack of takeaways and still considered the defense a dominant force-most notably in the aftermath of the Week 12 loss in Cleveland, where the Browns had eight takeaways to Pittsburgh's one. The lone exception was the 2010 Steelers team that finished +17 in the giveaway/takeaway category, and not coincidentally, appeared in Super Bowl XLV. The result, two missed playoff years and a one and done in the wild card round. In fact, turnovers and lack of takeaways have been a problem for Pittsburgh in three of the past four years, where the offense has averaged over 27 turnovers a season, while the defense has averaged 19 takeaways. Indeed, for the second season in a row, Pittsburgh finished in the red in the turnover department with a minus-10 for the season (in 2011, the Steelers finished minus-13 in that category).
One of the topics discussed often centered around turnovers, takeaways, and the Steelers' lack of success in both areas. Like most years that end with an 8-8 record, folks in Steeler Nation engaged in many long and heated debates during the 2012 season.
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