March 29, 2022
It's impossible to compare teams across eras.
The rules change. The quality of the athletes change due to technology, science, training techniques and so on.
The styles change. The 3-point line has only been around since 1979. The spread offense didn't exist a few decades ago.
But who cares. Let's do it anyway.
In the spirit of March Madness, we compiled a 40-team bracket. Managing sports editor Evan Macy, deputy sports editor Shamus Clancy and staff writer Nick Tricome ranked the 40 teams you see in the bracket below and we took the average of the three seedings to create the seedings we will use for this exercise.
coming this week on @thephillyvoice: pic.twitter.com/unti3yYnG7
— shamus (@shamus_clancy) March 15, 2022
How should you vote? Is it for your favorite of the two teams matched up? Which you think is better? Which you think would win a head to head match (if it were possible)? That's entirely up to you.
Today, we'll break down the remaining eight teams in our Elite Eight. Which of these all-time great groups will make it to the Final Four?
Without further ado:
VS.
Who ya got?
Kyle Neubeck: Flyers. I have a heavy bias toward the ’08 Phillies, the first local team to win a title during my lifetime, so I’m not sure I can evaluate them fairly. I was a freshman in college during their postseason run, and there are so many memories I can look back on that convinced me (and most of my social circle) they were destined to win that year. Set aside the premier guys in the middle of the order, and you had moments like Brett Myers earning a walk against Sabathia, Matt Stairs’ pinch-hit bomb, and Joe Blanton’s World Series dinger. They never felt out of a game, and Lidge was always there to shut the door at the end.
I’ll give the edge to the Flyers for two reasons. First, their championship ultimately culminated with them beating an opponent who was clearly the best possible team they could have faced in the Finals. The Bruins had the league’s top scorer and MVP, the best defenseman in the league, and the best record in the league that season. The 08 Rays were very good (and a favorite to open the series, I believe) but only just snuck by the Red Sox to earn their meeting with Philly. Second, I think Bernie Parent was the most dominant player in their respective sports between the Phillies and Flyers. He played a whopping 73 regular-season games and led the league in save percentage, capping off the year by actually improving his save percentage in the playoffs. Having Parent in goal was like having a starting pitcher with Lidge’s 2008 effectiveness for 144 games. Cheat code.
Evan Macy: Flyers. This one is really tough. The '08 Phillies won the year I was 21, and I was a junior at Temple and went to at least two dozen games that season. They're my all-time favorite team. But are they the best? I think the Stanley Cup-winning Flyers have to get the nod here for historical significance.
Shamus Clancy: Flyers. Like Evan, this is a bit tough for me. The '08 Phillies were the first championship team I had seen in this city. I was at Game 5 of the 2008 World Series (both parts!). Still, the '74 Flyers essentially changed the blueprint for sports franchises in Philadelphia. Though the team is nearing its 50th anniversary, they feel like the first modern Philly team and set the tone with their Broad Street Bullies vibes, to say nothing of their 112-point season on the way to hoisting Lord Stanley.
Nick Tricome: Flyers. The Phillies broke a 25-year championship drought and it can't be understated how huge that was for the city (I still go to my parade spot along Broad St. every once in a while just to remember how crazy and happy everyone was that day). But the '08 Phillies were a good baseball team. The '73-74 Flyers were a game-changing hockey team. They didn't just win the Stanley Cup (and fight a lot along the way), they did it playing a style of hockey that changed the NHL. When you shake things up that much, the edge has to go to Bobby Clarke and his toothless smile.
Time to vote:
VS.
Who ya got?
Kyle: Sixers. Picking against the only Super Bowl champions in Philadelphia history is blasphemous, I get it, but like another team we’ll discuss in a moment, the ’67 Sixers are on a very short list of all-time teams in their sport. In the history of the NBA, there are only four teams who surpassed their mark of 68 wins in the regular season, each of them iconic teams in NBA history: the ’96 and ‘97 Bulls, ’16 Warriors, and ’72 Lakers. A brief aside — the 69-win mark for the ’97 Bulls one year after going 72-10 is underplayed in Michael Jordan’s career accomplishments, a staggering level of dominance in back-to-back seasons.
In any case, that Sixers team was recognized as the best team of the NBA’s first 35 years, and deservedly so. Wilt Chamberlain led the NBA in total rebounds and assists, shot a staggering 68.3 percent from the field, and was flanked by multiple Hall of Famers to finally get over the top as Philadelphia’s centerpiece. The Eagles were a great team, one with perhaps an even higher ceiling if Carson Wentz stays healthy, and beating Brady in the big game the way they did will live on in history forever. Relative to their peers, though, a pretty standard great team.
Evan: Sixers. Maybe an unpopular opinion here. I was at the Super Bowl in 2018 and it was the highlight of my career. But the 66-67 is one of the best in NBA history, had an entire roster of Hall of Famers and won an insane 68 regular season games. Sorry Birds.
Shamus: Eagles. The 2017 Eagles are the team that matters more than any in Philly's history. It was bigger than sports. They also throttled the greatest defensive mind of all time and had a nucleus in place that allowed a backup QB to out-duel the best player in the history of the sport along the way. Comparing the '17 Eagles to any other champion in the city's history comes down to a "heroes get remembered, but legends never die" dichotomy. What does "best" really mean? It's a mixture of greatness, legacy, purpose and narrative for me. The Birds may not have been stacked with Hall of Famers like the '67 Sixers, but nothing, sports or otherwise, has embodied the most endearing parts of Philadelphia quite those Eagles.
Nick: Eagles. That Sixers team is legendary, but the thing about the '17 Eagles is they so perfectly embody what Philadelphia is all about, and Jason Kelce's speech captures it beautifully. That team was great, but disregarded by the rest of the football world every step of the way. They were true underdogs. Never good enough until the clock hit zero and the trophy was in their hands. And the best part? No one else can make any excuses, not after they had to topple one of the biggest titans in professional sports to get the job done.
Time to vote:
VS.
Who ya got?
Kyle: Sixers. With all due respect to the last Flyers Stanley Cup winner, the ’83 Sixers have a case as the best single-season NBA team of all-time, which is something I don’t think you could say about the Bullies. Joining a regular Eastern Conference contender was Moses Malone, a multi-time MVP who won his third and final MVP award as the man who pushed Philadelphia over the top. And he didn’t just push them out in front of the competition by a hair, with the Sixers brutalizing the competition in the playoffs in fo-five-fo fashion.
Putting together that sort of season in the context of that decade is even more impressive, given the stranglehold the Celtics and Lakers had on the league during that stretch (the Sixers were the only champion not named Boston or L.A. from 1980-1988). They were a top-five unit on both ends of the floor, their top-end talent flanked by a talented cast of role players. I would rank them high in the list of all-time teams in American sports, period, let alone Philadelphia sports.
Evan: Sixers. This team, like the 67 squad is one of the best in league history. I would contend — and did in 2020 — that those two Sixers versions are the two best teams ever to play in this city.
Shamus: Sixers. Fo' Fi' Fo' says it all.
Nick: Sixers. The '74-75 Flyers pulled off the repeat. But the '82-83 Sixers were one of the most dominant teams the NBA has ever seen. A single loss kept them from a perfect sweep through the entire playoffs. They have to get the edge here.
Time to vote:
VS.
Who ya got?
Kyle: Phillies, though I don’t have any strong leanings on this one.
Evan: Eagles. Once again, gotta give a nod to history. They were the most dominant team in Eagles history. The 1980 Phils were spectacular but even 1980 has a recency bias to it.
Shamus: Phillies. This Phillies squad hits the sweet spot between "important" and "successful" for me. In the franchise's 98th season, they finally won a championship. Michael Jack Schmidt is the greatest third baseman of all time and won National League MVP. Steve Carlton is the greatest left-handed pitcher of all time and won the NL Cy Young Award. More than any other Philly team before I was born, I wish I was able to watch these Phillies for an entire summer.
Nick: Eagles. Like the '08 Phils, the '80 team was a good baseball team. The '60 Eagles? That team is just its own kind of legend. They were dominant, and the stats reflect that. They're also the only team to hand Vince Lombardi a postseason defeat. But moreover, their impact still echoes through the city. My Grandpa, to this day, insists there's never been any other team like them, and Ray Didinger even wrote a stage play about their top receiver. That team was just a unique kind of special.
Time to vote:
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