When You're a Jet (Fan)

There are presently thirty-two teams in the NFL, with twelve which have never  won a Super Bowl. However, several won their championships before the NFL expanded with the creation of the AFL and subsequently, with the merger,  which created the NFC and AFC.

Other teams have also never won a Super Bowl since they started but have made at least one appearance since they were formed in the Super Bowl era and lost. And just to be clear, the Super Bowl Era began in 1966-1967 season, with the first Super Bowl game in January, 1967.

Those early seasons consisted of a fourteen game season in both the NFL and AFL, with each league having an Eastern and Western Division champion, which played ONE playoff game, which decided the contestants to play the second Sunday in January in the AFL-NFL Championship game.

It wasn’t until the 1968-1969 season, with the impending merger to follow in 1969, that the championship game was called the Super Bowl.

And the teams which played that late afternoon/early evening game on January 12, 1969 in Miami’s Orange Bowl were the mighty Baltimore Colts, led by veterans Earl Morrall and the injured Johnny Unitas, and the 19 ½ point underdog New York Jets, piloted by the brash, young wise guy, twenty-five year old upstart, Joe Namath, who confidently boasted that the Jets would crush the Colts. In fact, he guaranteed it.

One that day, I was a seventeen year-old senior in high school, working part-time in a bakery, with no drivers license, still planning to become a priest the following September. LBJ would still be President for eight more days, the Vietnam War still raged and the Beatles were rehearsing to do the Rooftop Concert at the end of that month.

And by 7:30 that night, Joe Namath fulfilled his guarantee by crushing the Baltimore Colts by a score of 16-7. But it wasn’t until late in the fourth quarter that the Colts and Unitas had shown any life at all when they scored their first and only touchdown with less than five minutes to play.

Since that fateful Sunday, the Jets have never played  again in the Super Bowl. They hold the record for the longest drought in the Super Bowl era at fifty-five seasons. And counting. They have played in several conference championships but lost each time.

And yet, as a now seventy-three year-old fan, I still hold out hope that maybe, this will be the year. That is the pain I bear as a loyal, long-suffering fan. My almost forty year-old son keeps a chart of all our teams’ days (Jets - 20,287 days) between championship wins. And he has passed onto his ten year-old son that same pain I introduced to him many years ago.

This year, the Super Bowl will be held on February 9, 2025 at the Ceasar’s Superdome in New Orleans. It will be, I am sure, a rollicking good time for those who will have tickets, and for fans like me who love these games and the party atmosphere around our TV sets.

Ir would be extremely special if the New York Jets are on the field that day. And WIN IT ALL!