Weirdest Teams of All Time

[John Grasso]

Both the Card-Pitt and Phil-Pitt wartime merged teams qualify as "weird" teams.
Both had co-coaches among other oddities.

[TanksAndSpartans]

Going back to mention the merged teams made me think of the Oorang Indians - just quickly skimmed the Wikipedia entry which seemed pretty well written, more weird stuff than not weird. I never noticed the interlocking I/O logo before though - thought that was pretty cool.

[JuggernautJ]

I agree with Mr Grasso and T&S that the Oorang Indians have to be the strangest franchise in NFL History.
When this topic first came up that is the team I thought of first.

One of my favorite entries in Total Football is the "Player Register" for a player known only as "Arrowhead."
On page 494 of Total Football (I) it lists him as having played four games for Oorang in 1923 (two receiving TDs, 12 points). Other than that and his (approximate?) height/weight (5'7", 160#s) there's no other information available on this proud NFLer.... like much of Native American history it has been lost (or told only by the "victors," of whom the Oorang Indians apparently were not one).

I'm surprised no Cardinal teams have been mentioned yet! Plenty of 'weird' ones.
Yes, plenty of weird Cardinal teams. Who else?

If by "weirdest" we mean "unusual" then I nominate the 1947 Cards!
That's the only Cardinals team to win it all... in almost 100 years if NFL history.
(Honorable mention: 2008)

[CSKreager]

A pair of teams that played up and down to the competition

2002 New Orleans Saints (9-7)

Beat 4 playoff teams (Tampa Bay, Green Bay, Pittsburgh, San Francisco)
Lost to 4 last place teams (Cincinnati, Detroit, Minnesota, Carolina)

2003 Vikings (9-7)

Beat 4 playoff teams (GB/SEA/DEN/KC)
Lost to the 4 worst teams in NFL (OAK/Chargers/Cardinals/Giants)

[Retro Rider]

My apologies in advance for sneaking in a CFL oddity, but one of the weirdest teams that I can think of happens to be the CFL's Montreal Alouettes of 1966. Montreal finished third in the Eastern Division with a 7-7 record, good enough for a berth in the Eastern Semi-Final playoff game (a 24-14 loss at Hamilton). On the surface a 7-7 record doesn't appear all that bad but on offense they resembled anything but a playoff team.

1966 Alouettes.jpg (104.18 KiB) Viewed 20303 times

- Montreal was coached by Darrell Mudra, a 200 game winner in the U.S. college ranks. Mudra's style was to coach from the press box - not the sidelines. This would be his only season as a professional head coach. He was inducted into the College Football Hall of Fame in 2000.

- The Alouettes scored 156 points during the 1966 season - the lowest scoring output of any CFL team during the decade of the '60's. Their 11.14 point per game average ranks lower than several of the Canadian League's all-time weakest teams:

1967 Montreal Alouettes (2-12) 11.86 ppg.
1979 Saskatchewan Roughriders (2-14)
12.1 ppg.
1949 Hamilton Wildcats (0-12) 12.25 ppg.
1959 Saskatchewan Roughriders (1-15)
13.25 ppg.
1961 B.C. Lions (1-13-2) 13.43 ppg.
2003 Hamilton Tiger Cats (1-17) 16.2 ppg.

- QB's Bernie Faloney & George Bork combined for a season total 3 TD passes and 20 interceptions

- Placekicker Peter Kemp was the team leader in touchdown receptions with 2 and ranked 3rd on the club in total receptions with 18

- Don Lisbon led the Alouettes in rushing with 1,007 yards. He was the only 1,000 rusher in the Eastern Conference

- The Alouettes 7 win season was the club's high water mark for the entire decade. They would win just 7 games total from 1967-1969.

- Montreal scored 10 points or less in 8 of 14 regular season games played. They capped it off with a 1-0 win over Ottawa on October 30.

https://news.google.com/newspapers?id=q ... %2C6932328

[74_75_78_79_]

’66 Alouettes - nice knowledge drop, Retro! Interesting! I guess they were, pretty much, the CFL version of the ’77 Falcons only they made the playoffs.

EDIT - looking over their schedule just now on the CFL database, I see they generally didn’t give up too many points throughout the season but a CFL version of Gritz Blitz I would imagine not at all. A few stinkers they suffered like a 44-0 dousing at Sask and, two games later, getting thumped at Hamilton, 33-4; Tiger-Cats would beat them, 31-14, penultimate week as well. In addition to the 1-0 final you gave, plenty of other weird scores such as a 4-2 win at Winnipeg and 8-3 & 9-8 losses to both Edmonton & Toronto respectively.

[JohnH19]

Montreal’s 4-2 win against Winnipeg was played on Leo Lewis Sr. night. The Lincoln Locomotive retired partway through the 1966 season after a HOF career as a brilliant all-around RB who was also an excellent receiver and option passer. The second half of the game was played in a downpour.

[74_75_78_79_]

I attended the Iowa at Penn St game in 2004; pretty weird final score of 6-4. Despite a fourth losing season in five years, I felt good about PSU's D right after that game (although, yes, Iowa's QB did telegraph many of his passes) and was optimistic of the near-future. With Michael Robinson at QB, they finished #3 in the nation (to USC/Texas) the following year with an 11-1 record (only loss that nailbiter at Michigan, Henne-to-Manningham).

Back to pro ball and that 8-3 Montreal win over Winnipeg...that strange final score ought to ring some bells on this site! Not sure how many more times before and after that that final score took place in the CFL, but it only happened once in the NFL, and in an historically important game. Also looking at that 44-0 final, Sask over Montreal, I immediately thought of Bears over Dallas '85; and was surprised to see that final score took place numerous times - seven times in NFL, once in AFL.


'1-0'...I wonder if the NFL could ever embrace the rogue play?

[JohnH19]

The score in the Montreal-Winnipeg game was 4-2, not 8-3.

[74_75_78_79_]

The score in the Montreal-Winnipeg game was 4-2, not 8-3.

My mistake. I meant Edmonton 8, Montreal 3.