Super Bowl curse

The Super Bowl curse or Super Bowl hangover is a phrase referring to one of three things that occur in the National Football League (NFL): Super Bowl participants that follow up with lower-than-expected performance the following year; teams that do not repeat as Super Bowl champions; and host teams of the Super Bowl that have never advanced to the title game on their own home fields.

The phrase has been used to explain both why losing teams may post below-average winning percentages in the following year and why Super Bowl champions seldom return to the title game the following year. The term has been used since at least 1992, when The Washington Post commented that "the Super Bowl Curse has thrown everything it's got at the Washington Redskins. The Jinx that has bedeviled defending champs for 15 years has never been in better form". The phenomenon is attributed by football commentator and former NFL manager Charley Casserly to such elements as "a shorter offseason, contract problems, [and] more demand for your players' time". Casserly also notes that "once the season starts, you become the biggest game on everybody's schedule."

While the first five Super Bowl winners of the 2000s posted above average winning percentages the year following their Super Bowl appearance, the losers of the same games posted below average winning percentages in the follow–up year.

Super Bowl losing teams who went on to poor follow–up performance include:

There have been several exceptions since this curse supposedly began in 1977:

Since 1993, few winning teams have followed up their Super Bowl successes with a second Super Bowl appearance (Denver Broncos, Dallas Cowboys and New England Patriots won; Green Bay Packers and Seattle Seahawks lost), or even advanced to a conference title game in the subsequent season (Dallas Cowboys, Seattle Seahawks). In the Super Bowl era two teams have lost the Super Bowl, then won it the following season. The first was the Dallas Cowboys, who lost Super Bowl V to the Baltimore Colts, but came back in 1971 and defeated the Miami Dolphins in Super Bowl VI. The Dolphins repeated the feat in 1972 when they rallied to go a perfect 17-0, capping the season with a win over the Washington Redskins in Super Bowl VII.

...
Wikipedia