The Steelers were supposed to be among the best teams in the NFL, if not the best. With a powerful offense and a dominating defense, little could stop them but themselves.
And they did just that. Distractions, holdouts, a player wanting to be traded, a drug issue, on and on. The Steelers of 2017? That too, but these guys have nothing in that regard over their 1977 counterparts.
Forty years ago, the Steelers were in the middle of one of the great dynasties in NFL history. They had won Super Bowls in the seasons of 1974 and 1975 and might have made it a third consecutive in 1976 if injuries to Franco Harris and Rocky Bleier during an easy playoff victory in Baltimore did not derail them in the AFC championship.