What makes an undefeated team lose? Forget that for a moment. What makes a favored team lose? Is it some sort of cosmic retribution for speaking out in the media? Is it payback for the sort of hubris people often associate with great teams? Is it something as simple as blowing a game? With the New Orleans Saints now at 13-1, the Minnesota Vikings at 11-3 (losers of two of their past three games), and the Arizona Cardinals still stinging from their December 14th loss to the San Francisco 49ers, there?s no better time to look at why good to great teams lose. The Indianapolis Colts? supposed pursuit of the 2007 New England Patriots? 16-0 regular season record adds to the fray ? if the Colts lose this season or in the playoffs, it?ll be all over the front page of every major sports section. Fans don?t want to believe that their undefeated team is capable of being outclassed. It?s a lousy play call, it?s a freak injury, it?s a stupid turnover... it?s an excuse. Sometimes the underdog is actually a really good team. This stems, of course, from the difference in culture between a bottom-feeder and a team that narrowly misses the playoffs. None of the aforementioned teams lost to a bottom-feeder. The Vikings trounced the Lions twice, just as the Cardinals roasted the Rams. The Saints have fricasseed so many bad teams that the smell is starting to overpower the Superdome. It makes sense ? teams win over two thirds of their games by, well, winning a lot, just as teams that win less than one third of their games get there by losing a lot. The teams in that middle third can?t be expected to win or lose any particular game. Many are there due to their own injuries (Carolina) or boneheaded mistakes (San Francisco). Many, like the maligned Dallas Cowboys (who, for those keeping track, have the same record as the sweetheart status Cardinals despite playing in a tougher division), aren?t consistent enough to win as many games as New Orleans has. These spoilers all have a few things in common. They all have good coaching, they all play with heart, and they all have at least a few players who can single-handedly change games. The idea that San Francisco had no business beating Arizona, that Carolina had no business beating Minnesota, or that Dallas had no business beating New Orleans, is patently absurd. If anything, those were exactly the results that should?ve been expected. (I?ll admit I balked on the Cowboys/Saints game, if only because I seem to have overestimated New Orleans?s home-field advantage.) Teams have a fun way of correcting their records; an overachieving team can drop a game easily, and an underachieving team always has that little extra ferocity in its step. Masquerading at the Top New Orleans is not a 16-0 team. This was demonstrated in a lackluster showing against the Rams (really?), a game the Saints only won by five points and would probably have lost to any other team in the league. As if to prevent anyone from arguing against that ugly truth, the Saints then proceeded to win an overtime squeaker over Washington (read: a team nowhere near as good as Dallas) when the Redskins? kicker shanked a 23-yard field goal a high school kicker could have hit. If the Saints continued to play like they did in those two games, any self-respecting playoff contender would beat them handily. I still haven?t chalked up the Saints? season-ender in Carolina as a win, for one. The Cowboys, conversely, had at least the talent of an 8-5 team and probably more. They lost two heartbreakers to the New York Giants, a season series the teams traditionally split, and blew a goal line opportunity against San Diego so horribly that it got 1500 words out of me a bit over a week ago. This is a team with loads of talent, with good defensive coaching from Wade Phillips, and, for the superstitious out there, one that goes 9-5 a lot more often than it goes 8-6. The game was theirs to win. An interesting comparison to make is with the 2007 New England Patriots, who, of course, finished 16-0 and then lost in the Super Bowl. The misconception about that team is that it dominated everyone. The Philadelphia Eagles, Baltimore Ravens and the Giants (remember those Giants from somewhere else that season?) all played New England so tough that the Patriots were lucky to emerge from all of those games. That Patriots team, talent-wise, was likely about a 14-2 team, but overachieved to 16-0. Had it been a 14-2 Patriots team losing in the Super Bowl, there would not have been nearly the commotion. There probably hasn?t been a single undefeated-calibre team since the inception of the 16-game regular season. The closest ones were probably the 15-1 1985 Chicago Bears, who continued to impress in the playoffs, and the 1994 49ers, who only finished 13-3 due to what was brutal parity at the time. These Saints clearly weren?t a 16-0 team. They had to lose sometime. Against a highly talented Cowboys team scrambling for a wildcard spot is as good as any. Favre?s Fall from Favor Minnesota?s malaise came differently. Prior to the Cardinals game (which isn?t mentioned in the same breath as Cowboys/Saints even though it should be), Brett Favre only had three interceptions on the season. Being known for throwing interceptions, Favre had suddenly turned into more of a media and fan darling earlier this season than at any time since his MVP seasons in Green Bay. Many audaciously proclaimed that this was the best season of Favre?s career; more conservative analysts commented on Minnesota?s great job of reining in Favre?s frenetic tendencies, making him a crucial cog in a potent offense. Favre then experienced an in-season version of the Sports Illustrated curse. It goes as such: a player featured on the front of Sports Illustrated would typically have a worse season afterward, his play supposedly hexed by the magazine. In reality, the reason for the player?s placement on the cover was almost always that the player?s previous season was considerably better than his previous output. The following season, the player would then regress back to his normal level. Favre?s regression has come swift and hard, and it?s happened in a situation that made sense. The Vikings? most recent loss, in Carolina, was to a team with playoff-level talent that hadn?t been playing that way. The Panthers? 0-3 start was easy to write off to historically poor quarterback and receiver play, but the absence of all-world strong safety Chris Harris was just as damaging. The Panthers are 6-5 with Harris this season, with wins and losses alike coming no matter who?s been behind center. Unsurprisingly, it was Harris who was in the middle of two Minnesota turnovers on Sunday night. An interception-prone quarterback who?s thrown an eerily low number of them in the house of a vicious defense with its leader looking like someone from The Exorcist... was the Vikings? loss seriously that much of a shock? 49 Reasons to Cry Exactly why people think the Cardinals can reach the Superbowl again is a mystery to me, but that aside, they do have a better record than San Francisco. Most pundits (not me!) anticipated an Arizona win in Candlestick Park, because, why not? Eight wins is greater than five, the 49ers were 2-6 in their last eight games, and dumping on Mike Singletary?s great coaching job has become the biggest fad since Pogs. To all those who praise the Cardinals, keep in mind that they?re only 9-5, were only 8-4 at the time of that 49ers game, and only finished 9-7 last season. Their losses, unlike those suffered by the Cowboys, Panthers and 49ers, haven?t tended to be close ones cost by mental mistakes. When the Cardinals lose, it?s generally deserved. To understand why the 49ers lost six of eight games before manhandling the playoff-bound Cardinals, look no further than the team?s play-calling breakdown. During their 3-1 start (would?ve been 4-0 but for a last-second stroke of luck on the Vikings? part in the Metrodome), the 49ers ran the ball 48% of the time. During their 2-6 midseason slump, they ran the ball only 32% of the time. Their defense also played much better in that start, certainly not putting on a humiliating display like in their 45-10 October loss to the Atlanta Falcons. All the 49ers were doing against Arizona was channeling the start of the season. They accepted Alex Smith and Vernon Davis having increased roles in the offense, but overrode those tendencies with classic Mike Singletary football. Frank Gore bludgeoned the Arizona defense for 167 yards and the defense actually did force most of those seven turnovers, despite pontificating to the contrary. The score was only so close because the 49ers use field position, not points, to win games (incredibly anomalistic, I know); to that San Francisco team, pinning an opponent in its own red zone is often just as important as a score. To those unfamiliar with the concept of running the ball and playing merciless defense, it wins games. With a couple easy upcoming dates against the Rams and Lions, this San Francisco team will probably still finish 8-8 despite the hair-thin Vikings loss and an embarrassingly blown game against Seattle. That isn?t a team that has no business beating a division winner. No One Here?s Bad Picking a favorite to win isn?t only about the favorite. The game isn?t just about the more talented team. Every game has two teams playing it, which should be excruciatingly obvious yet seems to fly over the heads of those who are suddenly shocked when a team that?s won almost half of its games wins another one. There are teams that fold easily, and all from the .500 to the (ones who think they?re) perfect feast on those teams. The manner in which the 14-0 Colts ground the Rams into a fine powder, for example, was really no more impressive than the massacre the 6-8 49ers laid on those same Rams three weeks earlier. None of the Saints, Vikings or Cardinals lost those games to the Rams, to the Lions, or to any other team that gets routed most weeks. To bring the Saints? formerly undefeated record back into consideration, the 2007 Patriots (albeit only in the Superbowl), the 2005 Colts (started 13-0), the 1998 Broncos (started 13-0), and many others all lost to teams that specifically weren?t bottom-feeders. All teams that beat those three teams or this year?s Saints have finished 8-8 or better. To beat a good team, it takes a good team. There?s a difference between a favorite and a lock. When up against a team with playoff-level talent, it?s rare that the team with the better record ever appears in the second category. NOTE: The bit on the Sports Illustrated curse actually isn?t mine. I learned it from a statistics professor I had when in university. Oddly, she isn?t a football fan, just a lover of statistics. Thanks to her for showing that what?s learned in school can have a practical application! Matthew Gordon can be reached at matthewpmgordon@gmail.com