Since we haven’t heard from The Whisteblower in a while, here was a little gold from right before the kickoff of Thursday Night Football on NFL Network.
Mike Mayock was talking about Kansas City’s awful turnover differential (-13; it was actually -18), and said this line in regards to it:
“I don’t care if you’re the 79 Steelers, you are not winning football games turning the ball over.”
That’s fine, except Mayock could not have picked a worse example than the 1979 Pittsburgh Steelers.
The 1979 Steelers turned the ball over 52 times (worst in the league), and still went 12-4 in the regular season. They even led the league in scoring as well (416 points). Their turnover differential was -10, so it’s not like the defense balanced things out that much.
In the playoffs, the Steelers continued turning the ball over, with 8 giveaways in the three games. They still won the Super Bowl. Terry Bradshaw was Super Bowl MVP despite still throwing three interceptions in the game.
Everyone gets it. “Turnovers are bad, mmkay?” But Mayock could not have picked a worse example to make his point.
This is probably going to be the highlight of the night watching this awful game between San Diego and Kansas City.
Update 8:57 P.M.: Mayock is in a battle with the Chiefs, who just turned the ball over again, to see who can have the worst night. After the Chiefs fumbled on a third-down screen, Mayock said it wouldn’t have mattered as they would have turned the ball over on downs. No, not even thinking it was fourth down, but thinking it was third down.
Wow. What ever happened to the punt and better field position?
Update 11:01 P.M.: After a pick six by the Chiefs, Mayock went to the well for the third time on the 79 Steelers.
Captain Comeback: NFL Analysis by Scott Kacsmar 
I hate Mike Mayock and think he’s terrible as a color commentator (knowing where everyone was taken in the draft doesn’t make you knowledgeable about football…), but his example of the ’79 Steelers makes perfect sense. He was saying that even if the Chiefs were among the best in the NFL at overcoming a lot of turnovers (as you have stated that the ’79 Steelers were), they are committing simply too many turnovers to be successful. Obviously the Chiefs aren’t that, but if they WERE, they’d still be losing.
But if they were like the 79 Steelers, they would be able to win games despite the turnovers, because that’s what the 79 Steelers did. A lot of winning. He said you can’t win games with all these turnovers, which is obviously true for most teams, but the 79 Steelers are the last example you would want to use.