Make that the '72 Dolphins, the '07 Patriots- and the '34 Bears!

Not to quibble or anything, but everybody is saying that the New England Patriots last night became only the second team in NFL history to go undefeated during the regular season.

While I join football fans everywhere in congratulating the Pats for this feat, it needs to be pointed out that what everybody is saying is, in fact, wrong. The 2007 Patriots are not the second, but the third team to do so.

The 1934 Chicago Bears had a regular season record of 13-0, losing for the only time to the New York Giants in the NFL championship game. The Bears led at halftime, 10-3, on a field so badly frozen that nobody wearing cleats could get any traction.

But the Giants' coach, Steve Owen, had a brainstorm. He sent equipment manager Abe Cohen over to Manhattan College, where Cohen found a supply of sneakers for the New York players.

The Giants wore the sneakers during the second half, while the Bears continued to slip and slide around the ice-covered field in their cleats.

Final score: Giants 30, Bears 10.

ADDENDUM: As embarassing as this is for a Bears' fan with a penchant for history, I was wrong.

Make that the '72 Dolphins, the '07 Patriots- and both the '34 and '42 Bears.

That's right. What the Patriots accomplished yesterday, the Bears have already done- twice.

In 1942- the year after World War II began for the United States- the season was only eleven games long. After winning the NFL championship the two previous seasons, he Bears won all eleven regular season games, only to lose to the Washington Redskins 14-6 in that year's NFL title game.

By the way, one commenter has already suggested that the reason why so many sports journalists are saying that the '72 Dolphins and the '07 Patriots are the only teams to finish the season undefeated is that they played regular seasons of sixteen games, whereas the '34 Bears played a season only thirteen games long, and the '42 Bears one of only eleven. This is incorrect.

The regular season for the '72 Dolphins was fourteen games long.

It's true that the Greise/Czonka/Warfield Dolphins and the current Patriots are the only teams to win sixteen games in a row in the same season, but two of the Dolphins wins were in the playoffs. That's not the same thing as going undefeated during the regular season.

And so, in the most widespread and indefensible journalistic blunder since the media, by and large, declined to correct the yahoos and went along with the myth that the current milennium began in 2000 rather thatn 2001, the sports world is being misinformed about the historical significance of the Pats' win yesterday.

In fact, four teams in NFL history have gone undefeated throughout the regular season- and two of them wore the navy blue and burnt orange of the Chicago Bears.

ADDENDUM II: This year, of course, the Bears will be watching the playoffs from home.

Yesterday, the only thing at stake was a higher draft pick if the Bears lost. Of course, they beat the New Orleans Saints, 33-25.

Kyle Orton might well be the answer at QB. At least he doesn't lose games single handed, the way Rex has so often.