The numbers are self-evident: Win or lose Sunday night, Bill Belichick and the New England Patriots have put together one of the best runs in NFL history. Since 2001, the team has made seven Super Bowl appearances, with four wins (and another possible this week), and it has achieved a level of sustained success unheard of in the modern NFL. Exactly where does this stretch rank among football dynasties, though? Well, it depends on how you define dynasty.

Do two titles in three years qualify as a dynasty? What about three in five? The end points for runs of dominance have always been up for debate. So rather than pick one definition and stick to it, we went looking for the best team over any number of years. The table below shows the top teams over a given period — from the best one-year teams, to the best team over a quarter-century, based on FiveThirtyEight’s Elo ratings:

BEST DYNASTY SECOND-BEST THIRD-BEST # OF YEARS TEAM AVG. ELO TEAM AVG. ELO TEAM AVG. ELO 1 Patriots 2007 1824 Patriots 2004 1816 Bears 1985 1796 2 Cowboys 1992-93 1786 Patriots 2003-04 1782 Dolphins 1972-73 1779 3 Cowboys 1992-94 1759 Dolphins 1972-74 1751 Steelers 1974-76 1743 4 Cowboys 1992-95 1751 Patriots 2004-07 1747 49ers 1989-92 1734 5 Patriots 2003-07 1747 Steelers 1975-79 1727 49ers 1988-92 1725 6 Patriots 2003-08 1732 49ers 1989-94 1727 Steelers 1974-79 1726 7 49ers 1988-94 1722 Patriots 2003-09 1713 Patriots 2010-16 1713 8 49ers 1987-94 1718 Patriots 2003-10 1713 Steelers 1972-79 1700 9 Patriots 2003-11 1715 49ers 1987-95 1715 Steelers 1972-80 1689 10 Patriots 2003-12 1714 49ers 1987-96 1709 Steelers 1972-81 1677 11 49ers 1984-94 1712 Patriots 2003-13 1711 Cowboys 1971-81 1671 12 Patriots 2003-14 1714 49ers 1984-95 1710 Cowboys 1970-81 1670 13 Patriots 2004-16 1710 49ers 1984-96 1706 Cowboys 1970-82 1667 14 Patriots 2003-16 1713 49ers 1984-97 1700 Cowboys 1970-83 1663 15 Patriots 2002-16 1702 49ers 1984-98 1697 Cowboys 1970-84 1655 16 Patriots 2001-16 1700 49ers 1983-98 1692 Cowboys 1970-85 1647 17 49ers 1981-97 1685 Patriots 2000-16 1684 Cowboys 1970-86 1637 18 49ers 1981-98 1683 Patriots 1999-2016 1673 Cowboys 1970-87 1628 19 49ers 1980-98 1666 Patriots 1998-2016 1665 Packers 1994-2012 1617 20 Patriots 1997-2016 1662 49ers 1981-2000 1654 Packers 1995-2014 1614 21 Patriots 1996-2016 1660 49ers 1981-2001 1651 Packers 1995-2015 1614 22 Patriots 1995-2016 1650 49ers 1981-2002 1645 Packers 1995-2016 1615 23 Patriots 1994-2016 1646 49ers 1981-2003 1639 Packers 1994-2016 1614 24 Patriots 1993-2016 1635 49ers 1980-2003 1628 Packers 1993-2016 1611 25 Patriots 1992-2016 1621 49ers 1980-2004 1615 Cowboys 1971-95 1611 The top dynasties in NFL history, by number of years

That the 2007 Pats (undefeated until a loss against the New York Giants in the Super Bowl) are the top one-year team of all time, despite not winning the title, isn’t all that surprising. But the Patriots’ dynasties being at the top of the longer-term ranges is. Consider that the Pats claimed the top spot for the 25-year stretch despite a dreadful 2-14 1992 season, when they were coached by Dick MacPherson, as well as a couple painful years during Bill Parcells’ brief tenure, which also included a Super Bowl appearance following the 1996 season.

In the in-between lengths, New England owns many but not all of the top spots. It never had as dominant a three- or four-year run as the Cowboys in the 1990s, but at the five-year mark, New England begins a run of taking a top-two spot in most ranges, trading off occasionally with the 49ers. But by the time we get into the 20-year windows, with Walsh and Montana having given way to Mooch and Garcia, even San Francisco begins to fade.

And we haven’t even accounted for the NFL’s modern era of parity yet, although things begin to look a little unfair once we do. If we look at the post-Cowboys-era NFL, beginning in 1997, the Patriots take the top spot in every dynasty range, from one year to 20 years, except for the three-year range, which Seattle locked down from 2013 to 2015.

ALL-TIME BEST DYNASTIES BEST DYNASTIES SINCE 1997 # OF YEARS TEAM AVG. ELO TEAM AVG. ELO 1 Patriots 2007 1824 Patriots 2007 1824 2 Cowboys 1992-93 1786 Patriots 2003-04 1782 3 Cowboys 1992-94 1759 Seahawks 2013-15 1743 4 Cowboys 1992-95 1751 Patriots 2004-07 1747 5 Patriots 2003-07 1747 Patriots 2003-07 1747 6 Patriots 2003-08 1732 Patriots 2003-08 1732 7 49ers 1988-94 1722 Patriots 2003-09 1713 8 49ers 1987-94 1718 Patriots 2003-10 1713 9 Patriots 2003-11 1715 Patriots 2003-11 1715 10 Patriots 2003-12 1714 Patriots 2003-12 1714 11 49ers 1984-94 1712 Patriots 2003-13 1711 12 Patriots 2003-14 1714 Patriots 2003-14 1714 13 Patriots 2004-16 1710 Patriots 2004-16 1710 14 Patriots 2003-16 1713 Patriots 2003-16 1713 15 Patriots 2002-16 1702 Patriots 2002-16 1702 16 Patriots 2001-16 1700 Patriots 2001-16 1700 17 49ers 1981-97 1685 Patriots 2000-16 1684 18 49ers 1981-98 1683 Patriots 1999-2016 1673 19 49ers 1980-98 1666 Patriots 1998-2016 1665 20 Patriots 1997-2016 1662 Patriots 1997-2016 1662 All-time dynasties and dynasties since 1997, by number of years

How we qualify success is a big part of how we define a dynasty, so a quick note on the method we’re using here: Elo ratings are a favorite around FiveThirtyEight because they are relatively simple to calculate and don’t require many points of input, making it possible to apply them to time periods when data collection wasn’t very good. Want to know if the Cleveland Spiders of the 1890s were the sorriest team in baseball history? Elo can do that.

The price of that simplicity is, well, a fairly simplistic stat, without the benefit of modern advancements like player tracking data in the NBA or PITCHf/x in MLB. Elo doesn’t know about star players coming or going or fortuitous bounces or egregious penalty calls — it just knows who won, who lost, and by how much, and trusts that the specifics will even themselves out over time.

While this can complicate things when trying to use Elo to make predictions (as with the 2016 Raiders), the stat is much stronger when it looks backward because it struggles to immediately pick up a team’s rises and declines.

Public perception tends to lag when a traditionally bad team gets good, or a traditionally good team goes all to hell. And football is less dependent on individual players than basketball, where LeBron James can leave town and send the Cavaliers to the lottery for nearly half a decade. So when we see the Patriots maintaining these high ratings across different eras and team compositions, what we’re seeing isn’t just sustained performance, but sustained relevance.





FiveThirtyEight: The Patriots must stop Julio Jones