2002 NFL season

• 1. Introduction

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  The 2002 NFL season opened with 32 teams for the first time in league history. Houston had a franchise again, and the arrival of the Texans forced the most sweeping realignment in the NFL's modern era: eight divisions, four teams each, built to last. But the season would be remembered for more than paperwork. A tie game broke a five-year drought. Marvin Harrison caught more passes in a single season than anyone ever had. And on the 26th of January, 2003, the Tampa Bay Buccaneers routed the Oakland Raiders 48-21 in Super Bowl XXXVII at Qualcomm Stadium in San Diego, the most lopsided championship result in years. What made that Buccaneers defense so dominant? How did a league still reeling from September 11 hold itself together through a transformation this large? And why did the Seattle Seahawks cross conferences twice in a career that most franchises never attempt once?

• 2. Houston Changes Everything

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  On the 18th of February, 2002, the Houston Texans held their expansion draft, and with the very first pick they chose Tony Boselli, an offensive tackle from the Jacksonville Jaguars. Two months later, at the Theater at Madison Square Garden, the regular draft opened and the Texans again held the first selection, taking quarterback David Carr out of Fresno State University. The franchise was building from scratch, and the NFL had to reorganize around them.

  Three AFC teams had a legal claim on one another. Cincinnati, Cleveland, and Pittsburgh were bound by an agreement forged in the wake of the 1995 Cleveland Browns relocation controversy; any realignment proposal was required to keep all three in the same division. That constraint shaped the AFC North before any other decisions were made.

  The politics in the AFC South were less formal but no less contested. The owners of the Jacksonville Jaguars, Tennessee Titans, and Houston Texans tried to persuade Dolphins owner Wayne Huizenga to move Miami into the new division, which would have displaced the Indianapolis Colts. Huizenga declined, keeping the Dolphins with their longtime rivals in the AFC East.

  With the scheduling calendar now balanced at 32 teams, the league could restore the format it had used before 1999, when no team received a bye in the first three or last seven weeks of the season. An odd number of franchises had created scheduling gaps from 1999 to 2001, a situation that had briefly intersected with crisis when the San Diego Chargers held a bye during the week of the September 11 attacks. The expansion of the bracket also changed the playoff structure: four division winners and two wild cards per conference replaced the previous three-and-three arrangement.

• 3. The Seahawks Cross Twice

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  Seattle became the first team since 1977 to switch conferences, and when they moved from the AFC West back to the NFC West in 2002, they accomplished something no other franchise in NFL history had done: the crossing of conferences twice. The Seahawks had originally played in the NFC West in their first season, 1976, before moving to the AFC. Now they came home, along with a new stadium and new uniforms.

  The Arizona Cardinals moved in the opposite direction geographically, shifting from the NFC East to the NFC West. Owner Bill Bidwill was publicly disappointed by the decision but said he would accept it.

  The Atlanta Falcons, Carolina Panthers, and New Orleans Saints arrived in the newly formed NFC South from the old NFC West, joined by the Tampa Bay Buccaneers from the NFC Central. For Tampa Bay, the realignment was an afterthought. A championship was coming regardless.

• 4. Tampa Bay's Defense

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  Derrick Brooks, the Tampa Bay linebacker, won the Defensive Player of the Year award in 2002, and the numbers behind the Buccaneers' defense that season make the honor feel inevitable. Tampa Bay allowed only 196 points during the regular season, the fewest in the NFL. They also surrendered fewer total yards than any other team, finishing at 4,044. Their passing defense was the tightest in the league at 2,490 yards allowed, and cornerback Brian Kelly led the entire NFL with 8 interceptions.

  Martin Gramatica, the Tampa Bay kicker, made 32 field goals, the most by any kicker that year. Dexter Jackson, the safety, was named Super Bowl Most Valuable Player after the Buccaneers' 48-21 victory over Oakland on the 26th of January, 2003. That score marked the last Super Bowl held in January and the last to be hosted in San Diego's Qualcomm Stadium.

  Jon Gruden had arrived in Tampa Bay through one of the more unusual transactions in league history. The Oakland Raiders traded Gruden to the Buccaneers in exchange for two first-round draft picks, two second-round picks, and cash. He had coached Oakland the previous season. His replacement in Oakland, Bill Callahan, led the Raiders all the way to the Super Bowl, only to face the defense Gruden had been building.

• 5. Records Fall

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  Marvin Harrison of the Indianapolis Colts caught 143 passes during the 2002 season, breaking the record of 123 that Herman Moore of Detroit had set in 1995. Harrison also led the league in receiving yards with 1,722. The record stood as a statement about how the game was changing around the quarterback position.

  On the 29th of September, Jerry Rice, playing for the Oakland Raiders, surpassed Walter Payton's career record for yards from scrimmage. Rice reached 21,284 yards, edging past Payton's mark of 21,264, set across the running back's career from 1975 to 1987. That same month, on the 27th of October, Emmitt Smith of the Dallas Cowboys broke Payton's career rushing record of 16,726 yards.

  Michael Vick of the Atlanta Falcons set the record for rushing yards by a quarterback in a single game on the 1st of December against Minnesota, gaining 173 yards. The previous record of 150 had belonged to Tobin Rote of the Green Bay Packers, set against Chicago on the 18th of November, 1951. Chris McAlister of the Baltimore Ravens returned a missed field goal 107 yards against Denver on the 30th of September, breaking the previous mark of 104 yards set by Aaron Glenn of the New York Jets in 1998.

  Rich Gannon of the Oakland Raiders won the league's Most Valuable Player award after throwing for 4,689 yards, while Tom Brady of New England led the NFL with 28 passing touchdowns. Priest Holmes of the Kansas City Chiefs scored 24 touchdowns and 144 points, winning Offensive Player of the Year. Kansas City also set the league record for fewest fumbles in a season, losing only 2.

• 6. Reebok, Rooftops, and the Broadcast Booth

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  Reebok took over as the official uniform supplier for all 32 NFL teams in 2002, replacing the system in which each franchise held individual contracts with separate athletic suppliers. When Reebok announced in 2000 that the deal would require every team to wear new uniforms, several owners objected. Pittsburgh Steelers owner Dan Rooney was the most vocal critic, and Reebok eventually stepped back from the blanket requirement. Only the Buffalo Bills and Seattle Seahawks redesigned their uniforms entirely. Reebok did shorten sleeves and tighten jersey fits league-wide, a change most visible on the Indianapolis Colts, whose shoulder stripes were truncated to the top of the shoulders.

  A legal challenge to the Reebok arrangement wound its way to the Supreme Court of the United States. American Needle, which had previously supplied a number of teams, sued over the exclusivity of the deal. The NFL argued it operated as a single entity. In 2010, the Supreme Court ruled against that argument, finding the NFL was not a single entity. Reebok held the contract through 2011, when Nike took over.

  Reliant Stadium opened in Houston as the NFL's first venue with a retractable roof, prompting a new rule requiring the home team to commit to open or closed position 90 minutes before kickoff. During the regular season, that decision was final once made. In the playoffs, the NFL itself would make the call.

  In the broadcast booth, 2002 marked the first season since 1980 without Pat Summerall and John Madden as Fox's lead team. Madden moved to ABC to join Al Michaels on Monday Night Football. Fox introduced Joe Buck, Troy Aikman, and Cris Collinsworth as their new lead team. Jimmy Johnson eventually took over from a rotating group of analysts on Fox NFL Sunday. CBS added Boomer Esiason and Dan Marino as analysts on The NFL Today, and promoted Deion Sanders to pregame analyst.

• 7. Losses and a Tie

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  Johnny Unitas died on the 11th of September, 2002, from a heart attack. During Week 2, before every game that weekend, the league observed a moment of silence in his honor. Mike Webster, the Hall of Fame center, also died during the 2002 season, as did Dick Lane, known as Night Train Lane. Al Lerner, the owner of the Cleveland Browns, died during the season from brain cancer; the Browns wore a uniform patch in his memory.

  Pat Tillman, the Arizona Cardinals safety who would later leave football to join the United States Army, was among the notable player retirements at the end of that year, alongside Ryan Leaf and Eric Allen.

  On the 10th of November, Week 10, the Atlanta Falcons and Pittsburgh Steelers played to a 34-34 tie at Heinz Field. It was the first NFL tie since the 23rd of November, 1997, when the New York Giants and Washington Redskins finished 7-7. No further tied games would occur until 2008. The Chicago Bears, meanwhile, played their entire home schedule at Memorial Stadium in Champaign, Illinois, while Soldier Field underwent reconstruction. The league's 83rd regular season had scattered its franchises across new stadiums, new divisions, and, in the case of the Bears, a college football field downstate.