So Which Super Bowl Loss Hurt More? Super Bowl 36 or 53? (Poll)

[Loyal]

Coming off the Super Bowl loss year, there is a danger of recency bias here. Yes, we are only 18 days away from Rams at Panthers, @OldSchool, before questions like this end (I can 'see' you rolling yur eyes over there!). But which one hurt more?

Super Bowl 53: Just last year, the Rams were rolling until Kupp was injured and then, whatever it was, limited Gurley in the Super Bowl. The Rams were getting shyte because of how they won the NFC Championship game. But hey, it had been so many years of futility between Super Bowl 36 & 53, you have to feel to good about the future.

Super Bowl 36: For me, it was the most disappointing moment in sports. Of course, it always hurts when you are expeced to win and you don't. But the Rams that year were a level above that. I remember the cover of the ESPN Magazine with Warner, Holt, Bruce, Faulk, Hakim, and Proehl : "SPECIAL OPS: When the Rams Attack, You Never Know What or Who will Beat You." It was when Max Q was unveiled by Mike Martz, and the feeling that it didn't matter what the opponent did because the Rams were that good. Leading up to the game, an analyst risked his reputation in thinking the Rams would not only beat the Patriots, but would blow them out.

We could not lose, and yet, we did.

 

[IBruce80]

36.
Much more time to reflect.
Not only the Super Bowl and the alleged cheating, but how the team just fell apart for one reason or another in the following seasons.

 

[rking4441]

36 since the Rams were the better team and it really started the end of the GSOT era. Last year was disappointing but we are at the beginning of the Goff/McVay era! There is a bright future for this team and we know how the 2002- GOST Rams wound down. I see last years loss as a huge lost opportunity but a building block to future success not a bookend to the GSOT era.

Also SB 14 (79') is what made me a Rams fan so I personally would never have chosen that SB.

 

[bubbaramfan]

I don't know what pisses me off more. The fact that the Patriots cheated by taping Rams practice or the NFL front office's "no Balls" sweeping it under the rug and destroying the tapes, letting the phuc-ing cheaters get away with it.

I have to beleive because they got away with it they are still cheating. How, I don;t know, but they are.

 

[Ram_Rally]

53 for me. We spent all of those years in the gutter and finally make it back just to be beaten, and by who? The team that started it all.

 

[coconut]

It isn't close. 36 was by far the most disappointing loss because you knew the officials threw the game to the Cheatriots. That was during the game since the non calls were so blatant. What I didn't know until the game ended and I mean right after the game ended was that the Rams players were saying the Cheatriots were calling out the red zone plays of the Rams at the LOS. Even plays that had not been run all season. Years later Tape Gate became known and then the coverup and it made the THEFT of 36 hurt even worse.

 

[FaulkSF]

36. Because we were favorites to win by a wide margin. Tapegate, DBs holding our receivers (enforcement was brought to light the following seasons and still is today), and Martz's stubbornness to run the Damn ball.

53. In general the Rams were not expected to make it to the Superbowl. Win the West and maybe one playoff game, yes. Our inability to pick up blocks and stick with the run killed us. But definitely not as disappointing as 36.

 

[Classic Rams]

36 started the Cheatriot dynasty and ended the Rams, hurts worse. We were "expected to win" against that bunch of no-names.

But I wanted to win 14 most of all, I could live with the other losses. I wanted one for that 70s team, a game where we lead and "could have" won.

Of course we "could have won" the others... if only... if only....

I have zero interest in watching 36 again, though I can still watch 14. I'd replay 53 but am putting it off until I'm ready, which may take a while. Too bad because the Rams' defense put on a great showing, just the O was so damn ineffective.

 

[OldSchool]

Easily 36 both before and after the fact. I was 9 for SB 14 and over it pretty quick plus that was the first game I rooted for the Rams.

 

[SeminoleRam]

SB 36! Although, All Rams losses always hurt the Rams were heavily favored in that game and were expected AND should have won! Not to mention, I think that game started the Brady, Belichick and Patriot Dynasty (Now, That Also HURTS!!!)!

 

[nighttrain]

36 the worst of my football experiences
train

 

[thirteen28]

36 was just gawd-awful, because the Rams were clearly the better team and got cheated out of the win. The officiating wasn't perfect in 53, but I don't feel like we were cheated in that one.

 

[jetplt67]

I said 14. I was just a young fella in Oklahoma. Everyone in school liked the Cowboys, who the Rams beat to get in the SB. Even my teacher was teasing me when they lost......brutal

 

[LARAMSinFeb.]

14 still hurts.

53 didn't bother me in the least. I'm still stoked about the Rams coming home, and it's just a bonus that I'm in awe they're back to contention and in great hands for the foreseeable future. McVay looks at it as the "best season he's ever been a part of." I so get that sentiment. Great time to be a Rams fan!

 

[MadGoat]

SB 36 by far. I'd even put some other playoff loses above SB 53 ('89 vs Niners and '03 vs Panthers).

 

[RamFanWA]

36 was worse... After all these years, just getting to 53 was goal achieved!!

 

[Merlin]

I'm with you guys on it being Super Bowl 36. We had the dominant team in every phase. Pats cheated by preparing for new plays due to video taping, refs looked the other way when our wideouts were mugged, and the MFing NFL burned the tapes.

 

[FrantikRam]

I was younger for 36 - so I got over it more quickly.

This past one I couldn't even think about football for months.

People are letting what happened AFTER 36 cloud their judgement - this one hurt much worse, for a few reasons:

After 36 we still had the last three league MVPs and the best roster in the NFL. We were favored to win the Super Bowl the following year, and were predicted to win it all from time to time in the years that followed. That should have been a Patriots esque dynasty, which is why that Super Bowl shouldn't have hurt as much.

Now we're in the unknown - following that game, here's what we have had to listen to:

Goff is a question mark
Rams shouldn't have been in the game to begin with
Gurley's knee
Has McVay been figured out?

We as fans can say that we're not worried about any of those things, but that's a lie. On the flip side, those questions really didn't exist following Super Bowl 36.

To top it off, we were beaten by Brady, AGAIN. If you look at both games in a vacuum, this one hurt much worse.

 

[Noregar]

THEY ALL SUCKED!!

For Super Bowl 14 I was 14 years old and a new young Rams fan. The biggest thing was the irritation from my teenage peers who mocked my team for losing but I was younger and not as invested in my team so it stung a lot less.

For Super Bowl 36 I was .........36 years old with a wife, child, and another child on the way, so following the Rams became a great escape form the responsibilities of the day to day. Even though the Rams had the recent Super Bowl 34 trophy in the case this one bothered me the most. Like others have stated it was worse because the Rams were really the better team and had superior talent across the board. I like Martz but in retrospect coaching was the difference IMO.

For Super bowl 53 I very disappointed in the loss but being older and having a different perspective on life-priorities and after suffering through the Linehan, Spags, and and Fisher regimes, I was still grateful for seeing another playoff run like the days of old despite the loss.

After each loss I thought the team would come back better and stronger but sadly they never did.
I think this time is really different and the team is set up for long run of success with a young coach, QB, and GM. Another big difference, which is often overlooked, is this new Rams era has a very stable ownership and front office situation.

 

[PhillyRam]

That SB 14 was a team that I look back on as my "Original Rams team"

Those guys were together for years since there was no FA. So that was a team that still had most of the guys that lost tough and heartbreaking NFCCG games to the Cowboys and Vikings.

So if I had my wish for one of those teams to win it all, that would be the team I would want to get their rings.