How Long It's Been: The Washington Football Team Won a Super Bowl (Or Even Went to One)

January 26, 1992, 30 years ago: Super Bowl XXVI is held at the Hubert H. Humphrey Metrodome in Minneapolis, Minnesota. The team then known as the Washington Redskins beat the Buffalo Bills, 37-24. After a scoreless 1st quarter, Washington scored 17 points in the 2nd, and coasted the rest of the way.

Quarterback Mark Rypien completed 18 of his 33 passes, for 292 yards, 2 touchdowns and an interception. He was named the game's Most Valuable Player. The Redskins had now won 3 Super Bowls, with 3 different quarterbacks: Joe Theismann in XVII, Doug Williams in XXII, and Rypien this time.

It was the 2nd straight Super Bowl lost by the Bills. For the 'Skins, it ends a run of 9 seasons in which they reached 4 Super Bowls, winning 3 of them. They had previously won NFL Championships in 1937 and 1942, and reached Super Bowl VII in the 1972 season, but lost it.

They have not been back to the Super Bowl since. In 1992, they made the Playoffs, and won in the Wild Card round, but lost in the Divisional round. They didn't make the Playoffs again until 1999, and again won in the Wild Card round before losing in the Divisional round. They next made the Playoffs in 2005. Again: Won in the Wild Card round, lost in the Divisional round.

They made the Playoffs in 2007, 2012, 2015 and 2020, but lost in the Wild Card round each time. Moving from Robert F. Kennedy Stadium in the District of Columbia to what's now FedEx Field in suburban Landover, Maryland didn't help. Dropping the racist team name and becoming, on a temporary basis, simply "The Washington Football Team," also didn't win them any more games. Choosing a new name, which will probably be done in the next few weeks, won't help. Changing coaches hasn't helped. Nor has changing general managers.

What might help? Maybe changing owners. Daniel Synder has created a toxic atmosphere that has lasted the entire 21st Century thus far.

And the Washington Football Team hasn't won, or even played in, a Super Bowl since January 26, 1992. That's 30 years. How long has that been?

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Art Monk, Russ Grimm and Darrell Green played in that game for Washington. Joe Gibbs was their head coach. Jim Kelly, Thurman Thomas, Andre Reed, James Lofton and and Bruce Smith played for Buffalo. Marv Levy was their head coach. Bill Polian was the general manager. All are now in the Pro Football Hall of Fame. And the Hall should probably add Jeff Bostic, Joe Jacoby and Charles Mann from Washington; and Cornelius Bennett and Steve Tasker from Buffalo.

There was a team in Houston, but it was the Oilers, not the Texans. The Texans, the Carolina Panthers, the Jacksonville Jaguars and (sort of) the Baltimore Ravens did not exist.

The Patriots, the Denver Broncos, the Los Angeles Rams, the Tampa Bay Buccaneers, the New Orleans Saints, the Seattle Seahawks, the Philadelphia Eagles, the Colts since they moved to Indianapolis had never won a Super Bowl. 

The Buccaneers, the Seahawks, the Saints, the Colts since they moved to Indianapolis, the San Diego Chargers (now in Los Angeles), the Atlanta Falcons, the Cardinals since they moved to Arizona, had never been to a Super Bowl.

All of those facts are no longer true.

Only 5 NFL teams are still using the stadium stadiums they were then. The Bills are one. The others are the Saints, the Green Bay Packers, the Kansas City Chiefs, and the Miami Dolphins.

Ray Lewis, Payton Manning and Tom Brady were in high school. Drew Brees was in junior high. Eli Manning was 11 years old; Troy Polamalu was 10; Ben Roethlisberger was 9; Aaron Rodgers was 8; Ndamukong Suh was 5; Colin Kaepernick was 4; Richard Sherman, Russell Wilson and Nick Foles were 3; Cam Newton and Rob Gronkowski were 2; Jimmy Garappolo was 2 months old; and Odell Beckham Jr., Dak Prescott, Baker Mayfield, Joey Bosa and Patrick Mahomes weren’t born yet.

Current Jets coach Robert Saleh was about to turn 13. Joe Judge, the most recent coach of the currently coachless Giants, was 10. Mets manager Buck Showalter had just been named manager of the Yankees. Current Yankee manager Aaron Boone was at the University of Southern California.

Tom Thibodeau of the Knicks was a scout for the Seattle SuperSonics. Steve Nash of the Nets was in high school. Sandy Brondello of the Liberty was playing for the Brisbane Blazers of her native Australia's women's basketball league. Gerard Gallant of the Rangers was playing for the Detroit Red Wings. Barry Trotz of the Islanders was an assistant coach for the minor-league Baltimore Skipjacks. Lindy Ruff of the Devils was playing for the minor-league Rochester Americans. And Gerhard Struber of the Red Bulls and Ronny Deila of NYCFC were in high school in their native countries, Austria and Norway, respectively.

The Redskins had dethroned the Giants as NFL Champions. The World Champions in the other sports were the Minnesota Twins in baseball, the Chicago Bulls in basketball and the Pittsburgh Penguins in hockey. The Heavyweight Champion of the World was Evander Holyfield.

The Olympic Games have since been held in America and Japan twice each; and one each in France, Spain, Norway, Australia, Greece, Italy, China, Canada, Britain, Russia, Brazil and Korea. The World Cup has since been held in America, France, Japan, Korea, Germany, South Africa, Brazil and Russia.

The idea that two people of the same gender could get married, and have all the benefits of a regular marriage, was considered absurd. But then, so was the idea that corporations were "people," and entitled to all the rights thereof. Clarence Thomas was the only Justice on the Supreme Court then who is still on it now.

The President of the United States was George Bush. The father, not the son. The son was working on the father's campaign – well, as much as he's ever "worked" on anything. Bill Clinton was Governor of Arkansas and a few weeks away from securing the Democratic nomination to challenge Bush the father in the Presidential election. Barack Obama was the president... of the Harvard Law Review. Donald Trump was in the process of divorcing Wife 1 and marrying Wife 2. Joe Biden was in his 4th term in the U.S. Senate. And Kamala Harris was a Deputy District Attorney in Alameda County, California.

Ronald Reagan, Jimmy Carter, Gerald Ford, Richard Nixon, their wives, and the widows of Lyndon Johnson and John F. Kennedy were still alive. 

The Governor of New York was Mario Cuomo. The Mayor of New York City was David Dinkins. The Governor of New Jersey was Jim Florio. And the Mayor of Washington was Sharon Pratt. The current holders of those offices? Kathy Hochul was a legislative assistant in the New York State Assembly, Eric Adams was a New York police officer, Phil Murphy was an executive at Goldman Sachs, and Muriel Bowser was at Chatham University in Pittsburgh.

There were still living veterans of the Spanish-American War, the Boxer Rebellion, the Philippine Campaign, the Boer War and the Russo-Japanese War. There were living survivors of the Johnstown Flood.

Burmese human rights activist Aung San Suu Kyi was the holder of the Nobel Peace Prize. The Pope was John Paul II. The current Pope, Francis, Jorge Mario Bergoglio, was named Auxiliary Bishop of Buenos Aires.

Canada's Prime Minister was Brian Mulroney. Elizabeth II was Queen of England, but her 40th Anniversary on the throne would turn out to be tainted by the breakup of the marriage of Charles and Diana, and soon also by a fire at Windsor Castle. Prime Minister John Major led the Conservative Party to victory for the first and, as it turned out, only time. There have since been 6 Presidents of the United States, 6 Prime Ministers of Britain, and 3 Popes.

England moved from its old "Football League" to its "English Premier League," with Leeds United winning the last title of the old League, and Liverpool winning the FA Cup thanks to Ian Rush (no surprise there) and Michael Thomas (big surprise, since his goal beat Liverpool for Arsenal to win the League 3 years earlier). And 1992 was also the year soccer's European Cup was first won by Barcelona, and it became the UEFA Champions League that fall.

Major books of 1992 included The Bridges of Madison County by Robert James Waller, The Pelican Brief by John Grisham, Jazz by Toni Morrison, Waiting to Exhale by Terry McMillan (who, clearly, still had her groove going), The English Patient by Michael Ondaatje, Paddy Clarke Ha Ha Ha by Roddy Doyle, Oh Canada! Oh Quebec! by Mordecai Richler (a great study of how the Province relates to the rest of the country), Men Are from Mars, Women Are from Venus by John Gray, and the debut of R.L. Stine's Goosebumps series of horror novels for young adults.

As if young people in that era needed any more things to frighten them. Trust me, I know. Speaking of which, 1992 was also the year Stephen King published Dolores Claiborne. George R.R. Martin began writing A Game of Thrones. J.K. Rowling had already begun writing Harry Potter and the Philsopher's (Sorcerer's) Stone.

Major films of the Winter of 1992 included The Hand the Rocks the Cradle, Freejack, Juice, Mississippi Masala, Final Analysis and Medicine Man. Michael Keaton was about to appear in Batman Returns. Dean Cain would soon be cast in Lois & Clark: The New Adventures of Superman. The James Bond franchise was in legal limbo, between the Timothy Dalton and Pierce Brosnan eras. Also in limbo was the Doctor Who franchise, with Sylvester McCoy standing as the last and Seventh Doctor.

Michael Douglas, 47 years old, was starring in Basic Instinct with Sharon Stone. And Catherine Zeta-Jones, just 22, was starring in the British TV series The Darling Buds of May, and sang "For All Time," a minor hit on the British charts, which was recorded for a concept album titled Jeff Wayne's Musical Version of Spartacus – which was apparently never filmed, unlike the 1960 version of Spartacus, starring Catherine's future father-in-law, Kirk Douglas.

Johnny Carson was about to hand The Tonight Show off to Jay Leno. The Arsenio Hall Show was doing well, and would soon be booming, partly thanks to having Bill and Hillary Clinton as guests on June 3, and partly due to Arsenio's handling of the Los Angeles race riot in late April, including an appearance by Mayor Tom Bradley.

The Number 1 song in America was "All 4 Love" by Color Me Badd. Nevermind by Nirvana topped Billboard's album charts, turning Grunge from an underground genre of music into a mainstream one, and lead singer Kurt Cobain married Hole lead singer Courtney Love. Paul Simon became the 1st major musical performer to tour South Africa after the end of the United Nations' cultural boycott. And the longbox format of compact discs was phased out.

Inflation was such that what $1.00 bought then, $1.99 would buy now. A U.S. postage stamp cost 29 cents, and a New York Subway ride $1.25. The average price of a gallon of gas was $1.13, a cup of coffee $1.60, a McDonald's meal (Big Mac, fries, shake) $5.02, a movie ticket $4.15, a new car $16,334, and a new house $144,500. The Dow Jones Industrial Average closed the preceding Friday at 3,232.78.

The tallest building in the world was the Sears Tower in Chicago. There were mobile phones, but they were still barely small enough to fit in your pocket, and not everybody had one. The top home video game system was the Sega Genesis. The Internet existed, but most people had never heard of it yet.

In the Winter of 1992, Bosnian Serbs declared their own republic within Bosnia and Herzegovina, escalating the breakup of Yugoslavia, and leading to the declarations of independence of Croatia and Slovenia. The El Salvador Civil War was ended. China and Israel established diplomatic relations. The government of Algeria declared a state of emergency. The Maastricht Treaty was signed, founding the European Union. And President Bush met with Russian President Boris Yeltsin at Camp David, and they formally declared that the Cold War was over.

Grace Hopper, and Willie Dixon, and Jean Yawkey died. Kris Bryant, and Shawn Johnson, and Neymar were born.

January 26, 1992. The Washington Football Team won the Super Bowl. They have not even played in an NFC Championship Game since.

When will they do so again? As long as Daniel Snyder is still the owner, don't get your hopes up.