Hello APBA football community. My name is Bob Boyd and I have been playing APBA football for 37 years now and I have been graciously invited to post my 1997 NFL replay on Greg’s site. I am honored and I want to thank Greg for allowing me to be a part of his outstanding site that pays homage to APBA football, a game we all love. I bought the ’97 set back when it first came out. I’ve played a Packer replay with this set back in my 20s and now I am having fun playing all the games of the ’97 season.

Let me take you back to 1997. Wow, it’s been 26 years since that historic season. I say historic because the Denver Broncos upset my Green Bay Packers in Super Bowl 32 that year. It was the first AFC Champion to win a Super Bowl since the Raiders did it in ’83. Barry Sanders became the third back in NFL history to surpass 2,000 yards in rushing. There have only been 8 in NFL history. Sanders along with Brett Favre were co-MVP’s of the ’97 season. Favre won his third consecutive.

In the NFC, the 49ers finished with a 13-3 record along with the Packers. Sadly, I will have to conduct a replay without getting to play with the great Jerry Rice, who tore his ACL in week 1 against the Buccaneers. Strangely enough, two franchises began to go in opposite directions. The Buccaneers under Tony Dungy have surged to the league’s elite, while the Cowboys missed the playoffs for the fist time since 1991. In the East, the Giants took over with a 10-5-1 record.

In the AFC, it wasn’t the Denver Broncos who had the best record in the regular season, but the Kansas City Chiefs, who finished 13-3. The Broncos were 12-4. Kordell Stewart took over as the Steelers’ signal caller and paced the Steelers to an 11-5 record tying the Jaguars in the Central. At 1-15 last year, Bill Parcells brought a new identity to the NY Jets and they went 9-7 as one of the best turnarounds in NFL history. The Patriots still won the East at 10-6.

Over the next few days, I’m going to post the standings through week 4 of my replay and I will begin posting the results of week 5 in the following days. I already completed four weeks of this replay when Greg invited me to post my results on his site. So far through four weeks, there have been some surprises and some outstanding games through the first quarter of the season. I will also keep you informed on Barry’s quest for 2,000.