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The 1998 NFL season was the 79th regular season of the National Football League. The Tennessee Oilers moved their home games from Liberty Bowl Memorial Stadium in Memphis to Vanderbilt Stadium in Nashville, still awaiting construction on a new stadium (Adelphia Coliseum) in Nashville. This was the first season that CBS held the rights to televise American Football Conference games, taking over the package from NBC. Meanwhile, this was the first time that ESPN broadcast all of the Sunday night games throughout the season (this was also the first season in which ESPN’s coverage used the ''Monday Night Football'' themes, before reverting to using an original theme in 2001). Football Outsiders noted “1998 was the last hurrah for the great quarterbacks who came into the league in the 1980s. The top four QBs () were all over 35: Vinny Testaverde, Randall Cunningham, Steve Young, and John Elway. Troy Aikman, age 32, was fifth. Dan Marino was 11th in his last good year.”〔(1998 DVOA Ratings and Commentary )〕 The season ended with Super Bowl XXXIII when the Denver Broncos defeated the Atlanta Falcons. The Broncos had won their first thirteen games, the best start since the undefeated 1972 Dolphins, and were tipped by some to have a realistic chance at winning the full nineteen games.〔“Denver eyes 19–0, but there's no rush” in ''Minneapolis Star Tribune'', November 16, 1998〕〔Freeman, Mike; “Chasing Perfection and Taking Questions; Voluble Broncos Are 13–0 and Ready to Talk” in ''New York Times'', December 9, 1998〕 The Minnesota Vikings became the first team since the 1968 Baltimore Colts to win all but one of their regular season games and not win the Super Bowl. ==Major rule changes== *The officiating positions of back judge and field judge were swapped to become more consistent with college and high school football. The field judge is now 20 yards deep, positioned on the same sideline as the line judge, while the back judge is 25 yards from the line of scrimmage near the center of the field. *Tinted visors on players' facemasks are banned except for medical need. *A defensive player can no longer flinch before the snap in an attempt to draw movement from an offensive linemen. *A team will be penalized immediately for having 12 players in a huddle even if the 12th player goes straight to the sideline as the huddle breaks. *During the season, the rules regarding the coin toss were changed to where the visiting team must make the call before the coin is tossed instead of while it was in the air. On Thanksgiving, the game between the Pittsburgh Steelers and Detroit Lions went to overtime. During the coin toss, Steelers running back Jerome Bettis was heard calling "tails" but referee Phil Luckett claimed he said "heads". The coin landed on tails, and the Lions won the toss and eventually the game on a Jason Hanson field goal. It was later revealed that Bettis had changed his mind during the call and was originally going to call "heads" but stopped. Thus, the rule change was adopted to prevent any further confusion. 抄文引用元・出典: フリー百科事典『 ウィキペディア（Wikipedia）』 ■ウィキペディアで「1998 NFL season」の詳細全文を読む スポンサード リンク
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