A specific date

The episode "You Only Die Once, or Twice, but Never Three Times" was broadcast on Wednesday, January 5, 2022. And in his voiceover Adam says the date is "January 5, 1980 something".

Adam always says the date is the same day and month as the episode airs, and never gives the year beside it being "1980 something".

But this episode begins with the characters discussing a James Bond movie which they just saw. They say that Bond is starting to look old, so it should be one of the later Roger Moore movies. And someone thinks it is very dumb of the villain to try to make his escape in a blimp.

Like in the James Bond movie A View to a Kill which was released on 22 May, 1985, which should make the date they saw A View to a Kill January 5, 1986.

But would A View to a Kill still be in theaters after almost 8 months? Possibly the theater was showing when it was already several years old, and thus in a rerelease sometime in 1987, 1988, or 1989. And I actually do remember seeing a movie in the movie theater in Jenkintown a few years after it was originally released, so I guess they might have seen a rerelease of A View to a Kill sometime in the later 1980s.

So "You Only Die Once, or Twice, but Never Three Times" starts on January 5, in 1986, 1987, 1988, or 1989.

I only started watching The Goldbergs a few years ago. So it is possible that there have been a few other episodes that gave equally strong clues to their fictional dates.

And I rather doubt that any such specific dates would agree with the relative dating indicating by the ages of the characters in different seasons.