Thursday, November 3, 2011

NFL notes and fun facts

Tarvaris Jackson, who never had a 300-yard passing game in 40+ starts with the Minnesota Vikings, already has two this season as a Seattle Seahawk. This doesn’t necessarily indicated improvement; it does suggest that unless your name is Brett Favre in a Vikings uniform, it is kind of hard to pass for 300 yards while Adrian Peterson is running for 100 yards at the same time. The Seahawks have an invisible running game, so obviously it’s not that difficult to throw for 300 yards on 40 pass attempts the way the rules are structured now (unless your name is Tim Tebow). It should be pointed out that those yards were used inefficiently, with the Seahawks scoring but 9 points during T-Jack’s tenure in last Sunday’s game against Cincinnati. Things could be worse, of course; on October 16, the St. Louis Rams wracked-up an NFL record 424 yards of offense while scoring 3 or fewer points in their 24-3 loss to Green Bay—coincidentally breaking the previous mark of 385 held by the 1978 version of the Packers in a loss to Philadelphia.

This all brings back other memories of yesteryear. I was too young to remember the Lombardi years, but I do remember the bad old days that followed. The Vikings were the division bullies back then, going to four Super Bowls during the 1970s—and losing all four. I remember one particular game, not the details but the excitement of a weakling Packer team actually putting up a stiff fight against the local bully. Until the last few minutes of the game, the Packers held the Vikings to 0 points; the problem was, they also scored exactly 0 points. It was exceptionally deflating when the Vikings eventually won the game on a late field goal, 3-0.

I had to do some research to find out the details of this game. It was even more difficult to understand how the Packers lost this game. They had more first downs 15-5, rushing yards 245-66, and even net passing yards 56-21 (yes, it was a different world back then). The Packers outgained the Vikings 301-87. Running back John Brockington gained 149 yards on 23 carries, on his way to leading the NFC in rushing as a rookie. Scott Hunter actually completed half of his passes—five of eight.

So what happened? The Packers managed 4 turnovers to the Vikings one, for one thing. Together with one missed field goal, these miscues managed to nullify drives to the Vikings’ 16, 21, 1, 10 and 8 yard lines. The Vikings, on the other hand, were practically immobile the entire game. Until, as Minnesota sports journalist Ben Welter remembered

“Late in the fourth quarter, with the game still scoreless, the Packers had the ball at the Minnesota 8, second and goal to go. Needing only a field goal against a team that had not scored a touchdown in two weeks, QB Scott Hunter got greedy…and called a pass play — and found the Vikings’ Charlie West in the end zone. West returned it to midfield, and Dave Osborn and Fred Cox did the rest.” The rest meaning that the Vikings gained 35 of their 87 yards on their game-winning drive, and Fred Cox kicked a 25-yard field goal, back when the goal posts were flush with the goal line.

Those were the days when it was trying to be a Packer fan. Although Packers somehow won their division the following year, that was the last time they would do so until Holmgren/Favre era.

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I was watching a YouTube series of the first Monday Night Football telecast on September 21, 1970—before Frank Gifford, and when Don Meredith was trying to be taken as a serious commentator instead of the class clown. The Cleveland Browns defeated the New York Jets 31-21. Joe Namath threw for 298 yards on 18 0f 31 passes, one touchdown and three interceptions. I had to admit that Namath could throw that ball anywhere and look good doing it; the problem was that he really did throw it “anywhere.” That year he would play only four games (winning just one); against Baltimore in week five, Namath completed 34 of 62 for 397 yards and one touchdown. He also threw 6 interceptions. Namath had an injury-plagued career, and his season ended after a sack by Colts’ defensive tackle Billy Ray Smith, although it would not be determined that he had a broken wrist until the following day. Namath went on to miss most of the 1971 season with a knee injury. He would come back to lead the AFC in passing yards and touchdowns in 1972, but in 1973 he was out most of the year again with injuries, and in 1974 and 1975 his most notable accomplishment would be to lead the conference in interceptions. He would lead the Jets to the playoffs twice in his career. He would finish his playing days with a whimper on the Los Angeles Rams roster.

Namath remains one of the most well-known and popular players in the NFL, and he did gain a permanent place in football lore by “guaranteeing” that the Jets would win the Super Bowl III. He was elected to the Hall of Fame in his third year of eligibility. Here are his final regular season statistics, along with two other quarterbacks for comparison:

Starts W L T Att Comp Cmp Pct Yards TDs Ints QB Rating

Joe Namath 130 62 63 4 3762 1886 50.1 27,663 173 220 65.5

Ken Stabler 146 96 49 1 3793 2270 59.8 27,938 194 222 75.3

Phil Simms 159 95 64 0 4647 2576 55.4 33,462 199 157 78.5

Now, I’m certain that there are some football scholars who have a very good suspicion about why Stabler and Simms are on this list. Like Namath, they have Super Bowl rings. Unlike Namath, they are not in the Hall of Fame. In Simms case, it is perfectly “understandable”: unlike Namath, he had no “personality”—and still doesn’t, if you ask me. Stabler’s snub is somewhat less understandable, since he was popular among fans in a redneck sort of way, and he even had a catchy nickname: “The Snake”; nevertheless, there was something not quite “tidy” about the man, like several divorces and DUI convictions. Still, something is not quite right here. After an embarrassing performance in the 1969 AFL championship game against Kansas City, Namath never led the Jets to the playoffs again. Stabler led the Oakland Raiders to seven playoff appearances, while Simms led the New York Giants to five (or six, had he not been injured late in the 1990 season, when the Giants went on to beat the Buffalo Bills in the Super Bowl on Scott Norwood’s botched field goal attempt).

In baseball, there are a lot of players from yesteryear in the Hall of Fame for seemingly no reason justified on the stat sheets; it seems they became “legends” because sportswriters gave them catchy nicknames. If truth be known, “Broadway Joe” has less reason to be in the Hall than Stabler and Simms; the only reason Namath may legitimately belong in there is because he helped legitimatize the AFL in the eyes of the football world. On the field, Namath could throw a pretty pass and was fun to watch, but to say he was more deserving of the Hall than other Super Bowl-winning quarterbacks simply on the basis of certain “intangibles” is to bring great discredit to the selection process.

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Pro-Football Reference (and Pro-Baseball and Pro-Basketball) is a seemingly endless font of information. You can find break downs of draft picks by position for each year, and their subsequent NFL statistics. Brett Favre was the third quarterback picked in the 1991 draft, in the second round behind Dan McGwire and Todd Marinovich. I found the following particularly interesting, because it shows you how rare a truly great quarterback comes along:

G Cmp Att Yrds TD Int Rat

Favre: 302 6300 10169 71838 508 336 86.0

Everyone else (12): 234 1588 2988 19165 89 116 66.8

McGwire, by the way, was picked by Seattle. The story goes that Seahawks coach Chuck Knox tried in vain to convince ownership to pick Favre, and was reportedly "livid" when ownership ignored him and selected McGwire instead.

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