Still great, but overrated athletes

[Scoe]

Brett Favre, fun to watch was a gun slinger but an absolute turnover machine in big games. The Super Bowl he won had a ton of all pros, hall of famers in Reggie White and Leroy Butler on defense. Beat an expansion team in the Panthers and a distracted Pats team with Parcells having 1 foot out the door. The Vikings team was loaded too Favre choked in that game too.

You put Favre on the 2007 and 2011 Giants they don't sniff a Super Bowl go ahead with your laughing emojis, I have watched both of those superbowl runs a bunch of times. Favre absolutely would have turned it over in key spots. 1 turnover against the 2011 Niners defense in a muddy down pour loses that game you cannot tell me Favre wouldn't have turned it over..

Put Eli on those Packer teams he wins 5 superbowls at least 3. The 2009 Vikings team he wins a Super Bowl too.

 

[superjohn]

Brett Favre, fun to watch was a gun slinger but an absolute turnover machine in big games. The Super Bowl he won had a ton of all pros, hall of famers in Reggie White and Leroy Butler on defense. Beat an expansion team in the Panthers and a distracted Pats team with Parcells having 1 foot out the door. The Vikings team was loaded too Favre choked in that game too.

You put Favre on the 2007 and 2011 Giants they don't sniff a Super Bowl go ahead with your laughing emojis, I have watched both of those superbowl runs a bunch of times. Favre absolutely would have turned it over in key spots. 1 turnover against the 2011 Niners defense in a muddy down pour loses that game you cannot tell me Favre wouldn't have turned it over..

Put Eli on those Packer teams he wins 5 superbowls at least 3. The 2009 Vikings team he wins a Super Bowl too.

You may have had something until you brought up Eli.

 

[Scoe]

You may have had something until you brought up Eli.

Watch the playoff games then come back and see me. Eli turns it over 1 time against that 2011 Niners defense the Giants lose you cannot tell me Favre doesn't turn it over in a key spot. Favre would've given Coughlin a stroke on the field.

 

[champs99and04]

Surprised nobody's mentioned the most obvious answer: Kobe

 

[Zanzman]

Well he didn't say "Jr."

Jr

 

[AZHuskiePop]

I'll start with Lynn Swan.
Although he was a member of those great steelers teams, and is in the hall of fame and was also playing at a time where the passing game wasn't as open as it is now, his acrobatic play, and rings overshadow his numbers:
He isn't nearly in the top 300 of receiving yards, or receptions. Only ranks 153rd all time in TDs with 51.

Bone Yarders in their mid to late 60s will crush me for this. I'm sorry.

He played at a time when every wideout was hit on every play coming off the line by some of toughest CB ever.
It was open season on wideouts and he retired before he ended up with serious injury .
I couldn’t even imagine how potent a Steeler offense would be with that great offensive line , Swan , Stallworth and Bradshaw would be today .

 

[MrJama100]

LeBron James

Laughable. Anyone that says LeBron is not at least 2nd best player all-time (or possibly third to Kareem, perhaps even first) doesn't understand basketball. The man literally took teams with no talent to the NBA championship almost every year he played. Even now at 40 he's one the best players in the league. Hard to overrate the all-time NBA scoring leader, 4x champion, 3 gold medals, and on and on.

 

[Jaydumo20]

Laughable. Anyone that says LeBron is not at least 2nd best player all-time (or possibly third to Kareem, perhaps even first) doesn't understand basketball. The man literally took teams with no talent to the NBA championship almost every year he played. Even now at 40 he's one the best players in the league. Hard to overrate the all-time NBA scoring leader, 4x champion, 3 gold medals, and on and on.

I'm assuming it was a joke.

 

[storrsroars]

Joe Namath - Coming from a lifelong Jets fan. Horrible passing numbers.

50.1% pass completion
173 TD's vs 220 INT's
His TD/INT's in his four best seasons? 19/27, 26/28, 20/22 and 19/21.
His performance in the famed Super Bowl he predicted a win? 17 for 28 for 206 yds, 0 TD, 0 INT.

Namath is a weak HoF member, but I don't put that on TD/INT ratios. Back in the old AFL, nobody had great TD/INT ratios. The year the Jets won it all, 7 of the 10 teams in the league threw more INTs than TDs. Of the most successful QBs in the '60s AFL, only Dawson and Griese had positive TD/INT #s. Guys like Jack Kemp, John Hadl, Daryle Lamonica, Babe Parilli... all negative ratios.

Namath's thing was basically going Air Coryell well before Air Coryell was a thing. Was the first to 4K yards passing. He went for big chunks. He had two short white guys (Maynard & Sauer) he turned into leading receivers. He was drafted as a dual threat guy - he could run at Alabama - but had to learn how to be a pocket passer in the pros.

He was a better QB and leader than given credit for today. But under today's criteria, he's nowhere near a HoF. He's kinda like Dave Parker - had a brief time on top, but most of his career is mediocre or worse. If he didn't win that SB or get named MVP for it (and for the league in general), he wouldn't be in Canton.

 

[MrJama100]

Livvy Dunn

 

[Mr. French]

Spit it out show some courage.

Kobe.

 

[Mr. French]

Brett Favre, fun to watch was a gun slinger but an absolute turnover machine in big games. The Super Bowl he won had a ton of all pros, hall of famers in Reggie White and Leroy Butler on defense. Beat an expansion team in the Panthers and a distracted Pats team with Parcells having 1 foot out the door. The Vikings team was loaded too Favre choked in that game too.

You put Favre on the 2007 and 2011 Giants they don't sniff a Super Bowl go ahead with your laughing emojis, I have watched both of those superbowl runs a bunch of times. Favre absolutely would have turned it over in key spots. 1 turnover against the 2011 Niners defense in a muddy down pour loses that game you cannot tell me Favre wouldn't have turned it over..

Put Eli on those Packer teams he wins 5 superbowls at least 3. The 2009 Vikings team he wins a Super Bowl too.

Favre is another - great call.

Not only has he ALWAYS been a piece of junk human, but he's never been as great as everyone makes him. He had the Madden/Fox hype machine helping him and he was exciting. Gimme Steve Young all day.

 

[boog204]

1) baseball Bo Jackson. Maybe the greatest athlete ever and highlight reel stuff, but there is this consistent narrative that he would have been a HOF baseball player. Yes, he was raw and perhaps would have gotten better, but his WAR shows he was just slightly above average.

2) “Big Game” James Shields was a career 3-6 with a 5.50 era in the postseason. Big game?

3) Reggie Miller had those playoff moments, but was overrated.

4) Troy Aikman

5) Pete Rose

6) Carmelo

7) Posada. And I’m a Yankee fan. He was the king of the passed ball, admitted he didn’t like to block the plate, loved hitting 3 run homers in 7-1 games, and had at least 4 or 5 pitchers, HOF quality guys, request to only pitch to the backup C.

 

[boog204]

Kobe.

I agree in the sense that he retired as a top 10-15 player all time. Phenomenally talented. His tragic death has some putting him in the top 5 and many forgetting how difficult he was in the post Shaq years. Even that great Olympic doc has this cast of doubts of if he’d buy in and not be a problem.

 

[Deepster]

Namath is a weak HoF member, but I don't put that on TD/INT ratios. Back in the old AFL, nobody had great TD/INT ratios. The year the Jets won it all, 7 of the 10 teams in the league threw more INTs than TDs. Of the most successful QBs in the '60s AFL, only Dawson and Griese had positive TD/INT #s. Guys like Jack Kemp, John Hadl, Daryle Lamonica, Babe Parilli... all negative ratios.

Namath's thing was basically going Air Coryell well before Air Coryell was a thing. Was the first to 4K yards passing. He went for big chunks. He had two short white guys (Maynard & Sauer) he turned into leading receivers. He was drafted as a dual threat guy - he could run at Alabama - but had to learn how to be a pocket passer in the pros.

He was a better QB and leader than given credit for today. But under today's criteria, he's nowhere near a HoF. He's kinda like Dave Parker - had a brief time on top, but most of his career is mediocre or worse. If he didn't win that SB or get named MVP for it (and for the league in general), he wouldn't be in Canton.

I don’t necessarily disagree but….if he didn’t predict the SB win (and that’s become a much taller tale over time) and didn’t have the flash in mink coats and pantyhose commercials, no one would remember him for the rest of his on the field career.

 

[Chin Diesel]

Nolan Ryan and Derek Jeter

Was gonna bring up Ryan, classic compiler.

Jeter is hard - one of the all time great leaders, clutch when it mattered and part of a dynasty in a sport very hard to do it in. Not a Yanks fan but he was the core of that team culture and rebuilding that franchise from the ash. If you haven’t watched Bronx is Burning, great watch as to the early 90s Yanks all time worst season. The story around Mel Hall is specially wild.

Horrible take on the Ryan Express. His stats were destroyed by bad teams.

Consider this: Nolan Ryan had 198 career non-win quality starts during his career. He was 0-107 with a 2.27 ERA, 1.166 WHIP, and 9.77 K/9 in those starts.

 

[Chin Diesel]

I'd put Bradshaw there, personally.

That steelers teams is tough to correctly judge. They seemed to have completely captivated every K-12 sports fan from that era. I doubt if even the big red machine or the Jordan Bulls enjoyed that kind of countrywide conversion.

The thing with Bradshaw was he played on astro turf in an era where you could body slam QB's and roughing the passer almost non-existent. I'd like to see what a player like Bradshaw could do in today's two-hand touch football for QB's. And not just Bradshaw but many of the QB's in the 60's and 70's. If they knew they could drop back and have almost no fear of being hit, I think their numbers would look a lot better. As would their health.

 

[Mr. French]

I agree in the sense that he retired as a top 10-15 player all time. Phenomenally talented. His tragic death has some putting him in the top 5 and many forgetting how difficult he was in the post Shaq years. Even that great Olympic doc has this cast of doubts of if he’d buy in and not be a problem.

Even his early career, he wasn’t that good but his potential and star power was already there…he was overrated in 97. By the time he got great, he was a jerk and had Shaq still easily the most important player. Then he gets rid of Shaq and puts up 50 shots a game for multiple years on crappy teams.

He’s a great all-time player but he doesn’t sniff top 10. As you note, people now talk about top 5, top 3, maniacal worker, etc.

Who was the first person to talk about how hard he worked and how obsessed he was? Kobe. Other people said it about Jordan. Kobe told us about Kobe.

 

[Mr. French]

T-Mac is another one.

 

[Jaydumo20]

The thing with Bradshaw was he played on astro turf in an era where you could body slam QB's and roughing the passer almost non-existent. I'd like to see what a player like Bradshaw could do in today's two-hand touch football for QB's. And not just Bradshaw but many of the QB's in the 60's and 70's. If they knew they could drop back and have almost no fear of being hit, I think their numbers would look a lot better. As would their health.

Good point. even guys like Jim Hart, who nobody talks about, would be slinging 450 yds/game. It's impossible to tell but we can guess and I think your guess would be right.

 

[Jaydumo20]

1) baseball Bo Jackson. Maybe the greatest athlete ever and highlight reel stuff, but there is this consistent narrative that he would have been a HOF baseball player. Yes, he was raw and perhaps would have gotten better, but his WAR shows he was just slightly above average.

2) “Big Game” James Shields was a career 3-6 with a 5.50 era in the postseason. Big game?

3) Reggie Miller had those playoff moments, but was overrated.

4) Troy Aikman

5) Pete Rose

6) Carmelo

7) Posada. And I’m a Yankee fan. He was the king of the passed ball, admitted he didn’t like to block the plate, loved hitting 3 run homers in 7-1 games, and had at least 4 or 5 pitchers, HOF quality guys, request to only pitch to the backup C.

Shields. I never understood the nickname. He was great regular season.
I'll come out and say another Ray- aside from his first 3 years, i was never more nervous than when this guy was on the mound....David Price

 

[Jaydumo20]

Horrible take on the Ryan Express. His stats were destroyed by bad teams.

Consider this: Nolan Ryan had 198 career non-win quality starts during his career. He was 0-107 with a 2.27 ERA, 1.166 WHIP, and 9.77 K/9 in those starts.

The Nolan Ryan. No cy-young thing baffles me. I think most people would think he has 2 at least.
I think cy youngs go to guys who come out of nowhere and pop then fade.
Look at the last 20 cy young winners.

 

[slepers]

Scottie pippin
Troy aikman
Aaron rodgers

 

[superjohn]

Laughable. Anyone that says LeBron is not at least 2nd best player all-time (or possibly third to Kareem, perhaps even first) doesn't understand basketball. The man literally took teams with no talent to the NBA championship almost every year he played. Even now at 40 he's one the best players in the league. Hard to overrate the all-time NBA scoring leader, 4x champion, 3 gold medals, and on and on.

Agree with him being top 3 all-time but "The man literally took teams with no talent to the NBA championship almost every year he played" is a wild statement.

He took the 2007 Cavs to the finals, that team hardly had any talent so it's true for that one finals appearance. He had a really rough finals and got swept by the Spurs but getting there was a hell of an accomplishment. The rest of his finals teams had a lot of talent and were basically hand picked by him.

 

[Chin Diesel]

1987. Age 40. Nolan Ryan led the N.L. in strikeouts, E.R.A., and F.I.P. among other things. He posted a WHIP of 1.14. The Astros scored 0 or 1 runs in 1/4 of his starts. His record was 8-16.