Spent the better part of the morning trying to put together sets of Triplets — quarterback, running back, receiver — who share the same last name (even if they didn’t play on the same club or in the same era). There was no fudging allowed, either. For instance, you couldn’t try to team Kerry Collins with Cris Collinsworth or Trent Green with BenJarvus Green-Ellis or, heaven forbid, Rob Gronkowski with Bruce Gradkowski. The receiver could, however, be a wideout or a tight end. The rules weren’t totally inflexible.
Anyway, it was harder than I thought it would be. There just aren’t many surnames that are very common in NFL/AFL history. I almost hurled my laptop, Frisbee style, when I was two-thirds of the way to paydirt with Jim and Leroy Kelly — Hall of Famers both — but couldn’t come up with a receiver any better than Reggie, the underwhelming tight end for the Bengals and Falcons.
Smith is another one. You’d think that would be a gimmie — Emmitt at running back, Jerry (or Jimmy or Steve or Rod or Jerry) at receiver and . . . good luck finding a quarterback worth a darn.
If you work at it, though, you can dig up some nice threesomes. Here are my nominees for:
Only a few of these guys didn’t make at least one Pro Bowl or — in the case of pre-Pro Bowl players — all-pro team. Flipper Anderson didn’t, for example, but, hey, he holds the record for receiving yards in a game (336). In fact, he’s held it for 25 years, which is pretty remarkable considering how long receiving marks tend to last. And granted, Scott Mitchell was nothing special as a quarterback, but he did throw 32 touchdown passes one year for the Lions.
The first three listed are my gold, silver and bronze medalists. As for the others, you can order them however you like. I’m not sure it makes much difference. It’s kind of cool, by the way, that
Spec Sanders
Dub and Bert Jones are a father-son pairing. Dub, of course, is one of three NFL players to score six TDs in a game.
One last thing: I was fibbing about the no-fudging rule. Spec Sanders wasn’t technically a quarterback; he was a single-wing tailback for the New York Yankees of the All-America Conference in the ’40s. (He did play one season in the NFL, however, and intercepted 13 passes as a DB to lead the league.)
I included Spec because in 1947 he had one of the greatest offensive seasons of all time, throwing for 1,442 yards and 14 touchdowns and rushing for 1,432 yards and 18 TDs. (In his spare time, he ran a kickoff back 92 yards for another score.)
One day I spent a couple of hours on the phone with him, reminiscing about his playing days. He was utterly self-effacing, not the least bit impressed with his football feats. Just makes me want to keep his name alive.
In an eye blink Sunday, Cardinals fans went from dreaming about winning a Super Bowl on their home field to wondering whether there might be room for them on the Arizona State bandwagon. That’s the usual reaction, gloom and doom, when a starting quarterback goes down, especially the quarterback of an NFL-best 8-1 team.
The Cardinals weren’t a lock to take the title, but the way Carson Palmer was playing — he was 12-2 in his previous 14 starts before blowing out his knee against the Rams — they were definitely on the short list. Their defense, after all, has allowed more than 20 points only once (and all but won the last game by scoring two touchdowns). But now they have to look to Drew Stanton for salvation, the 30-year-old QB who has thrown 280 career passes.
Wonders never cease in these situations, though, and that’s not just a phrase. It’s truly amazing how often a backup quarterback has either led a team to the NFL title or kept his club in contention until the starter returned to finish the job (or at least come close). We’re not talking about a miracle here and a miracle there. We’re talking one, two, three . . . a slew of examples.
Almost every decade has a story like this — beginning with 1934, the NFL’s third championship game, which was won by a backup quarterback wearing sneakers on the frozen turf. That would
Ed Danowski
be Ed Danowski, a rookie (and New York kid) who’d done more running than passing before the No. 1 QB, Harry Newman, got hurt with three games left in the season.
The Giants were so panicked by the loss of Newman that they arranged to borrow Warren Heller from Pittsburgh, which had completed its schedule. (Crazy, isn’t it? The Giants still had three games to play, and the Pirates, as they were called then, were already done.) But the league disallowed the transaction after some owners squawked, leaving the Giants’ fate in the hands of Danowski. He wound up leading them to a key win over the second-place Boston Redskins in his first start, and was one of the heroes of the victory over the Bears in the legendary Sneakers Game, throwing for one touchdown and running for another.
And that’s just one for-instance. Here are 11 others that come to mind:
● Tobin Rote, 1957 Lions — Rote had been splitting time with Bobby Layne when Layne broke his ankle in the next-to-last game. With Rote under center, Detroit caught fire in the postseason, overcoming a 20-point deficit to beat the 49ers and obliterating the Browns 59-14 in the championship game (the last of the Lions’ three titles in the ’50s).
● Earl Morrall, 1968 Colts — Ol’ Flattop stepped in for Johnny Unitas, who missed virtually all of the season with an elbow injury, and guided Baltimore to a 13-1 record and the NFL championship, winning the MVP award in the process. Alas, the feel-good story had a horrible ending: a 16-7 loss to the AFL’s Jets in the Super Bowl, due in large measure to three interceptions thrown by Morrall.
● Mike Livingston, 1969 Chiefs — Livingston didn’t exactly tear it up after Len Dawson was sidelined with a partially torn ACL, but he did win all six of his starts to help Kansas City get in the playoffs. By this time Dawson was operational again, and he quarterbacked the Chiefs to victories over the Jets and Raiders to win the AFL crown and the NFL’s Vikings to capture the Super Bowl.
● Earl Morrall, 1972 Dolphins — Ol’ Flattop was four years older, 38, when he did for the ’72 Dolphins what he’d done for the ’68 Colts. He didn’t just hold the fort until Bob Griese recovered from a fractured leg, he won 10 straight starts, including the playoff opener over the Browns. Then Griese came off the bench in the AFC title game against the Steelers, rallied Miami to a 21-17 victory and remained the QB in the Super Bowl, which the Dolphins also won to cap their perfect 17-0 season. But without Morrall, it might never have happened.
● Mike Kruczek, 1976 Steelers — Kruczek was the Eddie Danowski of ’76, a rookie quarterback who was suddenly thrust into a starting role because of injuries to Terry Bradshaw. He didn’t need to shoulder that much of the load because Pittsburgh’s defense was nigh impenetrable that year, pitching five shutouts, and running backs Franco Harris and Rocky Bleier both topped 1,000 yards. Still, he went 6-0 during Bradshaw’s absence, putting the Steelers in position for a record-tying third consecutive championship. They might have won it, too, if Harris (bruised ribs) and Bleier (sprained toe) hadn’t been sidelined for the AFC title game.
● Vince Ferragamo, 1979 Rams — A third-year QB, Ferragamo got his big chance when Pat Haden broke his finger in Week 10. He responded by winning six of seven starts, leaning heavily on a staunch defense, as the Rams advanced to their first Super Bowl. They even led the heavily favored Steelers in the fourth quarter, 19-17, but then Bradshaw and John Stallworth burst their bubble with this famous play:
● Jim Plunkett, 1980 Raiders — The 32-year-old former No. 1 overall pick had fallen completely off the radar until Dan Pastorini broke his leg in the fifth game. But with a better supporting cast than he had in New England, Plunkett became the quarterback he was always supposed to be, leading Oakland to the championship that year (and again in ’83). Say this for the guy: He was a finisher. In the AFC title game and Super Bowl, he posted passer ratings of 155.8 and 145
● Jeff Hostetler, 1990 Giants — Phil Simms’ late-season foot injury opened the door for Hostetler, who was pushing 30 and had spent nearly six years as an understudy. He made the most of the opportunity, playing steady, interception-free ball in the last five games, all victories, including memorable postseason stare downs of the 49ers (15-13) and Bills (20-19 in the Super Bowl). His mobility (200 rushing yards, two touchdowns) brought a new dimension to the Giants offense.
● Erik Kramer, 1991 Lions — Undrafted coming out of North Carolina State, this one-time CFLer took over for Rodney Peete (torn Achilles) halfway through the season and guided Detroit to seven wins in a row, the last a 38-6 horse-collaring of the Cowboys in the second round of the playoffs. On that one he completed 29 of 38 for 341 yards and three TDs, with no picks. The NFC championship game against the Redskins didn’t go quite as well, but it was still a heck of a run. (And of course, the Lions haven’t gotten that far since.)
● Kurt Warner, 1999 Rams — We might never see another season like Warner’s. He was like Bill Murray in Caddyshack (except he really did win the Masters — or the Super Bowl, at least).
It still seems incredible, all these years later. Warner, a product of the Arena League and NFL Europe, was slated to play behind Trent Green that season. But then the Chargers’ Rodney Harrison bent Green’s knee the wrong way in a preseason game, and Kurt proceeded to toss 41 touchdown passes, win both the NFL MVP and Super Bowl MVP awards and take his first steps toward Canton (I’m guessing).
● Tom Brady, 2001 Patriots — Brady, the 199th pick in the previous year’s draft, had hardly set foot on the field when Jets linebacker Mo Lewis knocked Drew Bledsoe out of the lineup in Week 2 with this crushing hit:
That was the last game Bledsoe started in New England. Brady took the job and ran with it, winning an improbable ring that year — thanks to a couple of last-second field goals by Adam Vinatieri — and two more in 2003 and ’04.
And now we have Stanton trying to add his name to the list. He doesn’t have the crunching ground game Kruczek had at his disposal, the offensive talent that glittered around Warner (and others) or a Hall of Fame coach running the show (as Livingston, Morrall, Kruczek, Hostetler and, almost certainly, Brady did). But as we’ve seen over the decades, from Danowski on down, there are more championship quarterbacks in the NFL than we think. All they need, some of them, is a break — of a leg, an ankle or some other part of their competition’s anatomy.
In fact, here are two of them. The first is Stephen Gostkowski, who went over 100 points for the season in the Patriots’ ninth game. He’s only the second pure kicker in NFL/AFL history to get to 100 points — 101, actually — that fast. The other is Lawrence Tynes with the Giants two years ago (102).
But . . . three running backs and four multitaskers — guys who played an offensive position and doubled as kickers — also have accomplished the feat. Two of the seven did it twice. The details:
NFL/AFL PLAYERS WHO HAVE SCORED 100 POINTS IN THE FIRST NINE GAMES
Year
Player, Team
TD
FG
PAT
Pts (Final Total*)
2014
K Stephen Gostkowski, Patriots
0
34
29
101 (TBD)
2012
K Lawrence Tynes, Giants
0
26
24
102 (145)
2006
RB LaDainian Tomlinson, Chargers
18
0
0
108 (186*)
2005
RB Shaun Alexander, Seahawks
17
0
0
102 (168*)
1962
WR-K Gino Cappelletti, Patriots (AFL)
4
16
28
100 (128)
1962
RB-K Gene Mingo, Broncos (AFL)
4
18
23
101 (137*)
1961
RB-K Paul Hornung, Packers
10
12
34
130 (146*)
1961
WR-K Gino Cappelletti, Patriots (AFL)
7
12
32
110 (147*)
1960
RB-K Paul Hornung, Packers
11
11
30
129 (176*)
1958
RB Jim Brown, Browns
17
0
0
102 (108*)
1942
WR-K Don Hutson, Packers
15
0
29
119 (138*)
*led league
Notes: Hornung reached 100 in just seven games in 1960 (100 exactly) and again in 1961 (101). Cappelletti had 100 through eight games in ’61, and Hutson had 104 through eight in ’42. . . . Hornung missed two games in ‘61 because of a military commitment.
Anyway, that’s a pretty impressive bunch. Hornung, Brown and Hutson are in the Hall of Fame, and Tomlinson figures to join them soon enough.
The second kicker I wanted to call to your attention is Shayne Graham, currently with the Saints. I say “currently” because Graham has certainly been making the rounds lately. Since he left the Bengals as a free agent in 2010, he’s been with 10 different teams and played at least one regular season game with five of them.
● 2011 – Redskins (cut in camp), Cowboys (cut before season), Dolphins (2 games), Ravens (1).
● 2012 – Texans (16 games).
● 2013 – Browns (cut in camp), Steelers (on their roster for a game but wasn’t active), Saints (2).
● 2014 – Saints (9 games and counting).
How do ya like them frequent-flyer miles? But here’s the thing: Despite his job tenuousness, Graham has kicked the ball very well. In fact, in these five seasons — or parts thereof — he hasn’t missed a field goal try under 40 yards. The breakdown:
SHAYNE GRAHAM’S FIELD GOAL KICKING BY DISTANCE, 2010-14
0-19
20-29
30-39
40-49
50+
Made
Missed
%
2-2
22-22
22-22
18-14
10-5
65
9
87.2
(Numbers below distances are field goals attempted and made.)
To live out of a suitcase — well, practically — for five years and still perform at this level is . . . the definition of a pro. A guy like that deserves to kick in a dome at this stage of his career. He’s earned it.
Source: pro-football-reference.com
Much-traveled Shayne Graham has made 14 of 15 field goal tries for the Saints this season.
The Seahawks’ 38-17 win over The Giants in Week 10 was a statistical feast. Russell Wilson’s third 100-yard rushing game of the season — discussed in an earlier post — was just one aspect of the game that was out of the ordinary.
Seattle also won the rushing battle by 296 yards — 350-54. There have been only five bigger rushing margins since the 1970 merger.
BIGGEST RUSHING MARGINS IN AN NFL GAME SINCE 1970
Date
Winner, Yards
Loser, Yards
Edge
12-10-06
Jaguars, 375
Colts, 34
341
11-4-7
Vikings, 378
Chargers, 42
336
11-30-87
Raiders, 356
Seahawks, 37
319
10-5-80
Cardinals, 330
Saints, 15
315
11-11-01
Rams, 337
Panthers, 31
306
11-9-14
Seahawks, 350
Giants, 54
296
11-7-76
Steelers, 330
Rams, 34
296
The first three games are also notable for these reasons:
● The 2006 Colts went on to win the Super Bowl – overcoming their league-worst rushing defense in the process. Quite a trick.
● Finally, the Raiders got 221 yards from Bo Jackson, who had joined them after the Kansas City Royals’ baseball season was over and was playing in just his fifth NFL game.
The game is mostly remembered, though, for this 91-yard run of Bo’s:
One of the all-timers.
One other thing struck me as I was looking over the Seahawks’ stats Sunday night. Wilson threw two interceptions and no touchdown passes, yet Seattle still won by 21. Bet that hasn’t happened too often, I thought. When I researched it at pro-football-reference.com, I found only three other games like it in the past 16 seasons. In other words, it’s a once-every-1,000-games (or so) occurrence. Pretty rare.
And obviously, that makes sense. In this day and age, with quarterbacks passing so proficiently, you wouldn’t expect a club to win so easily when its QB has a 53.7 rating, as Wilson did (largely because of his two picks and zero TD passes).
For a while Sunday, as the fourth quarter wound down, the Seahawks’ Russell Wilson was sitting with 100 rushing yards in 10 carries. And I’m thinking: Oh, great. He’s going to kneel down on the last play or two and lose his 100-yard game.
You have to understand: This wasn’t just any 100-yard rushing game. It was his third 100-yard rushing game of the season, which is as many as any NFL quarterback has ever had in one year.
My fears, as it turned out were unfounded. Wilson kept going (mostly) forward and finished with 107 in 14 attempts in Seattle’s 38-17 win. This enabled him to join Michael Vick atop the following list:
MOST 100-YARD RUSHING GAMES BY A QUARTERBACK IN A SEASON
Year
Quarterback, Team
Rushing Yards (Opponent)
No.
2014
Russell Wilson, Seahawks
122 (Redskins), 106 (Rams), 107 (Giants)
3
2006
Michael Vick, Falcons
127 (Bucs), 101 (Cardinals), 166 (Saints)
3
2004
Michael Vick, Falcons
109 (Rams), 115 (Broncos), 104 (Giants)
3
2013
Terrelle Pryor, Raiders
112 (Colts), 106 (Steelers)
2
2010
Michael Vick, Eagles
103 (Packers), 130 (Giants)
2
2002
Donovan McNabb, Eagles
100 (Jaguars), 107 (Giants)
2
1972
Bobby Douglass, Bears
117 (Browns), 127 (Raiders)
2
1951
Tobin Rote, Packers
150 (Bears), 131 (Lions)
2
And, of course, Wilson still has seven games left, so he’s got a real shot at the record.
Only one of these quarterbacks, by the way, had back-to-back 100-yard rushing games. Any guesses? Answer: Rote. He did it, moreover, in the space of five days — against the Bears on Sunday and against the Lions on Thanksgiving. (Don’t count on another quarterback rushing for 281 yards in five days again. It’s one of those quirky marks that just might last forever.)
According to reports, Packers coach Gene Ronzani had Rote run out of a spread offense that was probably similar to what teams use today. An excerpt from the Milwaukee Journal story on the Bears game:
Rote had an even better game on Turkey Day. This is from the Journal again:
So Rote rushed for 131 yards against Detroit and threw for three touchdowns. Only two other quarterbacks have done that in the 63 years since: Vick in this game and the Eagles’ Randall
So what did the Packers do? They traded him to the Lions, one of their conference rivals, for three offensive linemen and a running back. “He is a great competitor — a great football player,” coach Lisle Blackbourn said, “but we need linemen if we are to have a chance.”
When Bobby Layne broke his ankle in the next-to-last game of ’57, Rote, who had been sharing the position with him, took over and led the Lions to an improbable NFL title. Six years later, he quarterbacked the Chargers to the AFL championship. Total points scored by his team in those two games: 110 (59 vs. the Browns and 51 vs. the Patriots).
Anyway, that’s the ghost Russell Wilson is chasing as he tries to become the second quarterback to rush for 100 yards in consecutive games in a season. The other QB in his sites, Vick, is — at last report — still up and running with the Jets.
By the way, I think we should put a bow on Ryan Fitzpatrick’s career as a starting QB.
Record as a starter: 31-54-1
Number of NFL teams that started him: 5
Number of winning seasons: 0
Most wins in one season: 6
Career: 117 touchdown passes, 101 picks, 28 lost fumbles, 185 sacks, 78.4 rating
Here’s why I brought this up. . . . Has anyone started 85 NFL games and won less than Fitzpatrick? We know Joey Harrington finished 26-50 and David Carr finished 23-56 . . . but did anyone win a lower percentage of 85 or more games than Fitzpatrick’s minus-23?
Fortunately, Grantland has one of the best editorial assistants/competitive eaters in the world: the one and only Danny Chau. Here’s what Danny found out: Only one player in football since 1920 has won less than Fitzpatrick after starting at least 85 games, a 5-foot-9 quarterback named Eddie “The Little General” LeBaron, who had a 26-52-3 record from 1952 to 1963.
Actually, if you study the information provided by The Competitive Eater (courtesy of pro-football-reference.com), you’ll see this isn’t true. Two other quarterbacks besides LeBaron started “at least 85 games” and had “a lower winning percentage” than Fitzpatrick — and two more had percentages that were nearly as bad. The list should read like this:
Years
Quarterback
Teams
W
L
T
Pct
1971-84
Archie Manning
Saints, Oilers, Vikings
35
101
3
.263
1952-63
Eddie LeBaron
Redskins, Cowboys
26
52
3
.340
1961-76
Norm Snead
Redskins, Eagles, Vikings, Giants, 49ers
52
99
7
.351
2005-14
Ryan Fitzpatrick
Rams, Bengals, Bills, Titans, Texans
31
54
1
.366
1987-99
Chris Miller
Falcons, Rams, Broncos
34
58
0
.370
1990-2001
Jeff George
Colts, Falcons, Raiders, Vikings, Redskins
46
78
0
.371
Note: The data lists LeBaron as having 85 starts but credits him with only 81 decisions.
Another way of looking at it, of course, is:
George (1990) was the first pick in the draft.
Manning (1971) and Snead (1961) were the second.
Miller (1987) was the 13th.
And LeBaron (123rd, 1950) and Fitzpatrick (250th, 2005), the two outliers, have the least explaining to do.
And another way of looking at it is to say: For goodness sakes, whatever happened to context? Eddie “The Little General” LeBaron and Ryan Fitzpatrick have almost nothing in common except
Two Redskins lineman hoist Eddie LeBaron.
their position. LeBaron was one of the better quarterbacks of his era, a four-time Pro Bowler who was a magician as a ball-faker and even did some punting (averaging 40.9 yards on 171 kicks). He just had the misfortune of spending his first seven seasons with the Redskins (whose bigoted owner, George Preston Marshall, wouldn’t sign black players) and his last four with the expansion Cowboys.
Pro-football-reference.com lists LeBaron at 5-foot-9, but the Cowboys media guide in 1963, his final season, puts him at 5-7. When he retired, he was 13th in NFL/AFL history in both passing yards (13,399) and touchdown passes (104). Those totals may not seem like much today, but the ’50s and early ’60s were a much different time.
Some of LeBaron’s individual seasons were outstanding. In 1957 (86.1) and ’58 (83.3) he finished second to Colts Hall of Famer Johnny Unitas in passer rating. In ’62 he led the league (95.4). That was the year he might have played his most amazing game. In a 42-27 win over the Steelers in Pittsburgh, he threw for five touchdowns in a mere 15 attempts while rotating at QB with Don Meredith. Repeat: He threw for five TDs despite playing only about half the game. Here’s Pat Livingston writing about it in The Pittsburgh Press:
Can you imagine anybody calling Ryan Fitzpatrick “a brilliant old pro who happens to be one of the most underrated performers in pro football”? So again, a little context, please. Fitzpatrick and LeBaron in the same sentence? They’re not even in the same universe. Going into this season, Fitzpatrick had never had a year when his passer rating was higher than the league average.
Yup, The Little General could play. And Fitzpatrick, the Harvard grad, will appreciate this: While Eddie was with the Redskins, he got his law degree at George Washington and practiced law in Dallas — that is, when he wasn’t busy throwing five touchdown passes in half a game.
It was a semi-big deal. Bob Arum was the promoter, Angelo Dundee worked Tommy Z’s corner and the setting was Madison Square Garden.
According to NCAA rules, Zbikowski, a cruiserweight, could accept his $25,000 purse and still retain his football eligibility, but he couldn’t “accept any money from any manufacturer to wear a specific brand of boxing apparel,” The New York Times reported.
By that time he’d had 90 amateur fights, compiling a 75-15 record. “I think I avenged all those losses,” he once told the Los Angeles Times, “and I probably had 10 to 20 more fights not listed, in smokers and stuff around the [Chicago] area.”
The Ravens drafted Zbikowski in the third round in 2008, and he spent four years in Baltimore backing up strong safety Ed Reed, returning kicks and running down under them. After that came a season with the Colts that was ended, five games early, by a shin injury.
Alcohol had become such a part of Zbikowski’s routine the night before games that he compared it to a superstition. His ideal mix: four glasses of scotch and four Guinnesses. Of the 64 NFL games Zbikowski participated in, he estimated at least 12 were played with a massive hangover.
“Get a little messed up, sneak a girl into your room, feel on top of the world,” Zbikowski said. “I had some of my best games off of benders — some of my worst, too. My two best seasons ever were 2005 [at Notre Dame] and 2009 [in Baltimore], when I was the most out of control drinking, so I thought, hey, maybe I should go back to that.’”
But for the first time in Indy, Zbikowski felt his nighttime activities affecting his game-day ability.
“I was drinking too much,” Zbikowski said. “I got fat.”
To lose the weight, he said, he took a diuretic, a blunder — the substance was banned by the NFL — that earned him a four-game suspension at the start of the 2013 season. It turned out to be moot, though, because he didn’t make it out of training camp. His hometown Bears, who had signed him in the offseason, released him, and that was the end of his football career.
All told, Tommy Z spent less than 17 minutes in the ring as a pro — 16 minutes, 54 seconds, to be exact. How good was he? Arum thought he had prospects, though Bob was probably thinking mostly about all the Notre Dame subway alumni who might come to his bouts. We’ll give Emanuel Stewart, who trained Zbikowski at the end, the final word on the subject. After Tommy hung on in the fourth round to beat Grummet, a mixed-martial-arts guy, Stewart said, “Thank goodness it wasn’t a six-round fight.”
One more thing: This clip has Spanish broadcasters — a Friday Night Fights (and Pro Football Daly) first. Don’t worry, though. “Zbikowski” in Spanish is still “Zbikowski.”
How often are interceptions — the defensive kind — a topic of discussion in the NFL? Oh, every once in a while a DB will go wild, pick off three or four passes in a game, and you’ll think: How’d that happen? Did the Hot Tub Time Machine transport DeAngelo Hall back to 1962? Anything less than that, though, and . . .
So allow me to point out that, eight games into the season, Browns free safety Tashaun Gipson has six INTs. And while you’re stifling a yawn, let me also point out that six is halfway to 12, and nobody has had that many since Lester Hayes had 13 for the Super Bowl-winning Raiders in 1980. In fact, since ’81, when Everson Walls had 11 as an undrafted Cowboys rookie, nobody has had more than 10.
Here are the seven sneak thieves who’ve reached that total in the last two decades:
DBS WITH THE MOST INTERCEPTIONS IN A SEASON (LAST 20 YEARS)
Year
Defensive back, Team
Int
Yds
TD
2007
Antonio Cromartie, Chargers
10
144
1
2006
Champ Bailey, Broncos
10
162
1
2006
Asante Samuel, Patriots
10
120
0
2005
Ty Law, Jets
10
195
1
2005
Deltha O’Neal, Bengals
10
103
0
2001
Ronde Barber, Bucs
10
86
1
2001
Anthony Henry, Browns
10
177
1
For those of you scoring at home, there are 31 Pro Bowls in that group – Bailey 12, Law and Barber 5, Samuel 4, Cromartie 3 and O’Neal 2. Three of them, moreover, had more than 50 career picks (Law 53, Bailey 52, Samuel 51) and another had 47 (Barber). That puts them in the Top 20 since 1978, the year the league started legislating against defense. So if Gipson reaches double digits, he’ll be in good company.
Hey, just trying to work up some enthusiasm for The Other Side of the Ball. It ain’t easy these days. After all, Night Train Lane’s record of 14 interceptions in a season has stood since 1952, when they played only 12 games, and hasn’t been seriously challenged in ages. Look at it this way: Tom Brady and Ben Roethlisberger have thrown a combined six picks this year. That’s how many Gipson has. Impressed yet?
Source: pro-football-reference.com
Gipson at the start of his 62-yard pick-six vs. Drew Brees and the Saints.
The rumblings are getting louder that Jim Harbaugh is on the way out in San Francisco. Jerry Rice is the most recent member of the Niners Family to pipe up. “I have heard some complaints from some players that he likes to try to coach with the collegiate mentality,” the Hall of Fame wideout told Newsday’s Bob Glauber, “and that’s just not going to work in the NFL.”
Boy, that’s a tough crowd in the Bay Area. Harbaugh takes over a team that has missed the playoffs eight years running, guides it to three straight NFC title games and one Super Bowl, and folks are starting to dump on him because (a.) the 49ers are off to a 4-4 start, and (b.) his coaching style is unorthodox by NFL standards.
His “collegiate mentality” has worked just fine up to now — unless you’re going to argue that it was his “collegiate mentality” that caused Kyle Williams to mishandle punts in the 2011
Jim Harbaugh in full throat.
conference championship game, or that it was his “collegiate mentality” that kept his offense from putting the ball in the end zone late in Super Bowl 47, or that it was his “collegiate mentality” that prevented the Niners from winning a fourth consecutive game on the road at the end of last season (formidable Arizona to finish the regular season, then Green Bay, Carolina and Seattle in the playoffs).
Yeah, that “collegiate mentality” is just a killer.
But that’s not the subject of this post. It’s just my way of beginning this post. The subject of this post is: former NFL quarterbacks who become head coaches in the league — and how Harbaugh is one of the few who have experienced much success. Going into Sunday’s game, he’s 45-18-1, postseason included. That’s a .711 winning percentage, far better than most ex-QBs have done.
If there’s anything we’ve learned over the years, it’s that former NFL QBs — despite their inherent genius, sixth sense, Pattonesque leadership ability and whatever other bouquets were tossed their way during their playing days — have no Special Insight into the game. They’re just as capable of turning out losing teams as the next guy, maybe more so.
Check out the regular-season records of the five modern Hall of Fame quarterbacks who have become head coaches in the league:
HALL OF FAME NFL QUARTERBACKS AS HEAD COACHES
Quarterback, Played For*
Coached
W-L-T
Pct
Sammy Baugh, Redskins
1960-61 N.Y Titans, ’64 Oilers
18-24-0
.429
Bob Waterfield, Rams
1960-62 Rams
9-24-1
.279
Norm Van Brocklin, Rams
1961-66 Vikings, ’68-74 Falcons
66-100-7
.402
Otto Graham, Browns
1966-68 Redskins
17-22-3
.440
Bart Starr, Packers
1975-83 Packers
52-76-3
.408
*Team he played for longest.
I’ll say it for you: Yikes. Of these five, only Starr coached a club to the playoffs – in the nine-game ’82 strike season.
Lesser-known quarterbacks, it turns out, have done a lot better on the sideline — though, again, none has been Vince Lombardi. Their regular-season records look like this:
HOW OTHER FORMER NFL QUARTERBACKS HAVE FARED AS HEAD COACHES
Quarterback, Played For*
Coached
W-L-T
Pct
Jim Harbaugh, Bears
2011-14 49ers
40-15-1
.723
John Rauch, N.Y. Bulldogs
1966-68 Raiders, ’69-70 Bills
40-28-2
.586
Frankie Albert, 49ers
1956-58 49ers
19-16-1
.542
Jason Garrett, Cowboys
2010-14 Cowboys
35-30-0
.538
Tom Flores, Raiders
1979-87 Raiders, ’92-94 Seahawks
97-87-0
.527
Allie Sherman, Eagles
1961-68 Giants
57-51-4
.527
Ted Marchibroda, Steelers
1975-79/’92-95 Colts,’96-98 Ravens
87-98-1
.470
Gary Kubiak, Broncos
2006-13 Texans
61-64-0
.488
Sam Wyche, Bengals
1984-91 Bengals, ’92-95 Bucs
84-107-0
.440
Harry Gilmer, Redskins
1965-66 Lions
10-16-2
.393
June Jones, Falcons
1994-96 Falcons, ’98 Chargers
22-36-0
.379
Steve Spurrier, 49ers
2002-03 Redskins
12-20-0
.375
Jim Zorn, Seahawks
2008-09 Redskins
12-20-0
.375
Kay Stephenson, Bills
1983-85 Bills
10-26-0
.278
Frank Filchock, Redskins
1960-61 Broncos
7-20-1
.268
*Team he played for longest.
If you want to add the Saints’ Sean Payton (77-43, .642), a replacement quarterback during the ’87 strike, to this list, be my guest. To me, he was a pseudo-NFL QB, but . . . whatever.
Anyway, this group at least has had its moments. Flores won two Super Bowls (1980/’83), Rauch (’67) and Wyche (’88) led teams to the Super Bowl, Sherman’s Giants went to three straight NFL title games (1961-63) and Marchibroda came within a Hail Mary of getting to the Super Bowl with the ’95 Colts (with — you’ve gotta love this — Harbaugh throwing the pass).
Obviously, this is a small sample size. Most former NFL quarterbacks, after all, don’t become coaches, don’t want to deal with the aggravation. They’d much rather pontificate about the game from a broadcast booth or TV studio — or cash in on their celebrity in the business world. And who’s to say that doesn’t make them smarter than the ones who so willingly hurl themselves back into the arena?
Still, Harbaugh, “collegiate mentality” and all, might be the best the league has seen. Does anybody really think, if he leaves the 49ers after this season to coach at his alma mater, Michigan, that pro football will be better for it?
There are two kinds of streaks in sports: the real kind, which go on without interruption, and the regular-season kind, which are suspended for the playoffs and resume — the player hopes — the next year. In Sunday’s 43-21 loss to the Patriots, the Broncos’ Peyton Manning threw two touchdown passes for the 14th straight regular-season game to set an NFL record.
“Going into the game,” The Associated Press reported, “Manning had two 13-game streaks with at least two touchdown passes, and Tom Brady of the Patriots and Aaron Rodgers of the Green Bay Packers each had one.”
Of course, if postseason games were included, then that paragraph would have read differently. Brady (2010-11) and Rodgers (the same two seasons) have both had 14-game streaks counting the playoffs – and Manning’s current run of 14 games would only be eight games (since he threw for just one TD in the Super Bowl against the Broncos).
I’m not trying to bust anybody’s chops here. I totally get why the NFL separates the regular season from the postseason for record-keeping purposes. In the playoffs, after all, you’re going up against the best teams every week. They’re not Typical Games.
But I do wish the league paid as much attention to Real Streaks as it does Regular-Season Streaks. I mean, what’s the harm? All it would cost is a few extra pages in the record book. And the benefit is obvious: You’d be acknowledging some performances that might otherwise be overlooked. Better still, you’d be letting the fans decide for themselves whether one streak is better than another.
My reason for bringing this up is that Johnny Unitas threw two touchdown passes or more in 13 consecutive games in 1959 — the Colts’ 12 regular-season games, plus the title game against the Giants. That’s as long as any Real Streak Manning has had. (Peyton had a 13-gamer to start 2004, when he tossed 49 TD passes.)
You know who else had a 13-gamer? Dandy Don Meredith with the Cowboys in 1965 (the last nine games) and ’66 (the first four). I’m still not sure why Meredith was left out of AP’s story. His was strictly a regular-season streak, unlike Johnny U.’s.
Here are the game-by-game breakdowns for Unitas’ and Meredith’s streaks. Given the times — and the less-passer-friendly rules — who’s to say their runs weren’t greater those of Manning, Brady and Rodgers?
UNITAS’ 13-GAME STREAK (1959)
Opponent
TD
Lions
2
Bears
3
Lions
3
Bears
2
Packers
3
Browns
4
Redskins
2
Packers
3
49ers
2
Rams
2
49ers
3
Rams
3
Giants*
2
Total
34
*championship game
MEREDITH’S 13-GAME STREAK (1965-66)
Opponent
TD
Browns
2
Steelers
2
49ers
2
Steelers
2
Browns
2
Redskins
2
Eagles
2
Cardinals
3
Giants
3
Giants
5
Vikings
2
Falcons
2
Eagles
5
Total
34
Note that each threw for exactly 34 scores during the streak. Unitas’ 32 TD passes in the regular season broke the NFL record of 28 set by the Bears’ Sid Luckman in 1943. Johnny U.’s Colts, by the way, won the title that year, and Meredith quarterbacked the Cowboys to the championship game in ’66.
There’s little chance the NFL and its record-keepers will ever come around on this issue, but that won’t stop me from bugging them about it from time to time. That said, something tells me Unitas, were he alive today, probably wouldn’t care much about such a record, being an old schooler and all. In fact, if you ever brought the matter up to him, he’d probably give you a look like this:
