If you are basing "Great QBs" with SB wins, not many teams have more than 1 or 2, and some teams don't have any. I would have to say Ken O'brien and Chad Pennington have been very good selections. Sanchez could also prove to be a great one, but only time will tell.
Nobody as great as Namath. Good ones were Todd, O'Brien, and Pennington. Jury's out on Samchez. Was this a trick question?
My thoughts exactly, those three have been the best we've draftred, all #1 picks. We haven't totally whiffed on a #1 pick QB, those are the three. Jeff Blake was also our draft pick who turned out good but unfortunately not for us. Also, once the salary cap and free agency came along the Jets opted for veterans over the draft for a long time, bringing in Boomer, Neil O'Donnell and Vinny via trades/free agency. That explains largely why we didn't draft a good QB between O'Brien and Pennington with the exception of Blake who left when we got Boomer.
What I meant was when he retired, I always wonder what could have been with Kenny O had the Jets drafted Rice instead of Toon. Then again how good could have Toon been if Walker wasn't at the end of his career when Toon was beginning his. The Jets had some very good weapons in those days as Shuler was a very good TE too. McNeil was a solid RB and Hector was a good backup. If If If..... the life of a Jet fan
O'Brien was good but reliant on a good O-line because he couldn't move and didn't have a fast release. Once the line and the players around him got old all his flaws were exposed. In my opinion Toon was every bit as good as Rice, Rice benefitted from going to SF and playing with that great team. That window from about 1985-88 when the old guys were still good and O'Brien stepped into the job was a good era for him and the Jets. By the end he didn't have the tools and never seemed to click with Coslet's offense.
On the money, Miano. Nice post. I totally agree. Poor Kenny, he was shell shocked toward the end of his career with all the times he had to eat the ball. But Chad would have been six feet under by then. On the other hand, what he did with that crappy Oline was to his credit. Obviously. But "great"? Depends on how you define great...
Well Toon certainly did not have Rice's longevity. Only one season did Toon play all sixteen games, which was 86, his second season. His rookie year he only had 46 catches, then in his third year his average catches per game went up, as did average gain, but he missed four games, and it pretty much tailed off after 88. Walker similarly missed lots of games in the period in question, other than the same year, 86. You had to love his average gain number, but only in 86 did he exceed 1000 yards total (after 78, of course). Shuler didn't miss a game from 83 to 86, which is awesome, but he missed five in 87, and came back in 88 to miss only one - 70 catches. Not bad for a TE. In other words, as great as those three guys were, it's not like Kenny had them all on the field for that period. Far from it.
That's hard to say. Todd won some playoff games and won big games in the cold that O'Brien never won. By the time they traded Todd I thought he'd evolved into a good player. To me they wasted a couple of prime years with that 80s team switching to O'Brien, even though O'Brien turned out good a few years later. Todd never had Al Toon, either, just a younger Wesley Walker and guys like Derrick Gaffney and Lam Jones.
As I pointed out above, O'Brien only had Toon and Walker on the field together the whole season for one year, 86. Todd only had one year nearly as good as 86, that being 81. Imo, not as good. He also had Barkum, Harper and a rookie McNeil that year to help in the passing game, not just Walker, Jones and Gaffney. I am not sure what you meant by wasting years switching to O'Brien. Todd was out of the league by the end of 85, hardly playing at all, and led NO to 6-8 in his last full year, 84. He wasn't even playing by 86.
You beat me to it. I was a big Ken O'Brien fan back in the eighties. He just got pummeled most games due to poor pass protection but damn, when he was given time he was great.
Back then it was harder for a QB to go to a new place and do well at 30 years old. I think if Todd stayed he'd have continued to be a good QB for the Jets--specualtion of course. You look at 1984, everyone was in their prime, Gastineau had 22 sacks, we had Walker, McNeil, Hector, all kinds of weapons, and a huge hole at QB--Ryan and O'Brien had never started a game going into the season. I think if we kept Todd there would have been more continuity between the 81 -82 playoff teams and the 85-86 playoff teams, the latter may have been better in the playoffs. O'Brien had his best years in 1985 and 86 but faded at the end, when Todd had a history of playing better in the cold and in the playoffs. Certainly 1983 was disappointing with Todd but to me trading him set us back a couple years when the rest of the team was all put together and ready to win.
Have you ever seen him play? I don't mean anything by this other than it seems most people that claim he is overrated only look at his numbers today and never saw him play in his era. Edit: You also got slammed because MO CARLETT WAS THE STEAL OF THE DRAFT.
