Are you aware that half (nine of the 18) of the defensive ends inducted into the PFHOF predominantly played on the left side? Are you also aware that of the other eight, only Deacon Jones and Reggie White had better sack numbers? Again, I will use my common sense, game footage (and in the case of Strahan, I saw the majority of his games in real time), and actual words spoken to me by an actual PFHOF voter over the baseless stuff you are putting forth in this thread. Maybe myself and everyone else are the dopes here. Maybe we should stop watching football and have you explain everything to us.
where did I pin it on him? I made a valid point he got that record in mostly meaningless action. all his great play wasn't helping them win so what good was it? he had a great year w/o a doubt, he had 2-3 great years but that's not enough in a 15 season career to get into the HOF. It's so watered down it's ridiculous.
who are the others? Deacon doesn't have official sack #s but reggie puts Strahan to shame and I have seen people compare Strahan to Reggie. reggie DOMINATED from the left side, Strahan did not.
It was a great season regardless of what the team did. He did a great job with his part. He had 4 1st Team All Pro seasons and 2 2nd Team All Pro seasons. He had more than 2-3 great years. Keep looking at the sacks statistic, but unfortunately for you stats in football never tells the whole story.
Well, people can compare White to Strahan. They both played the same position for NFC East teams. There seems to be a natural comparison to make there. It would be like Jets fans comparing Curtis Martin to Thurman Thomas. Now, if you are saying people are comparing Strahan to White as in they are saying Strahan was just as great, then they are biased Giants fan fools. I thought it goes without saying that White and Jones are on a different level. White and Jones will be in the running for spots on the NFL All-Time 100th anniversary team in a few years. Strahan will not be. That does not mean Strahan is not deserving of his induction. Hall of Fame DEs who played mostly on the left side- Willie Davis Carl Eller Howie Long Gino Marchetti Reggie White Jack Youngblood Michael Strahan Claude Humphrey Deacon Jones Hall of Fame DEs who played mostly on the right side- Doug Atkins Elvin Bethea Len Ford Andy Robustelli Lee Roy Selmon Bruce Smith Chris Doleman Richard Dent Fred Dean As a group, the left side guys were more well-rounded than the right side guys. While not officially recognized, there are numbers out there and besides White and Jones, Humphrey also had better sack stats than Strahan (did earlier post in car at lunch; was supposed to indicate that only White and Jones were clearly better than Strahan, but I flubbed that portion of the post; meant the others were in the same neighborhood of Strahan). The other guys are right there with Strahan. (Humphrey should have been inducted a long time ago. I was saying this before ever joining this site.)
This is what happens when posting from a phone. A little awkward in the writing above there, but so what. I am not going to continue to fiddle around with it. Of the 18 ends in, I am iffy on Bethea, Dent and Dean. Bethea I think of as being a tick below HOF level and Dean and Dent were a little too much one dimensional for my liking. For this reason, I am also against Simeon Rice and Dwight Freeney being inducted down the road.
I could not agree more strongly with your posts. Also appreciate the research, Good Job Cakes. The only thing I will say about Freeney is that he was virtually the only defensive presence on those Colts teams. He would get all of the attention of the opponents. They were memorable teams of their era and of course won a SB. It's possible he could get in and I might be okay with that, despite him being quite one dimensional. Rice was horrendous against the run. The only weakness on that great 2002 Bucs Defense was Rice against the run. Teams would run right at him. I could careless about his sack #s. You want to talk about a compiler. Plus Rice was probably the 5th best player on his own defense. Playing on the same D line as Sapp certainly helped him. Plus that team already has Sapp, Brooks in the hall and probably Ronde Barber gets in.. Rice too? No way.
Reggie was also possibly the GOAT when it comes to defensive linemen regardless of position, so trying to compare him to almost anyone else isn't exactly fair.
pass rushers are judged on getting to the QB, his compiled sack #s and deceiving rank amongst the all time sack leaders is a major reason why he made it. Howie Long also in b/c of his TV popularity. all those other guys besides Reggie we don't have sack #s b/c sacks were not an official statistic and they played in eras where they didn't pass as much so they had less opportunity. Rice was the missing piece to those great TB Ds and the '02 Bucs may have been the greatest D in history and he was a huge part of it. Opponents averaged 3.8 YPC against the Bucs, I wouldn't call that a weakness. In 3 postseason games opponents ran it for less than 3.6 YPC. Rice had 8 DD sack seasons in 13 years, Strahan 6 in 15 years. Strahan wasn't half the pass rusher Rice was and Rice did it against LTs.
He was one of the best Defensive players of his era and that is why is in. Anything else is just speculation on your part, and being that your a Giant hater, it's obvious as to how you came to your conclusion. There are many people who have done extensive research on total sacks for players prior to 1982. While it's not an "official" number, they are very accurate. TB opponents didn't have a tremendous amount of success running against TB before Rice got there either - it wasn't a weakness to begin with. 1997 - 3.9 1998 - 3.8 1999 - 3.9 2000 - 4.1 (TB lost Hardy Nickerson and Brad Culpepper before 2000.) 2001 - 4.1 (TB adds Simeon Rice) 2002 - 3.9 2003 - 3.9 I'd say the reason why TB were so good against the run had more to do with Sapp, Brooks, Lynch, McFarland, Quarles, Duncan etc. etc. than Simeon Rice.
one of the most overrated, overhyped. he's in b/c of the sham sack record, the compilation of sacks, the deception of where he is on the all time sack list and being the next regis Philbin. accurate but not official and again they threw less in the olden days so Strahan had more opportunities. so that throws the notion that their weakness was against the run and it was all b/c of Rice? I guarantee you the Giants YPC #s are much worse with the "great run stuffer" Strahan. The bottom line is this, pass rushers are judged on getting to the QB. Rice was MUCH better getting to the QB than Strahan was, that's not even debatable.
Fuckin Simeon Rice. The guy is a POS. He belongs in the hall of stupid fucks not the pro football hall of fame. He is so fortunate to have shared the field with Sapp, Brooks, Barber and Lynch or he have 1/2 or less of those precious coverage sacks he had in his career. Not only is he about as overrated a defensive end ever to suit up in this league, he's also a fuckin jackass. -He wasn't just a little one dimensional... he was selfish and horrendous against the run. He would duck away from blocks and contact. He would give up on plays, saving his energy for 3rd down because he only cared about $$$ and sack numbers made him money. He never played hard unless it was an obvious passing situation and didn't care about his assignments or getting better against the run. He made it harder on his teammates out there because they couldn't count on him at all. That's why Arizona was fine with him leaving in free agency... -Going to Tampa was the best thing that ever happened to him because he had the safety net of that great defense around him such that he could get by being selfish and horrendous against the run because those great players picked up his mess for him. Yet he still had the gall to call Coach Gruden the guy who dealt with his bullshit for years, worked around his selfish play for years, a scumbag. - Pat Tillman makes the ultimate sacrifice to walk away from $3Million from the Cards to join the Army Rangers during a war and his former teammate Simeon Rice publicly rips him saying it was "a good thing he left the NFL because he was a crappy player." I listened to that interview at the time and Jim Rome kept trying to give him the opportunity to save face...basically like "good player or not he's making a great sacrifice, right Simeon..???" Nope. he kept doubling down on those asshole comments. -He goes to Denver in free agency after Tampa and they wanted him to be more of a two way player, a veteran leader, etc. And he refused. As a result they gave him less playing time so he completely quit on his team, asking to be released The hall of fame doesn't need to be about inducting hall of fame citizens but it at least should factor in whether or not the guy was a terrific player that a team was based around. Strahan at least fits that minimum requirement. Rice who rode the coattails of his teammates and selfishly set out to compile stats only - - doesn't.
I am not sure why you keep harping on this. Just because defensive end A is a better pass rusher than defensive end B, it does not necessarily mean A was a better player than B. Also, according to your own logic every left end should be compiling huge sack totals every year because they are facing lowly right tackles. So which LDEs are getting the job done?
What is this "compiling sack #s" bit? Did Strahan hang around for several years falling into sacks based on mediocre play? The compiler business works in baseball much more than in football. Steve Carlton tacked on some extra wins while playing with four or so teams in his last three seasons. He wasn't great anymore but he did compile some additional stats. Don Sutton could be considered a compiler in that he was not really ever dominant. He was good to very good in a very long career. Craig Biggio compiled. He was probably never actually great or dominant. Anybody, though, who played a long time compiled stats. Willie Mays was a compiler. Babe Ruth was a compiler. Hank Aaron was a compiler. Tom Seaver was a compiler. Bob Gibson was a compiler. Compiling in the NFL could be seen in Tim Brown's year with Tampa Bay or Thurman Thomas playing with Miami or Emmitt Smith with Arizona. What those guys did late in their careers is what the sports statistics compiling notion actually is about. Those three guys finished their careers playing mostly ineffective football but got some stats added and helped move past or created more distance from others on all time record lists. Strahan finished his career playing for a championship team. I didn't find him to be ineffective that season and I don't recall him falling into sacks because his teammates did all the work. Do I think Strahan is a top tier Hall of Famer? No. Do I think he belongs in the Hall of Fame? Yes.
Do you know that it is harder to sack quarterbacks now than it was 50 years ago? It is true. There were major rule changes implemented prior to the 1978 season. One rule made it easier for offensive lineman to block. In Strahan's 21.5 sack season (with bonus "sack" of Favre), teams averaged 244 yards in sack yardage. 10 years earlier, in 1991, teams averaged 246 yards lost while attempting to pass. 1981: 292 was the league average 1971: 253 1961 NFL: 301 1961 AFL: 310 1951: 254 Yes, you are absolutely right. Teams pass more now. Therefore, there are more opportunities to sack quarterbacks. Sacks occur with far fewer frequency in this day and age, though. This is, again, primarily due to offensive lineman having had their job duties made significantly easier due to rule changes. By the way, while individual sack totals are not official pre-1982, the team totals are official pre-1982. This is mostly, or maybe solely, due to the fact that stat keepers did not bother noting which individual players recorded the sacks until the league decided it was important to do so.
what does yards lost have to do w/ anything? find average pass attempts per team through the generations. That will tell you more.
he put up decent sack #s throughout most of his career w/ 2-3 high sack seasons. He played forever and compiled #s, he wasn't great. He was a failure as a RDE facing LTs and couldn't dominate weaker RTs.
Yeeah, okay... Accurate and still a good gauge as to where players are ranked. OL back then couldn't use their arms to block like they can now, so while Strahan had more opps, he didn't have an advantage the older guys did (plus things like the head slap were legal and used back then). I don't recall anyone saying the Bucs D was weak against the run, just that Simeon Rice was weak against the run. Strahan was a much better DE than S. Rice was. Strahan was a much more complete DE.
