What many people forget is Dawson played for Hank Stram who practically created play action. When Namath went back to pass he didn't drop back 3 or 5 steps he took a very deep drop and set up deeper than any QB I have ever seen play. He also throw the ball primarily down field into a set up D. Dawson was throwing primarily on the play action fake on quick drops or right into direct lanes to his WR. Dawson was throwing short to wide open recievers much of his carreer. Namath, Hadl and Lamonica where throwing into set coverage with safety help down the field.
What a horrible year for QBs if Joe was 1st team all-pro. 19 TDs to 21 INTs while leading his team to a 7-7 record was the best the NFL had to offer that year? that tells me Dawson was smarter. JoeWillie mentioned yards per completion well dawson had almost 13.5 yards per completion while namath was at 14.5- that's not that big of difference and certainly not enough to justify -47 in TD/INT ratio to +56 for Dawson. Joe played 71 LESS games and threw 37 MORE INTs than Dawson. dawson led KC to THREE AFL Titles and a SB title and dawson BEAT Joe and the defending Champ Jets head to head in their only playoff meeting AT NY.
Montana has 4 SB, Dawson was 1 & 2 Namath was 1 for 1. Montana isn't even remotely considered the best QB in football without Walsh.
Dawson won THREE AFL titles and reached 2 SBs, Joe won 1 AFL title and won his only SB. If all things were equal and both had only 1 SB appearance then maybe you can close the gap but 3 AFL titles, 2 SB appearances and as many SB wins gives the nod to dawson and it's not even close. In 1966 he led KC to the SB by winning AT Buf even though KC won 2 more games than Buf(unlike Joe who led the Jets to a win at home against a teamt hat had more wins than them). In 1969 beat Joe and the Jets AT NY, then beat Oak AT Oak the completely dismantled the Vikes in the SB.
Junc this are Bart Starr's numbers for the 67 SB champs. By the way I saw Starr and he was great. Att Com % yards YPC TD Int 115 210 54.8 1823 8.7 9 17
He still ended up w/ 14 more TDs than INTs which is a difference of 51 from Joe's -47. He struggled in the reg season as did GB but he had a good SB and I'm guessing a good NFL Title Game. Joe had a good year in '69(only 2 more INts than TDs) but didn't get it done at home in the playoffs.
Just to give you an idea of what passing was like in 1972: touchdown passes- 404 interceptions- 480 Compare that with 2004: touchdown passes- 732 interceptions- 524
The Chiefs had a much better team than the Jets in the mid 60's the Chiefs were a great football team and probably outside of the Packers the best coached team in football. Dawson never had to throw for more than 2500 yards in a season for KC to dominate.
I'm not comparing him w/ QBs of today, today it is definitely safer but Dawson was a contemporary as were others who didn't have negative TDs to INTs.
The Ice Bowl. 14 of 24 for 191 yards and two touchdown passes He carried once for one yard. We've all seen the play countless times.
Joe didn't have to pass for much in the SB. He had 208 yds and didn't attempt a pass in the 4th qtr so the Jets must have had a pretty good team, right? and in '69 we beat KC at KC so it's safe to say the Jets and KC were close in the late 60s, right?
Since when is a 10 point game over? If there is 5 minutes left and you're driving, a TD would then be followed by a kickoff. Then you hold em and get the ball back and score again. From fan standpoint, this is basic 'watching football 101'. But he didn't throw a TD, he threw a pick.......twice. I'm not saying he wasn't great in 98, he was. I'm not saying he didn't play great in that game and his teammates didn't let him down. He did and they did. However, you're ascertion that a 10 point game is over midway or even 3/4's of the way through the fourth quarter is just dead wrong. Score, hold em, score. I mean, it's been done.
What I was getting at there is that most people under the age of 40 see those Namath interceptions and think he was overrated or flat out sucked. Most QBs threw more INTs than TDs back then. Dawson was one exception. If they played today, Dawson would project to throw 7 or 8 interceptions a season. Ken O'Brien or Neil O'Donnell type numbers. I do like comparing players to their contemporaries and like I wrote earlier Dawson statistically has Namath beat across the board. However, not many people who saw them play regularly would take Dawson over Namath.
Den had all the momentum after the McCaffery pass play then the Meggett goof on the KOR. We HAD to pass b/c we couldn't run, the Den D could just sit back and play for the pass. Vinny had us at midfeild when Curtis fumbled, inside the 15 when Byars fumbled and about the 30 when van Dyke fumbled and a missed FG. Those were key plays, an INT down 10 w/ 6-7 mins left then down 13 w/ 2 mins left were not thre reasons we lost.
That 8.7 is actually YPA (yards per attempt), not YPC (yards per completion). That's the standout stat there. 8.7 is a big number. For a career the top three are: Otto Graham, 8.63 Sid Luckman, 8.42 Kurt Warner, 8.40 (entering the 2005 season) If you looked at one number to analyze QBs, that might be the best stat to consider. (Namath owns the third highest single game number. He had a 17.71 mark against Baltimore on 9-24-72. He threw 28 passes for 496 yards.)
I agree, but you're saying two different things. Here you're saying the picks were 'not the reason we lost', which I agree with you on. In your prior post you said when Vinny threw a pick down 10 with 6 minutes to go, 'the game was over already', which I disagree with.
In seasons that Dawson, Starr and Namath played at least 12 games Namath averaged 2,900 yards, Dawson 2,035 yards and Starr 1,721 yards. The Jets didn't have an offense without the passing game, KC and GB were power teams that inflicted there will on teams by beating the crap out of them in the trenches. The Jets were a finese team that beat teams by throwing the ball down the field. If you want to look at a QB of the era who you can really make the argument with try Sonny Jurgensen. He was a true downfield QB who was great and couldn't win in that era. The thing that seperated Namath was he was the first real down field throwing QB who was able to win a SB.
