Professional Football Researchers Association Forum
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readjack wrote: Watters in SF wasn't getting nearly the touches that Priest got in his three-year peak in KC, but their production per touch was similar, with Priest a smidge ahead in yards per touch (5.6 to 5.4) and a smidge ahead in TDs per touch (.05 to .04)
This is where you really lose me….if you think Watters’ time in SF is comparable to Priest in KC, then I guess it makes sense that everyone in your group thinks so highly of Watters. They are nothing alike. First, Priest is miles ahead of Watters in number of touches (among other things, like every counting stat). Second, when Watters had anything similar to Priest’s workload during his career, his ‘yards per touch’ was 4.3, 4.6 and 4.3. So for Priest to have a 5.6 yards per touch and such a high workload is remarkable.
I agree that Priest was vastly superior. I'm saying, they were similar types. Like when Phil Jackson said that Steph Curry reminded him of Mahmoud Abdul-Rauf.
I agree on your point that Watters being top 3 would have been super hard. I'm not knocking him for not being Barry or Emmitt or even Thurman. I'm saying that he was annually among the best RBs in the game as an all-around player. I personally would rather have Watters than Bettis, and maybe over Curtis Martin. I just liked the breadth of his abilities.
I don't see any of these RBs as HOFers, IMO. Eddie George, Priest Holmes, Corey Dillion, Shaun Alexander - all HOVG. None of them as good as Adrian Peterson, IMO.
Jamal Lewis had ONE excellent season. One. Only once more than 10 rushing TDs in a season. I'd rather see WRs get in than any of these backs.
sluggermatt15 wrote:I don't see any of these RBs as HOFers, IMO. Eddie George, Priest Holmes, Corey Dillion, Shaun Alexander - all HOVG. None of them as good as Adrian Peterson, IMO.
Jamal Lewis had ONE excellent season. One. Only once more than 10 rushing TDs in a season. I'd rather see WRs get in than any of these backs.
None are as good as Adrian Peterson, but Reggie Wayne, Hines Ward and Anquan Boldin are all a far cry from Randy Moss, Terrell Owens and Larry Fitzgerald. Roethlisberger, Rivers and Eli all seem headed for Canton and they are at least two levels below Brady/Manning/Brees/Rodgers.
Running backs should be granted that same multi-tiered respect.
readjack wrote:
None are as good as Adrian Peterson, but Reggie Wayne, Hines Ward and Anquan Boldin are all a far cry from Randy Moss, Terrell Owens and Larry Fitzgerald. Roethlisberger, Rivers and Eli all seem headed for Canton and they are at least two levels below Brady/Manning/Brees/Rodgers.
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That is why reasonable people can think guys a "far cry" and "two levels below" are not HOFers. I am not a small Hall guy myself but I am not a let everyone in, either. The reason I blocked a certain person on Twitter is because he said "Small hall people should shut up".
There is room for both ideas and anywhere in between. However, the problem with the big Hall is that there is not enough room. The Hall has their rules, for better or worse, and there has to be priority.
I think you make a point you were not trying to make - that a lot of players may be HOVG that are being pushed for HOF, especially skill players.
Peterson could run better than these backs but Peterson couldnt block like Dillon or George and couldnt catch the ball like Holmes, Watters or Barber. I also believe Alexander and Holmes had better vision running through the line than Peterson but shorter careers. Alexander scored as many TDs as Peterson ... Though we all know Peterson will be first ballot. It helps that he racked up yardage after the NFL started to crack down on hard hits and putting more restrictions on defensive football. In my opinion, basically after the Legion Of Boom put Denver on their ass in the SB ...
Thats why coaches should emphasize the running game more now than ever. Defenses cant go to war against runners and receivers like the 1990s. I really believe many defenders dont even want to tackle today. They want to run around and cover or chase down players ...
I'm thinking they are going to induct the all decade RBs minus Jamal Lewis and leave everyone else to the senior committee. Maybe someone else gets through and Watters seems to be in front of the long long line of RB candidates(with Fred Taylor oddly enough)but he's running out of time. Think he's down to his last 3 or 4 tries.
sluggermatt15 wrote:I don't see any of these RBs as HOFers, IMO. Eddie George, Priest Holmes, Corey Dillion, Shaun Alexander - all HOVG. None of them as good as Adrian Peterson, IMO.
Jamal Lewis had ONE excellent season. One. Only once more than 10 rushing TDs in a season. I'd rather see WRs get in than any of these backs.
None are as good as Adrian Peterson, but Reggie Wayne, Hines Ward and Anquan Boldin are all a far cry from Randy Moss, Terrell Owens and Larry Fitzgerald. Roethlisberger, Rivers and Eli all seem headed for Canton and they are at least two levels below Brady/Manning/Brees/Rodgers.
Running backs should be granted that same multi-tiered respect.
I don't think that's a fair comparison. Moss is arguably the greatest receiver ever and Wayne and Boldin are not far removed from Fitzgerald if they are at all.
Part of it is the list of running backs with comparable stats is larger than WRs and they're all dragging each other down. At least in the 90s and 00s and early 10s(eras that are currently on the ballot)there's just not as many WR HOF candidates. This will likely change in 5-10 years but with the generations on the ballot right now that's the case. The current WR logjam was about all the WRs retiring around the same time not really their being a stampede of WRs with HOF cases. Given that WRs play longer and the inflation of passing statistics the stats of this group tend to pass the "borderline" by quite a bit whereas the more short tenured running backs tend to all plateau near the borderline(say 10,000ish rushing yards 14,000ish yards from scrimmage,80-90ish TDs).
Eddie George made the Semi finals last year over Jamal Lewis and besides maybe Priest Holmes I think all the running backs you listed have a better chance at induction than Jamal. Jamal Lewis getting the 4th all decade spot was a highly questionable decision but there wasn't a really obvious choice for that slot. Like all the other backs in this group Lewis's has it's strengths and then it's lacking in some areas. In any case the HOF voters ranking of this group seems to be Taylor/Watters/George.
The only guy on that list that I thought - "could be a Hall of Famer" while I was watching him play through his career is Shaun Alexander. Fred Taylor might be borderline. Same with Eddie George. Priest Holmes has that TD record and maybe he deserves some kind of consideration for that possibly.
Ricky Watters was very good. At times excellent. But not in the same class as HOFs like Sayers, Payton, Brown, etc. And he didn't add a new stat category like Roger Craig did. Same with Priest Holmes - I love Priest Holmes and think he's highly underrated - always was going back to his college days. But he isn't a Hall of Fame level running back, IMO. He deserves historical recognition as an excellent player, but he's not the HOF level.
Maybe I'm a smaller hall type of guy, I don't know. But I do think it should be icons of the game and the types of players that during their careers were consistently year after year players that everyone was focused on and might even watch the game solely because they might do something special that would be remembered for quite a while. Adrian Peterson? Absolutely in that category. I don't ever remember wanting to watch a game simply because Ricky Watters or Jamaal Anderson was playing. I liked Stephen Jackson, but I wasn't going to rush to the tv to watch him like I would Eric Dickerson - because every single time Eric Dickerson touched the ball could turn out to be the play of the year. So that's kind of what I'm saying - Hall of Famers have the potential to do that.
These other guys, they might have great careers, nice stats, might have put together 5 outstanding years straight. But they're not the same caliber of player, IMO. Team Hall of Fame, Ring of Honor, that sort of thing is made for players like that, IMO.
I'd say no on Watters and I think there's a better methodology here than who showed up on the most ballots. What if you weighted it so a 1st place vote was worth 5 points, a 2nd 3 points, and a 3rd 1 point? Or you could do something fancier like a Borda count.
Also, I couldn't get the numbers to add up:
readjack wrote:
0 votes: Barber, Jackson, Lewis, Taylor
1 vote: Dillon, George
5 votes: Alexander, Holmes
9 votes: Ricky Watters
9/10 of us
I think there should be 30 votes (10 folks each with 3 votes), but I only see 21 votes above:
One thing that will definitely help Watter's case for future induction, is total TDs scored counting postseason. With 103 TDs scored and a SB ring, he has a good chance at making it, since most players scoring near, or over 100 TDs get enshrined ...
Top Touchdown Scorers Without Making HOF Counting Postseason
Adrian Peterson -- pending -- 131 total TDs
Larry Fitzgerald -- pending -- 131 TDs
Shaun Alexander -- 120 TDs
Antonio Gates -- pending -- 118 TDs
Rob Gronkowski -- pending -- 108 TDs
Marshawn Lynch -- pending -- 106 TDs
Frank Gore -- pending -- 105 TDs
Ricky Watters -- 103 TDs
Steve Smith -- 97 TDs
Hines Ward -- 96 TDs
Priest Holmes -- 96 TDs
