Re: Steve Young- yes, it’s true that he received little playing time under Walsh himself, but Walsh was responsible for Young’s development, and to some extent I’m using “Bill Walsh” as metonymy for the entire Bill Walsh coaching system and offensive scheme. Which seems fair to me, because that’s how the rest of the world treats it. Witness: Mike Shanahan being considered part of the “Bill Walsh coaching tree” despite (a) never coaching under Bill Walsh, and (b) having a decade worth of coaching experience (including two years as a head coach) before he ever joined San Francisco.
Re: Ken Anderson- yes, some of his best years came after Walsh left, but see my last point. Also, it’s true that neither of us had him in our top 25, but that’s not my point. My point is this, and only this: revolutionary coaching causes a player’s statistical production to outpace his true talent level. He was a guy we agree was not a top-25 QB, and yet he still put up top-10 numbers because his offense was decades ahead of its time. Otto Graham’s offense was also decades ahead of its time, so I treat his statistics with skepticism.
Re: Walsh scouting effectively – this actually is an interesting demonstration of my point. Bill Walsh called Jake Plummer “the next Joe Montana”. Is this an example of poor scouting, based on how Plummer did in Arizona? Or an example of good scouting, based on how Plummer did in Denver? Personally, I think it reinforces the importance of coaching and the power of the West Coast Offense, properly implemented. Plummer had 4.37 ANY/A in Arizona. He had 6.32 ANY/A in Denver. I think Plummer is perhaps the biggest example of just how dependent a quarterback’s production really is on his situation.
Re: Manning, Unitas, Baugh- you’re absolutely right that they all succeeded with multiple coaches. Which is exactly why all three made my all-time top 10. I’m much more confident that those three were not a product of their scheme or coaching than I am about, say, Otto Graham.
Re: Paul Brown – So he says Graham was his greatest player ever. That’s awesome. That’s a data point. John Madden says Ray Guy was the greatest punter of all time. Doesn’t make it true, but it’s a data point. I think Graham was absolutely the most integral piece of those dominant Cleveland teams, but does that mean he was a better quarterback than NVB? Not necessarily. Maybe those Cleveland teams would have been even better still if they’d had Van Brocklin, and Paul Brown would instead be claiming NVB was the greatest player he ever coached. So yeah, you keep repeating that statement, and I think it’s a data point, but I don’t find it nearly as dispositive as you seem to. Bill Belichick could say that Tom Brady is the greatest player he’s ever coached and I still wouldn’t think he’s better than Peyton Manning.
I also vehemently disagree with your claim that the Browns dynasty “collapsed” after Graham retired, unless by “collapsed” you mean “had one losing season in the next 18 years”, or “went 9-2-1 and made the championship game two years later, and then went 9-3 the year after that.” Sure, they weren’t winning multiple titles, but they were doing pretty well for a team that had lost so many Hall of Famers. Remember, in addition to Graham, you had Lavelli and Gatski retire in 1956, plus Motley retired in 1953. That’s FOUR Hall of Fame offensive players gone in a very short span.
Speaking of collapse, though, how did the Rams do after Van Brocklin left? Philly did fine, but they had this young guy named Sonny Jurgensen waiting in the wings, which probably helped.
I didn’t mention that NVB worked with Clark Shaughnessy and Sid Gillman, this is true. Of course, you failed to mention that NVB won a league MVP award under Buck Shaw. My point wasn’t that NVB never played in phenomenal circumstances – obviously those early ’50s Rams teams were tailor-made for huge offensive production. My point was that we saw NVB succeed outside of those situations, too, which makes me more convinced that NVB’s production was inherent to NVB himself, whereas I have far less assurance that Graham could have succeeded elsewhere. Again, it’s like Peyton Manning vs. Tom Brady. I’m sure Peyton could have succeeded on multiple teams for multiple coaches, because we’ve seen him do that. I’m not sure Tom Brady could have, because we haven’t. It’s possible Brady could have, but the fact that we never saw him do it hurts him in comparison to Manning.
I never complained that 1953 or 1955 shouldn’t count. I said that Graham was better than NVB when they played together, but that was essentially a 3-year window. We can’t play the “who was better when they were contemporaries” game, because “when they were contemporaries” basically represented such a tiny portion of their total careers. It was a three-year span. Graham was better during that three-year span, no doubt, but it was a three-year span.
You might not want to rate people on assumptions, but my original post rating quarterbacks started with the clarification that I was rating based on who I thought could “take his’n and beat your’n, then take your’n and beat his’n”. That’s naturally rating based on assumptions and counterfactuals. You’re welcome to rank some other way, but that’s how I ranked. If you want to say “any ranking system based on what players actually did and nothing more should value Graham over NVB”, I would heartily agree. Of course, I could argue that any such ranking system should probably include Ken Anderson in the top 25. Ultimately, I believe Adam said there were 80 sets of rankings, which means that there were 80 sets of assumptions and value judgments. Yours might not be mine, but given the parameters of the activity, mine were still valid.
Likewise, I absolutely *CAN* throw out AAFC production, just like I threw out CFL and USFL production. I did not consider production that came outside of the NFL (or AFL, and even there I substantially discounted early-AFL stuff because the league was a joke for its first few years). You seem to have a much higher opinion of the AAFC than I do. It’s possible that the early ’80s CFL was substantially worse than I thought, too, but the AAFC was atrocious aside from the Browns. Look how much Cleveland’s statistics declined when they merged. Look how much San Francisco declined when they merged. Look how few other AAFC players landed on an NFL roster after the league disbanded. It was a bad league with one great team. Otto Graham averaged 9.4 AY/A against the AAFC and 7.0 AY/A against the NFL. Graham had a rating of 99.1 against the AAFC and a rating of 78.1 against the NFL. I feel quite comfortable discounting his AAFC production just like I’d discount a player’s college production, or production in any other similarly inferior league.
Again, maybe I’m underrating Graham. I’m supremely open to that possibility, given that we’re talking about guys who played more than 50 years ago, (and I am not more than 50 years old). That’s okay though. It’s my opinion. I’ve given it a lot of thought. If opinions on Graham exist on a continuum, mine might be among the lowest, but personally I think it’s important to try to balance out those whose opinion on Graham is among the highest, (many of whom I guarantee have thought far less about this particular issue).
I think coaching is an underrated factor in player success. I think the AAFL was a joke league. I think “RINGZ BABY” is an uncompelling argument. For these reasons, I’m destined to be lower on Graham than consensus. And I’m okay with that.
Kibbles, it seems I may have offended you, and that wasn’t my intention. If so, I apologize.
I don’t want to get too sidetracked on the Bill Walsh issue, but I can’t agree about Steve Young or Ken Anderson. Young threw 170 passes for Walsh in 1987-88, and I don’t believe that and the WCO are what made him the NFL’s best QB in the mid-90s. The systems that show Anderson as a top-10 QB are bad systems. I’m willing to disagree on these issues, though, because I don’t think they’re central to our discussion, and surely we’d agree that Walsh is an exception, not the rule.
I think you’ve misunderstood me here: “Re: Paul Brown- So he says Graham was his greatest player ever. That’s awesome. That’s a data point. John Madden says Ray Guy was the greatest punter of all time.”
Madden was comparing Guy to all punters, ever, and [1] he’s biased for his guy, [2] punting is widely misunderstood. Brown was comparing Graham to his own players, the guys he coached. That carries stronger weight. But it’s also not the crux of my argument. You’re right, it’s a data point. I didn’t intend to imply that was the end of the discussion. But I don’t believe Paul Brown would agree with you that Graham was so much a product of the system.
Browns, 1946-55: 105-17-4 (.849), 7 CS, 10 CS Appearances
Browns, 1950-55: 58-13-1 (.813), 3 CS, 6 CSA
Browns, 1956-62: 53-31-4 (.625), 0 CS, 1 CSA
The Browns were a +.800, year-in, year-out championship team with Otto Graham. Their worst record was 8-4 (.667). Their average following his retirement was 40 points lower, and they ceased to be a championship caliber team. Furthermore, they fell from 9-2-1 in Graham’s final season to 5-7, then rebounded when they added Jim Brown, arguably the greatest player in NFL history. So yes, I think it’s fair to say that the Browns dynasty collapsed upon Graham’s retirement. No one considers the 1957-62 Browns a dynasty.
The Browns won back-to-back titles without Motley; his greatest years were in the AAFC and in 1950. Lavelli was a fine player, but he absolutely would not make the Hall of Fame today. I get your point, that Graham wasn’t the only player Cleveland lost. It’s a valid point, but the ’57-58 Browns had 5 HOF players. The Browns in Graham’s era were a uniquely successful team, the greatest dynasty in the history of professional football. Immediately upon Graham’s retirement, they ceased to be that exceptional team. My interpretation is that Brown’s magic wasn’t enough in Graham’s absence.
As stated earlier, I agree with you about Van Brocklin; we rank him the same. It’s Graham we disagree upon. You don’t need to convince me Van Brocklin was great. He was.
re: rating methodology, of course yours is valid. But I don’t see how you can restore credit to Van Brocklin during the years he split time with Waterfield, and throw Graham’s AAFC years or Moon’s CFL years out the window entirely. As with Van Brocklin, they were obviously great QBs, but their NFL playing time was limited by unusual circumstances. It seems logically inconsistent to include one but not the other.
I’m not suggesting you take AAFC stats at face value (or CFL, USFL, etc) — just that we need to acknowledge what Graham did during his years in the league. He was the best QB in football in the late ’40s, and any evaluation that ignores that is inevitably wrong. Warren Moon was prevented from playing in the NFL until he was 28, but we know he was a good quarterback in the early ’80s. Jim Kelly was the best QB in the USFL. We don’t have to take his stats at face value to acknowledge he had two good seasons that aren’t included in his NFL record. Signing with Houston didn’t make Kelly a worse QB. It’s hard to compare players in other leagues, but it’s better to make an educated guess than to ignore those years entirely. Graham was the best QB of the late ’40s. Moon and Kelly were good players before they reached the NFL. Those aren’t radical ideas at all; indeed, they’re obvious. All I’m suggesting is that we acknowledge this.
Otto Graham was also the best QB of the early ’50s (great stats, all-pro every year); I don’t need a ringz argument to support him. At the same time, I think his team’s success and his own championship performances are a valid consideration that can only enhance his case. If you revise your position on Paul Brown’s importance to Graham’s success, and give Graham credit for being what we know he was in the late 1940s, I imagine we’d rate him nearly the same, just as we do for Van Brocklin.
I’m not offended, I’m just chatting. I don’t mind a little bit of healthy disagreement in the slightest.
You keep bringing up Graham’s championships, which I suppose is unavoidable in any discussion of Otto Graham and the Cleveland Browns. Here’s my big problem with that. From 1950 to 1957- an 8-year span- the average rank of the Cleveland Browns in points allowed was 1.25. The average rank in yards allowed was 2.00. These figures are unprecedented – I have never seen an 8-year run anywhere close to that. Any way you slice it, Otto Graham played with an absolutely dominant defense. And I’m sure Graham made their job easier, but they ranked 1st in points allowed and 2nd in yards allowed in each of the first two seasons after Graham retired, so it’s not like we can give him too much credit. Part of that was pace, of course – Cleveland ranked “only” 2.75, on average, in yards per play allowed. (Though that was partly skewed by the fact that they were playing with so many leads). On the other hand, during Graham’s 6 years in the NFL, the Browns ranked 2.83 in points scored and 4.5 in yards gained. Again, part of that is pace – they ranked 3.00 in yards per play. But the larger point is this: Graham played with one of the best sustained defenses the league has ever seen. By any measure, that defense deserved every bit as much credit- if not more- for those championships.
By comparison, NVB’s Rams defense ranked, on average, 7.5 in points allowed and 9.13 in yards allowed. His Eagles defenses ranked 8.33 in points allowed and 9.0 in yards allowed. While Graham’s defenses were consistently among the top 2 in the NFL, Van Brocklin’s were consistently below average. If you average points allowed and yards allowed together, Graham played with one defense in his NFL career that ranked lower than 1.5 – a 1953 unit that was 1st in points allowed and 6th in yards allowed, for an average of 3.5. At the same time, Van Brocklin played with only one defense in his entire career that ranked better than 6th by that simplistic method – also in 1953, when his defense ranked 4th in points allowed and 5th in yards allowed for an average of 4.5. So Van Brocklin’s best defense was worse than Graham’s worst defense. And Graham also played with the best coach of all time and even had the best placekicker of his generation. Sure, he made a lot of championship games, but I don’t find that to be a particularly dispositive distinction in this particular comparison.
I also think it’s crazy to suggest that the Browns dynasty “collapsed” after Graham retired. Words mean things, and “collapsed” means something other than what happened to the Cleveland Browns after Graham retired. In the decade following Graham’s retirement, the Cleveland Browns had ONE losing season, posting a cumulative record of 84-41-5 (65.8%). They made three championship games during that decade and won one of them. Maybe we don’t still count that as part of the dynasty any more, but I can think of 32 NFL fanbases who DESPERATELY HOPE their franchise “collapses” to the tune of a decade of 11-5 seasons, three championship berths, and one title. I mean, this is essentially identical to arguing that the New England Patriots “collapsed” after 2004. It just doesn’t make sense under any meaningful definition of the word.
I also like how you add the “Well, then they got Jim Brown, so that’s why they were good again”. By that definition, (we must evaluate the Browns after Graham, but we can’t include the Jim Brown era because he was also great), we’re stuck with a sample size of N = 1.
Anyway, what it really boils down to for me is that Otto Graham was one of a handful of offensive Hall of Famers on a team with a better defense than offense coached by the greatest coach of all time. He never led his unit to the heights of the NVB Rams’ offenses. He made a lot of championship games, but see the first sentence of this paragraph again. His NFL averages were also essentially identical to NVB’s. I suspect that Otto Graham was no better of a QB from 1946-1949 than he was from 1950-1955, so if the Browns had been in the NFL, that would still likely remain the case. (If anything, I think that if Graham had spent his entire career in the NFL, his averages would have been worse than NVB’s.)
Given all of that, I think NVB was maybe a slightly better quarterback.
Good, I’m glad we’re on the same page.
I think you’ve misunderstood why I “keep bringing up Graham’s championships”. It’s part of my argument that Cleveland was substantially less successful following his retirement, which in turn is part of my argument that Graham may have played a larger role in the team’s success, and Paul Brown a smaller one, than you had previously believed.
When I say that the Browns dynasty collapsed, you’re focusing on the word “collapsed”, and I’m focusing on the word “dynasty”. If I re-phrase it, that the Browns were way less successful following Graham’s retirement, perhaps we could avoid any semantic disagreement. The stats are clear:
Browns, 1946-55: 105-17-4 (.849), 7 CS, 10 CS Appearances
Browns, 1950-55: 58-13-1 (.813), 3 CS, 6 CSA
Browns, 1956-62: 53-31-4 (.625), 0 CS, 1 CSA
I’ve used 1962 as the cutoff date, since that’s when Paul Brown was fired. As I understand it, you believe that Graham’s success was largely a function of Brown’s genius, and that belief is one of — if not the — main reasons you rate Graham lower than usual. I’ve presented objective evidence (Cleveland much more successful with Graham) and subjective evidence (Brown called Graham “my greatest player”, “the key to the whole team”, “the crux of how we got things done”) to support my position — that Graham was probably more critical to the team’s success than you had thought. The team’s results without Graham support Brown’s statements.
re: Jim Brown … Cleveland went 5-7 in the first season following Graham’s retirement, then rebounded when they added Jim Brown the following year. It seems almost certain that the team’s misfortunes would have been longer and worse had Brown not joined the team. This is not a critical element of my argument, but I think it’s obviously true.
You raise a good point about the greatness of the Browns’ defense, except that we’re getting
caught in a tangent. When I refer to Cleveland’s team success, it’s the success during the Graham Era as contrasted with the lesser success following his retirement — again, this is addressing your belief that Graham’s accomplishments were largely a product of Paul Brown’s coaching. The defense was still great in the late ’50s, but the team stopped winning championships. You note that Graham “never led his unit to the heights of the NVB Rams’ offenses”, but the Rams’ historic offensive seasons occurred while Van Brocklin was a part-time player, with Bob Waterfield. Van Brocklin’s stats in those seasons are terrific, but so are Waterfield’s, and he didn’t make the top 25. Also — and this is one of the hardest things to sort out (in various eras) — Graham’s offense in 1950-51 didn’t need to do as much as the Rams’. It might be a bit like comparing the Saints’ offense in the Drew Brees era to Brady/Manning/Rodgers. Beyond Van Brocklin’s personal performance, I’m disinclined to regard the 1950-51 Ram offenses as an important data point in this discussion, though I could potentially be persuaded otherwise.
My evaluation of Graham is based on his excellent stats and a consensus in contemporary opinion. Beyond his outstanding numbers and impressive collection of awards and honors, Graham is also — from the standpoint of team results — the most successful individual player in history; that reinforces my belief in Graham, but does not form the basis for it. I consider team success in my evaluation of QBs, but it is not a major factor in my rankings (for this project, I rated Brady 8th, Aikman outside the top 25). I do think it’s to Graham’s credit that he generally played at a very high level in the team’s most important games. His impressive postseason performances don’t show up in the regular-season stats, but they’re certainly a mark in his favor.
I think it’s great you’re beating the drum for Van Brocklin; if you look at my original response to Chase, I was pretty horrified at Van Brocklin’s relative lack of respect in the voting on this project. But I believe if you re-consider your evaluation of Graham, he comes off even better than Van Brocklin.
Well, after all that, I’m not sure I have figured out which way I fall in this debate. But I do know I’m appreciative to Kibbles and Brad O. for their great discussion.
