In a couple of weeks, the newest class of the Pro Football Hall of Fame will be announced. Only five modern-era wide receivers have been selected enshrinement on their first ballot: Jerry Rice, Paul Warfield, Steve Largent, Raymond Berry, and Lance Alworth. This year, in his first year of eligibility, Marvin Harrison is one of 15 finalists for the Pro Football Hall of Fame. I suspect the majority will view Harrison as a first-ballot Hall of Famer, but there are a few minority voices who disagree.

As best as I can surmise, there are three primary reasons why Harrison shouldn’t be selected in 2014. Two of those reasons can be addressed rather easily, but let’s start with the more complicated issue to analyze.

Harrison’s numbers are inflated because of Peyton Manning

Jerry Rice is the greatest wide receiver of all time. Rice was probably better at his position than any football player has ever been at theirs. Rice might be the most dominant sportsman of his generation. Rice probably isn’t in the discussion of greatest athletes in the history of mankind, which is about the only negative thing I’m willing to say about him. All of that is important background to say, being worse than Jerry Rice is not a negative, but just a fact of life as a wide receiver.
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Last weekend, I looked at career rushing stats in wins and losses, and yesterday, I did the same for quarterbacks. Today we will check out the splits for receivers.

I looked at all games, including playoffs, from 1960 to 2011, for all players with at least 4,000 receiving yards over that time period. The table below lists the following information for each player:

– His first year (or 1960, if he played before 1960) and his last year (or 2011, if still active)
– All the franchises he played for (which you can search for in the search box)
– His number of career wins, and his career receptions, receiving yards, yards per reception, and receiving yards per game in wins
– His number of career losses, and his career receptions, receiving yards, yards per reception, and receiving yards per game in losses

You might be surprised to see Andre Johnson at the top of the list, but his career average should decline the longer he plays; that said, 2012 didn’t drop his numbers. On the flip side, Calvin Johnson moves up into the #2 slot; part of that was due to a great season (although Detroit didn’t get many wins) and part of that was due to Randy Moss slipping. Larry Fitzgerald comes up high on the list for the same reason as both Johnsons, although it’s often easy to forget how great Fitzgerald can be thanks to his current situation.

The table is sorted by receiving yards per game in wins:

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Let’s start with some trivia before moving to today’s post:

• Only two quarterback-receiver pairs have ever topped the 10,000 yard mark. Can you name them?

  Hint:	SelectShow
  The same quarterback was part of both pairs.

• Only two receivers (minimum: 7,000 yards) gained at least 93% of their career receiving yards from one quarterback. Do you know who they are?

  Hint:	SelectShow
  The same quarterback was part of both pairs, but this is a different quarterback than from question 1.

• Two of the men in the top ten in career receiving yards can credit the same quarterback account for more of their yards than any other passer. Can you name that quarterback?

  Hint	SelectShow
  The receivers won a Super Bowl ring, but the quarterback never did.

• Can you name the receiver who gained over 10,000 yards in his career, but the quarterback from whom he gained the most yards was… Quincy Carter?

  Hint	SelectShow
  Spoiler: Quincy Carter wasn’t very good.

• Among the top twenty-five leaders in career receiving yards, can you guess which player was the only one to fail to catch at least 20% of his yards from a single quarterback?

  Hint	SelectShow
  One of his quarterbacks was Dan Marino.

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