Small Tribute to Mr. John

by Brad Wells on May 8, 2008 11:19 AM EDT

Rexx over at Baltimore Beatdown has a good post up honoring Mr. John Unitas. Today would have been his 75th birthday. Mr. Unitas passed away in 2002. Book publisher Grove/Atlantic, Inc. recently sent me a copy of Mark Bowden's new book The Best Game Ever, which tells the story of the 1958 NFL Championship game at Yankee Stadium between the super star NY Giants and the working class Baltimore Colts. It' really shows how Unitas and Raymond Berry invented the modern NFL. It is also eerie (and I do not say this lightly) how similar Unitas and Berry were then to Peyton Manning and Marvin Harrison today.

Speaking of Mr. Raymond Berry, here he is at the Colts last regular season home game in the RCA Dome:

Happy birthday, Mr. Unitas. I agree with Rexx. You were the best QB ever. However, very soon, Peyton is going to pass you, and somehow I feel you have absolutely no problem with that.

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passing unitas

wouldn’t that require peyton passing joe montana and john elway as well?

by SBakerTheTouchdownMaker on May 8, 2008 11:24 AM EDT reply actions

Peyton

I think he’s already passed Elway. He has more TDs, better career QB rating, higher TD percentage, lower INT percentage, and a higher completion percentage.

With Montana, Peyton has thrown more TDs, better career QB rating, higher TD percentage, and (amazingly) Peyton has a better completion percentage even though Montana played in a West Coast offense.

Oh, and please spare my the “rings” argument. If Peyton Manning had played on the 49er teams in the 1980s, he’d have 6 rings. That’s not to demean Montana, but Peyton is just a better QB.

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by Brad Wells on May 8, 2008 11:56 AM EDT up reply actions

all good points

and i’m not going to bring up the rings argument with elway, because 2 to 1 isn’t much of a difference. i still would put peyton behind elway (for now) but that could change if peyton gets back to a few more super bowls – which i think he will do. elway went to five super bowls, even though he was 2-3, that’s still pretty amazing.

as for montana, he had a passer rating of 127.8 in four super bowls (11 TD, 0 INT). im not sure there is anyone outside of a 30-mile radius of indianapolis that would put peyton in front of him at this point in his career. the offensive talent that peyton has had in his career in indianapolis is just as good as what montana had in san francisco. the defense? that’s a different story. but, just like elway, i think peyton has a great chance to eventually surpass him.

love the blog BBS, keep up the good work.

by SBakerTheTouchdownMaker on May 8, 2008 12:04 PM EDT up reply actions

Good points

I personally think Montana was a great QB, but he is also highly over-rated. I actually think Steve Young was better than him. And not to take anything away from Montana, but he faced Miami, Denver, and Cincy twice in his Super Bowl appearances: Not exactly stellar defenses.

And yes, Elway went to five Super Bowls. That is an amazing accomplishment. But the AFC in the 1980s was very weak. It didn’t have the Bill Belichick Patriots, and the Steelers in the 1980s were not that good. The Browns, Dolphins, and Bengals were the premiere teams in the 1980s, along with the Broncos.

Thanks for the compliment.

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by Brad Wells on May 8, 2008 12:14 PM EDT up reply actions

Jim Kelly went to 4 Super Bowls in a row

Manning surpassed him about 3 years ago. And Kelly also had comparable talent around him, with a better defense than Manning has had.

I love your name. Takes me back to the Tecmo Super Bowl days of playing with the Giants.

by mgrex03 on May 8, 2008 1:57 PM EDT up reply actions

Re:

For the record, I think Peyton Manning is probably the 2nd best quarterback in the history of the league. I would place him in front of John Elway for sure right now, and I’d probably have no trouble putting him in front of Montana, though I think it’s a close call.

Steve Young was probably not better than Joe Montana.

In any event, that ‘89 Broncos defense was just about the best in the league, and Joe put up 55 points on them. You’re free to criticize that 88 Bengals (meh but not HORRIBLE defense) or the 84 Dolphins (ditto) but Joe faced a very, very competent defense in 1989 and tore them up. The ‘81 Bengals team was just fine.

You put Joe Montana vs. the ‘89 Broncos against Manning vs. the ‘06 Bears and I don’t think there’s really much debate about who was the better player… in those particular games. THAT SAID… I have a real problem with evaluating the entire career of quarterbacks on one game, even if that game happens to be the Super Bowl.

I’ll repeat: I think Manning is better than Joe Montana. But I’d point out that Montana’s career stats aren’t a fair evaluation against Manning’s, since the latter hasn’t had an opportunity to lose his best years, yet. I still think Manning will probably still end up being the better quarterback statistically, but it deserves waiting and seeing.

I don’t htink it’s fair to measure quarterbacks by their postseason success, since hte sample size is unusually small. I think the better metric is to look at their entire careers holistically and judge statistics over the course of years, decades, rather than weeks.

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by Skin Patrol on May 9, 2008 3:46 AM EDT reply actions

And...

over the course of their careers I have a hard time finding a qb with as much success as Manning. He might just be the 2nd best quarterback in history.

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by Skin Patrol on May 9, 2008 3:47 AM EDT up reply actions

Curious

Just for the sake of clarification, who is your #1? If Peyton is #2, and you’d put him in front of Elway and probably Montana, is Unitas also your #1?

by ctnyc on May 9, 2008 12:47 PM EDT up reply actions