"Did you hear that a school system in Virginia is not assigning a version of Anne Frank's diary anymore because a parent complained the book has sexually explicit material and homosexual themes? That's so wrong. Do you know what that girl went through. Fucking A', man. Censorship sucks."*There was an interesting piece in USA Today on Terrell Owens, the mercurial wide receiver of the Buffalo Bills.
What got the hamsters in my head turning the wheel was this:
Owens turned 36 in December. He signed only a one-year contract with the Bills that brought an uneven and ultimately disappointing season. Even as he talks of playing another two or three years in pursuit of an elusive Super Bowl ring, he recognizes that Rice's individual records are out of reach for him.
He blames — who else? — his quarterbacks.
"I know hands-down I'd be close to Jerry Rice's records if I had been with quality quarterbacks like he had," Owens said. "He had Joe Montana and he finished with Steve Young. That wasn't a dropoff.
"Say I had been with a guy like Tom Brady, Peyton Manning or Drew Brees all of my career. Are you kidding me?"
Owens is not shy about sharing his beliefs and while I respect athletes who are open with their thoughts, I also think he's a braggadocio moron whose opinions are short sided, very selfish and usually doesn't know what the fuck he is talking about. But I read the above part and asked myself, "self, is there any validity in Terrell's statement or is he is morphing into his typical assbag persona and blaming every one else for his short comings?"
Terrell Owens wants to catch Jerry Rice however accepts the inevitability that he will retire below Rice's raw statistics. Here are their career numbers:
Jerry Rice - 1549 catches, 22,895 yards, 14.8 ypc, 197 TDs
Terrell Owens - 1006 catches, 14,951 yards, 14.9 ypc, 144 TDs
Rice blows Owens away. We should bring up two things here. First, both players were rookies at the age of 23. Second, Rice played up until he was 42, an additional six seasons. For the sake of this post, we're going to look at their careers between their rookie seasons up until Owens' last season. This is a total of 14 NFL seasons, with the last completed in December at the age of 36 (Owens current age). If we were to use data up until the age of 36 we have:
Jerry Rice - 206 games, 1139 catches, 17,612 yards, 15.5 ypc, 164 TDs
Terrell Owens - 204 games, 1006 catches, 14,951 yards, 14.9 ypc, 144 TDs
There is a difference of (all in Rice's favor) - 2 games, 133 catches, 2,661 yards, 20 TDs
Pretty significant. Maybe Owens was right...
...or maybe Owens is a fucking idiot.
I'm guessing there is a high probability of the answer being the latter.
Owens brings up Montana and Young but seems to forget his first three years in the league his QB was Steve mother truckin' Young. All three years the 49ers were a fairly successful team. They were in the playoffs each year and won two Divisional Titles. Young completed 777 passes (he did miss six games) for a 65.3 completion percentage and 9,609 yards.
Young wasn't a player stumbling along in the twilight of his career. In fact, Young's last full year as a starter he completed 322 passes in 517 attempts for 4,170 fucking yards and lead the Goddamn NFL in TD passes with 36 while throwing 12 interceptions. He was a Pro Bowl QB (not that that means anything, but he did have a tremendous season) and had a QB rating of 101.1. You may not like the rating stat, but it is a somewhat decent metric, albeit convoluted, at a QB's overall passing game.
Both Owens and Rice played in the same system and on the same team those three years Young was at the helm. Looking at the bigger 49er picture, you may wonder about what their stats looked like the five years they were split outs in San Fran together. I'm glad you asked:
1996-2000 (1996-1998 with Steve Young)
Rice - 66 games, 339 catches, 4,124 yards, 30 TDs
Owens - 76 games, 319 catches, 4,758 yards, 43 TDs
Owens played 10 more games than Rice (Rice missed virtually the whole 1997 season) and had 20 fewer catches. You would think if they both played an equal amount of games Rice's number should be well ahead of Owens strictly because he was the team's best receiver. Speaking of the 1997 season:
Rice - 2 games, 7 catches, 78 yards, 1 TD
Owens - 16 games, 60 catches, 936 yards, 8 TDs
This was Owens second season in the NFL. If we were to compare each player's second season:
Rice - 15 games, 86 catches, 1570 yards, 15 TDs
Owens - 16 games, 60 catches, 936 yards, 8 TDs
Terrell Owens had a year to be the focal point of the 49er passing game and had a whopping two catches more than J.J. Stokes. Roger Craig had 81 catches for the 49ers in 1986 and Dwight Clark had 61. What's really amazing about that 1986 season?
49er Quarterbacks Jerry Rice's second NFL Season
Joe Montana - 8 starts, 191-307 comp-att, 62.2%, 2,236 yards, 8 TDs, 9 Ints, 80.7 QB rating
Jeff Kemp - 6 starts, 119-200 comp-att, 59.5%, 1,154 yards, 11 TDs, 8 Ints, 85.7 QB rating
Mike Moroski - 2 starts, 42-73 comp-att, 57.5%, 493 yards, 2 TDs, 3 Ints, 70.2 QB rating
In a season where the 49ers got 8 starts out of Jeff Kemp and some guy named Mike Moroski, who threw 8 TDs in his entire NFL career by the way, and playing with All-Pro/Pro Bowl running back Roger Craig, former All-Pro Dwight Clark and 41 catches from former Pro Bowler Russ Francis, Jerry Rice still put up the ungodly numbers posted above.
In a season where the 49ers got 15 starts from Steve Young (Jim Drunkenmiller did start one game) and their biggest weapons in the passing games were J.J. Stokes and William Floyd (former Pro Bowler Brent Jones did catch 29 balls that year), Terrell Owens put up 60 catches.
But Owens is right. I mean if he had Jeff Kemp and Mike Moroski throwing to him instead of this Steve Young fellow, who knows what heights and accomplishments he'd reach. Fuck you Steve Young. Learn to play the position like a true QB.
This is only one season however. It could have been a fluke. Maybe if we look at the QBs throughout each receiver's career until the age of 35 (why 35? We'll get to that in a minute):
Jerry Rice - Starting QBs Joe Montana and Steve Young
175 games, 3430-5225 comp-att, 42,002 yards, 295 TDs, 133 Ints
Terrell Owens - Starting QBs Steve Young, Jeff Garcia, Donovan McNabb, and Tony Romo
185 games, 3568-5682 comp-att, 42,961 yards, 310 TDs, 143 Ints
These numbers tell us a few things. Over the course of 13 seasons, Owens got more starts out of his team's starting QBs. They attempted and completed more passes, although at a lower completion percentage. Owens QBs threw for 959 more yards and 15 more TDs, along with 10 more Ints.
I decided to not include each player's 14th season. If we do, it looks like this:
Jerry Rice - Starting QBs Joe Montana and Steve Young
190 games, 3,752-5,742 comp-att, 46,172 yards, 331 TDs, 145 Ints
Terrell Owens - Starting QBs Steve Young, Jeff Garcia, Donovan McNabb, Tony Romo and Ryan Fitzpatrick
195 games, 3,695-5,909 comp-att, 44,383 yards, 319 TDs, 145 Ints
Why such a disparity? Consider that 14th season:
(Rice) Steve Young - 15 games, 322-517 comp-att, 62.3 comp %, 36 TDs, 12 Ints
(Owens) Ryan Fitzpatrick - 10 games, 127-227 comp-att, 55.9 comp %, 9 TDs, 10 Ints
Owens is a physical specimen. He has demonstrated his skills beyond solely catching balls, which he doesn't always do anyway. He is an above average blocker and when I've watched him play I would say he is one of the better blocking WRs given his influence in the passing game. In other words, Owens isn't a blocking TE whose function is to block only. He is a valuable WR with one of his skills being his blocking. Hines Wards he is not, but he is still very good in this department. Owens does play hard and although I take some issue with his attitude and comments off the field, I cannot remember too many times when on the field, Owens has stopped playing. Not that I should give him credit for doing his job, but I'm doing my best to be objective.
There are two reasons Owens is in Buffalo catching passing from Ryan Fitzpatrick and why for the rest of his career his numbers may be pedestrian: his attitude blows and he drops way to many fucking passes.
Any team would love to have a player of Owens' caliber although maybe not right now because of his age and contract demands. But one of the main hindrances of Owens is that he burns people. If we consider his career as a whole, Owens started off in SF with a Hall of Fame QB followed by another QB who put up numbers in the Montana/Young stratosphere for a few seasons. Keep in mind I'm not saying Garcia was as good of a QB as Montana or Young, but he was a very effective passes and threw the ball around a lot. Many of those throws were to Owens. Owens then moved on to a team whose Head Coach throws the ball 800 times a game. Owens then moved on to another team that sacrificed the running game for chucking the ball around the air.
Owens played for teams that loved to throw the ball. I don't buy the argument either that McNabb, Garcia and Romo were shitty QBs that Owens made better since they all have had success without him and if Owens made QBs better then explain Ryan Fitzpatrick's shitty year. It is fair to say that Owens helps his QBs the way Rice helped his QBs. It is impossible to separate a QB from the WR since both have a direct relationship. Owens may have helped his QBs, but they were also good enough QBs to get him the ball consistently. To conclude the only reason his QBs put up good numbers was because of him is false.
His shtick grows old. He got ostracized to Buffalo because nobody wanted to deal with him bitching over not getting enough throws, not being the focal point of the offense, doing sit up in his driveway and picking fights with players. His QBs were good. McNabb is a very good QB. So is Romo. Are they Hall of Famers? Well McNabb is more of a Hall of Famer than Drew Brees is right now, even if Brees were to win a Super Bowl.
A receiver cannot have every pass in a game thrown to him. If they do, a defense can easily double Owens all game long. They can play a cover-2 zone with man underneath to help in coverage, thus preventing him from catching anything inside with the Outside LB there for support. You get a good CB to play Owens tight in that defense and he'll be a non factor. What made Rice different was that Rice made the most out of every opportunity. Whether a great or shitty QB, Rice didn't bitch. He knew passes would come his way and caught those passes thrown to him.
This brings us to his drops. I tried finding a season to season break down of drop passes in the NFL but failed in my task. Some sites have drop statistics, but not a cumulative totals over the last 10-15 years. According to Football Outsiders, "dropped passes are not specified in publicly available play-by-play, and unfortunately we cannot yet correct for this." Using both my eyes and watching football, along with some of the estimated statistics I researched, Owens does have an inordinately high percentage of drops for an elite NFL receiver. Jerry Rice never dropped 18 balls a year the way Owens has.
To blame his QBs is not only selfish but unprovable. He's gotten himself kicked out of basically three organizations now. He has played with a Hall of Fame QB, and at least one who might eventually be in the Hall of Fame. And then there are the drops. Lots and lots of them.
Owens has nobody to blame but himself for his current situation and will spend the rest of his life catching passes from QBs not named Peyton Manning because the Peyton Mannings of the world want nothing to do with a selfish prick who has a case of the dropsies.
In conclusion, there is little validity in Terrell's statement that his QBs caused his numbers to be lower than they should and he morphed into his typical assbag persona by blaming every one else for his short comings.
The end.
*This was not a direct quote from Terrell Owens. I made it up. I'm fairly certain Terrell has no idea who Anne Frank was.
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