A Football Life: Great Wall of Dallas

I always say that Corey Dillon doesn't get as much credit. Those were subpar Bengal lines he was reeling off 200 yard games with.
 
It's like when someone says that Romo has only thrown 7 interceptions this year, which ranks him 3rd in the league. But when you look at each one, 5 (or whatever) of them weren't Romo's fault for one reason or another, so he really only had 2, and that would rank him first in the league.

Well you can't say that about Romo without also going back and seeing how many interceptions were not the fault of all the other quarterbacks out there and then go back and rerank all of them.

By the same logic, you can't say that Emmitt ran behind Williams and Allen without also saying Sanders ran behind Lomas Brown, and Alexander ran behind Hutchinson and (the other guys name is escaping me at the moment), and Dickerson ran behind Slater, and Riggins ran behind Jacoby and Grimm, etc.

So the question is, was Emmitt's line during his career SO much better that his accomplishments should be held out as a product of line play more so than any other great RB?

I say no, because (a) his line wasn't all time great for more than 5 or 6 years of his career, which is a minority of Emmitt's total seasons, and (b) even when his line was elite Emmitt wasn't going off for 2000 or 2100 yards like you might expect when a great runner runs behind an all time line.

Which means that Emmitt didn't rack up all those yards in just a few seasons while he was behind an elite line; instead he got the rushing record because he was still putting up 1200 and 1300 yards in seasons in his 30s when almost every other RB ever is basically done, and because he almost never got hurt, so he never had that one or two years in his prime when he might've had under a 1000 yard season due to injury. And since he did not play behind an elite line in the last 8 years of his career, the line wasn't what made him.
 
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Genghis Khan said:
It's like when someone says that Romo has only thrown 7 interceptions this year, which ranks him 3rd in the league. But when you look at each one, 5 (or whatever) of them weren't Romo's fault for one reason or another, so he really only had 2, and that would rank him first in the league.

Well you can't say that about Romo without also going back and seeing how many interceptions were not the fault of all the other quarterbacks out there and then go back and rerank all of them.

By the same logic, you can't say that Emmitt ran behind Williams and Allen without also saying Sanders ran behind Lomas Brown, and Alexander ran behind Hutchinson and (the other guys name is escaping me at the moment), and Dickerson ran behind Slater, and Riggins ran behind Jacoby and Grimm, etc.

So the question is, was Emmitt's line during his career SO much better that his accomplishments should be held out as a product of line play more so than any other great RB?

I say no, because (a) his line wasn't all time great for more than 5 or 6 years of his career, which is a minority of Emmitt's total seasons, and (b) even when his line was elite Emmitt wasn't going off for 2000 or 2100 yards like you might expect when a great runner runs behind an all time line.

Which means that Emmitt didn't rack up all those yards in just a few seasons while he was behind an elite line; instead he got the rushing record because he was still putting up 1200 and 1300 yards in seasons in his 30s when almost every other RB ever is basically done, and because he almost never got hurt, so he never had that one or two years in his prime when he might've had under a 1000 yard season due to injury. And since he did not play behind an elite line in the last 8 years of his career, the line wasn't what made him.
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Damn, writing novels like Smitty now.

Good job.
 
Genghis Khan said:
So the question is, was Emmitt's line during his career SO much better that his accomplishments should be held out as a product of line play more so than any other great RB?
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I say yes. Because for 5-6 of the years it was the greatest line of the modern era, for another 4-5 years it was simply one of the best in the NFL.

But let's put an asterisk there. I'm not saying he was a "product" of that entirely. But I am saying it, along with his longevity, is what separates him in total statistics over a guy like Thomas or Sanders. The average OL performance that Smith got was better on a yearly basis almost uniformly from what either of them got, therefore his numbers were a little better because of that influence.

If you were to swap out Sanders with Smith, Sanders' numbers would have been better, Smith's numbers would have been worse. How much so? I don't think it would have been dramatic but it definitely would have been noticeable.
 
Watching NFLN now and they have Newton, Novacek and Moose on.

This is almost better than a game.

~cracking a beer with a tear in my eye~
 
Wait a second...

WTF does Gary Busey have to do with this?
 
boozeman said:
Watching NFLN now and they have Newton, Novacek and Moose on.

This is almost better than a game.

~cracking a beer with a tear in my eye~
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Hard to believe it's been 20 years. Mind-boggling. I mean the time between the last Landry SB to the first Jimmy Johnson SB was only 14 years and that seemed like a lifetime back then.

20 years...smh.
 
VA Cowboy said:
Hard to believe it's been 20 years. Mind-boggling. I mean the time between the last Landry SB to the first Jimmy Johnson SB was only 14 years and that seemed like a lifetime back then.

20 years...smh.
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The last 17 years of Jerry has been just as tough and long.
 
boozeman said:
The last 17 years of Jerry has been just as tough and long.
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No doubt the last 17 have been much worse. What I was trying to say, but apparently failed to, was to me it's hard to fathom it's already been 20 years since those Jimmy SB's. I guess getting older time seems to be going by faster.

But comparing the era's this is much worse. 17 years with one playoff win. Can you imagine that being the case from say 1975-1992?
 
Its on again today at 4 eastern time. Will need someone to call 2233 when its starts.
 
mschmidt64 said:
It's not "correct," -- by 1998 they may no longer have been All Timer great but they were still among the best in the league.
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bullshit,that 98 line would barely be counted in the top half of the league much less one of the best

it seemed like they couldn't get "in sync" that year
 
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