Gronkowski Retires

[rhickok1109]

The fivethirtyeight website has an interesting take on Gronk. They call him the most efficient receiver of all time. (That's receiver, not just TE.)

Interesting stat they use: Brady had a 124.7 passer rating when targeting Gronkowski.

https://fivethirtyeight.com/features/gr ... weve-seen/

[JeffreyMiller]

So we've moved the goalposts to "did he change the game?" How many players truly "changed the game"? If that is the criteria, then it's a small hall indeed ...

[JWL]

Well, don't go by me. I am apparently a hard maker on game changing. I also don't think it means much. There is nothing wrong with concluding that Gronkowski was a great player but he didn't change football.

As for coaching? Yeah, there is where I think there are plenty of game changers.

Back to players, I think the first guy to throw a certain type of pitch (knuckleball, splitter, etc) and then have copycats probably changed the game. The first soccer-style kicker probably changed the game. The first pass rusher to use the headslap may have changed the game.

I think there have been unique and fancy pants players like Earl Campbell, Gale Sayers, Joe Namath, Michael Vick, Fran Tarkenton but I don't think they really changed the game. I don't think a generations of kids said, "Look at that Tarkenton. He does something nobody ever thought of before. I want to be a great quarterback too.
Tomorrow at recess I am going to do this scrambling thing and run around all crazy like and then throw a pass to a receiver."

[Rupert Patrick]

About six months back I drew up a list of 14 players who I thought were historically unique, truly great players who were "one of a kind", a player who comes along maybe once or twice in a decade who broke the mold. This was my list:

Bronko Nagurski
Don Hutson
Sammy Baugh
Jim Brown
Johnny Unitas
Dick Butkus
Gale Sayers
Joe Namath
Earl Campbell
Lawrence Taylor
Jerry Rice
Bo Jackson
Deion Sanders
Ray Lewis
JJ Watt

I'm not saying these are the 14 greatest players of all time, by any means, but these players are all, great but special, in one way or another, in a way that is difficult to put into words. I guess my question to you John, is does Rob Gronkowski belongs on this list? Was he the kind of guy that watching him, you felt you would never see another player quite like him again? I'm on the fence on this one.

After thinking about it, I added Don Hutson to the list; he was a truly great player who was quite unique and did things on the field nobody else had ever seen before or since.

[JuggernautJ]

I don't think a generations of kids said, "Look at that Tarkenton. He does something nobody ever thought of before. I want to be a great quarterback too.
Tomorrow at recess I am going to do this scrambling thing and run around all crazy like and then throw a pass to a receiver."

I don't know about "generations" but I know of one kid who grew up in New York City who idolized Fran and copied his style.
I played with and against him for twenty years and I couldn't tell you which was more exhausting, chasing him or blocking for him.

[TanksAndSpartans]

Rupert, I like Hutson on the list. Did you consider adding Thorpe as well?

[Rupert Patrick]

Rupert, I like Hutson on the list. Did you consider adding Thorpe as well?

It would be too easy to stock the list with guys from the 20's and 30's, guys like Thorpe and Red Grange and everybody else who started pro football. It could be argued that Grange should be on this list, since he was the first real box office attraction in pro football and people drove 500 miles to watch him play. I hate that there is little film available of Grange, as I've seen just a few clips of him and mainly have to go by stories written by adoring reporters who sensationalized his performances to some degree in order to sell newspapers. I know Grange was in the first class of the Hall of Fame but the Fame part often has a lot to do with getting in there, and he was the league's first superstar. I don't know much about 1920's football but his peak seems rather short, and he was retired at 31. I dunno, were they still talking about the runs he made 30 years after he retired? Did he have a running style that was unlike anybody else's, or a combination of size and speed, or a special set of moves? Could he carry a mediocre team on his back and take them further then they deserved to go like John Elway and Peyton Manning could?

[TanksAndSpartans]

I love the 20s and 30s and earlier, but I don't think its easy to put a lot of players from that era on the list just because they were pioneers of the game. I may be in the minority, but Grange wouldn't be on any of my lists. Great college player which led to popularity. Humble and likable person, etc. by all accounts, but I don't have him as an upper echelon HoFer. Whenever someone has Grange on a list, I usually gently suggest Dutch Clark as a replacement. Thorpe on the other hand was not only a box office attraction, but he could dominate a game and lead teams to championships.

[conace21]

Grange's 7 year career was plenty long for the times. Ernie Nevers only played 5 years total. However, Grange's actual accomplishments on the professional gridiron pale in comparison to his collegiate accomplishments. He did officially play some in the 1925 season, but that was hardly indicative of his ability. This came after he had played a full college season and most of the games came on tour, interspersed with exhibitions, sometimes in consecutive days. He played one year in the first AFL, and half a season with the Yankees in the NFL before his knee injury. He apparently was never the same kind of runner after the injury; it affected his ability to cut and cost him some speed. He was still an effective runner when he came back for his second tour with the Bears, and an excellent defensive back. I'd probably compare him to Gale Sayers in 1969.
Neither Grange nor Thorpe probably deserve to be on any All-Decade Teams based solely on their accomplishments on the field. Thorpe was 32 when the NFL began and past his prime.

[JeffreyMiller]

Grange's 7 year career was plenty long for the times. Ernie Nevers only played 5 years total. However, Grange's actual accomplishments on the professional gridiron pale in comparison to his collegiate accomplishments. He did officially play some in the 1925 season, but that was hardly indicative of his ability. This came after he had played a full college season and most of the games came on tour, interspersed with exhibitions, sometimes in consecutive days. He played one year in the first AFL, and half a season with the Yankees in the NFL before his knee injury. He apparently was never the same kind of runner after the injury; it affected his ability to cut and cost him some speed. He was still an effective runner when he came back for his second tour with the Bears, and an excellent defensive back. I'd probably compare him to Gale Sayers in 1969.
Neither Grange nor Thorpe probably deserve to be on any All-Decade Teams based solely on their accomplishments on the field. Thorpe was 32 when the NFL began and past his prime.

Absolutely, Adam. For both Grange and Thorpe, their inclusion in the PFHoF was based on their importance to the game in general rather than their ability or accomplishments on the field.