Professional Football Researchers Association Forum

As some of you I've parsed most of the Gamebooks into a digital form for event data to try to get a better understanding of defensive contributions for prior eras, especially 1978 PBP data. And tinkering with individual weights + team weights for contribution distributions. Ran through a number of simulations and admittedly, a name I did not know ended up #1 a lot. Mike Reid of the Cincinnati Bengals. I was like, who is this guy and why is Joe Greene ranking 4-7. Well, funny you should ask as Reid was actually 1st team All-Pro in 1972 and as a DT had 12 sacks in 14 games. He was no flash in the pan either. In his senior year (1969) at Penn State he spearheaded Penn State on defense with 89 tackles. He was a unanimous All-America choice, finished 5th in the Heisman voting, outright won the Outland Trophy as the outstanding interior lineman in America, and was awarded the Maxwell Trophy as the nation's most outstanding college football player.

The following year he was selected 7th in the 1970 NFL Draft by the Cincinnati Bengals. And over the next 5 years playing for the Bengals Reid would be named Pro Bowl (2x) and All-Pro (1x) while accumulating 49 sacks in 64 games before retiring at age 27 to become a professsional musician. Mike went on to write "I Can't Make You Love Me" for Bonnie Raitt and won multiple Grammy awards. Pretty wild... Five NFL seasons, 49 career sacks, AP-1 in 1972, and then just... left. My metrics smithing has found him to be the the #1 defensive player in the league the year for 1972 and while I know NFL football better than 99% of people, I had no idea who Mike Reid was prior to working through these Gamebooks. Pretty cool story. How many of you remember Mike Reid? How many of you find it interesting he didn't get any DPOY votes in 1972?

1969 Interview at Penn State where he mentions his love for music and football. He was a VERY THICK NECKED dude.
https://www.facebook.com/reel/1398117448746428

PFR Profile:
https://www.pro-football-reference.com/ ... idMi00.htm

1972 DPOY Voting:
https://www.pro-football-reference.com/ ... ing_apdpoy

And here's a taste of his music. Pretty moving stuff. Won Grammy Awards too. So makes sense.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pNpPxWRD2JI

Mike Reid later in life on his time at Penn State

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VNzDXbi4fLI

Reid had the musical talent to retire quickly because he was having more injuries as well. I believe he would have made the HOF had he played another four years.

Ronnie Milsap's "Stranger in My House". Yeah, both musically and athletically Mike Reid seems to be under the radar. Basically no celebrity status.

Yes those back-to-back undefeated/untied '68 & '69 Penn State squads...a shame neither of them got a chance to play for the National Championship against Ohio State & (NIXON'S 'vote') Texas respectively. But that's the breaks. Being an east coast team playing real soft schedules didn't help (didn't help them in '73 either).

Jack Ham was on those defenses along with Dennis Onkotz and John Ebersole who both were the Jets' #3 and #4 picks respectively in the '70 draft.