There are very few NFL QB’s that have made enough of an imact to say it was their era while they were the quarterback for a particular team. Brett Farve has done it. He has surpassed Bart Starr as the greatest quarterback in Green Bay Packer history. Here are a few others that we can say left their mark.
New England Patriots:Tom Brady
Buffalo Bills:Jim Kelly
New York Jets:Joe Namath
Miami Dolphins:Bob Griese, Dan Marino
Pittsburgh Steelers:Terry Bradshaw(Big Ben is not at this level yet where you say there was a “Ben Roethlisberger Era”, but you can say there was a “Terry Bradshaw Era”.
Cleveland Browns:Nobody
Cincinnati Begals:Boomer Esiason may come close but NOBODY.
Baltimore Ravens:Nobody
Indianapolis Colts:Peyton Manning, Johnny Unitas from the old Baltimore Colts
Jacksonville Jaguars:Nobody
Tennessee Titans:Nobody(Steve McNair doesn’t cut it.)
Houston Texans:Nobody
San Diego Chargers:Dan Fouts(this guy is as about as close as greatness gets to never make it to a Super Bowl. Fouts was a great one and I almost forgot about him. He did it all for so many years in anonymity way out on the West Coast.)
Denver Broncos:John Elway
Kansas City Chiefs:Len Dawson
Oakland Raiders:Daryle Lamonica, Ken Stabler
Dallas Cowboys:Roger Staubach, Troy Aikman
New York Giants:Phil Simms
Washington Redskins:Sonny Jurgensen, Joe Theismann
Philadelphia Eagles:Nobody
Green Bay Packers:Brett Farve, Bart Starr
Minnesota Vikings:Fran Tarkenton
Detroit Lions:Nobody
Chicago Bears:Nobody(The Jim McMahon run was too short-lived, it doesn’t matter if they won the Super Bowl or not, McMahon was a true “one-hit wonder”.)
Tampa Bay Buccaneers:Nobody
Carolina Panthers:Nobody
New Orleans Saints:Nobody
Atlanta Falcons:Nobody
Seattle Seahawks:Nobody, (but I think Jim Zorn might come close.)
Arizona Cardinals:Nobody, (they are who we thought they were.)
San Francisco 49er’s:Joe Montana, Steve Young
St. Louis Rams:Nobody
*****You may not agree with all of these that I came up with but it does make for some interesting discussion and probably gets a few of us thinking and re-thinking our choices. And I bet you that they are talking about this very same topic on some Sports Talk Show up in Boston, or New York or even out in Chicago or Green Bay, somewhere/sometime today.***** +++++This isn’t local but the timing of it is pretty good with the league championship games coming up this Sunday.+++++
Warren Moon. Don’t worry, I won’t call Jesse or Al.
Sid Luckman, greatest quarterback in Bears history. 1940, 1941, 1943, and 1946 NFL Champions!
Good call on Warren Moon, but I can’t recall much on Sid Luckman, I’ve heard of him but he was before my time. I didn’t really think of Warren Moon, I do remember him from his days in the CFL and it’s a fact that he did leave his mark on the occasions when he beat his wife.
I was doing this piece off the top of my head and I almost forgot to include Dan Fouts. Did we leave anyone else out?
Doug Williams had a good run with the Redskins but many fans will take Billy Kilmer over Doug W. on their all-time Redskins favorites list.
Warren Moon almost gets lost on us because much of the Oilers history seems lost after the move to Tennessee.
Hopefully Al and Jesse will give me a pass and they may not be too happy when they look at the lineups at QB for the Championship games. For the QB’s they don’t get any more southern white than Farve, Rivers, and Eli Manning. David Garrard was the last great black hope this year but he had to face Tom Brady and the Pats.
Two black head coaches at last year’s Super Bowl but not even close this year after Tony Dungy’s Colts got let loose.
Al and Jesse will have to wait and get ready for the NBA All-Star weekend.
Seriously, can we name more QB’s that got left out?
This whole idea hit me after Brett Farve had his big weekend up in Green Bay and now has moved past Bart Starr in Packer QB history. The “Brett Farve Era” superceeds the “Bart Starr Era”, if you ask me.
I think Moon was a good call.
The run and shoot teams wern’t the greatest but, they were fun to watch.
It’s amazing to think about Chicago Bears history and think that in the modern era, they’ve had not one mememrable qt.
Don’t worry, I still love you Jim Harbaugh.
The oversight of Warren Moon could partly be overlooked because he was a mediocre playoff quarterback. Not only did he never play in a super bowl, but I don’t believe he appeared in conference championship, and his most famous playoff appearance was a loss — the 30+ point comeback of the Bills versus his Houston Oilers. I doubt many Houstonians consider the late 80s, early 90s the Warren Moon era. I think people there more fondly remember the Earl Campbell-Dan Pastorini era. Al and Jesse will have to stew a little while longer.
The Oiler’s defense during Warren Moon’s tenure was pretty pathetic. Those losses had more to do with coaches putting a beatdown on Glanville’s “D” than Warren Moon playing poorly. Give the brotha some love!
I think we need to include more of the older quarterbacks that many younger fans have never heard of or just plain flat out forgotten. How about Roman Gabriel with the Rams back when they were the LA Rams and Jack Kemp with the Buffalo Bills and John Hadl with the San Diego Chargers and Bill Nelson with the Cleveland Browns.
Those are some of my favorites.
Bernie Kosar and Kurt Warner should probably be listed here given the names above.
Nobody said Bartkowski yet. 🙁
I think we need to go in an opposite direction today. We are being hit by wannabees that we can’t let in. Moon is on the bubble but I can’t see us taking in Kemp, Nelson, Hadl, Gabriel, Warner, Kosar, or Bartkowski. I was thinking about Bartkowski when this got started but we have to be tough. We can’t just let anybody in.
Maybe we need to examine the list and decide who we need to kick out? Any thoughts in that direction?
Do we have other members of the Hall that still want to bring more men in? If so send our committee some real names and let’s talk about what they have done to become viable candidates.
Let’s try and keep this discussion going at least until the Sunday kickoffs or move it to the message board on Saturday night.
Don’t be so pushy with all the restrictions about who should be in. I thought that the new guys sounded pretty good. The ones you had on your list were OK but the list was too short. I hope all of this is still open for discussion. BTW, the message board really sounds like a good idea and if everybody is heading over there Saturday we’ll see you there.
Since I guess Bryan Sipe is also “on the bubble,” what about Otto Graham for the Browns?
But I think his run was kind of short too…
I guess we’ll have to dig him up and dust him off then. I have some good memories of Otto Graham. He helped begin the turn around of the Washington Redskins and then Bill Austin takes over then we get Vince Lombardi and then here comes the man the that put the Skins back on the map, George Allen. Joe Gibbs was a great one but to me George Allen will always be “The Man”.
Maybe the future for the Skins will be a good one….with Gregg Williams or whoever they end up with.
Turns out Otto was NFL chamPEEN six times in his 10 year career.
I guess it wasn’t as short as I was thinking….