zrinkill
Cowboy Fan
- Messages
- 49,043
- Reaction score
- 32,552
Every NFL quarterback, including the backups, has a good arm. They’re all good athletes. If they didn’t possess these qualities, they wouldn’t be NFL quarterbacks.
So we recognize there are many good arms and then there are a few great arms. Then there’s Brett Favre, who holds a ton of NFL records, some of which will probably never be broken.
Brett Favre is a freak of nature to have accomplished what he has at his age. And he can still do the job, or could, if he wanted to return to the game for another year.
A few months ago, I heard former Packer great Jerry Kramer say he talked with his former teammate, Hall of Fame quarterback Bart Starr. Kramer said it looked to him like Favre could still make all the throws, but he was “just a lineman,” so what did he know? He asked Starr for his opinion and Bart replied that Brett Favre could make throws now from his knees that Starr could never have made in his best days.
And this opinion came from a Hall of Fame quarterback, who ought to know a thing or two about playing the position, and in reference to a 38-year old man, who should have been washed up quite a few years ago.
After seventeen years in the NFL, his accomplishments are many and storied. Before writing anything more about Favre, I’d like to put his arm and his career in perspective by reviewing some other legendary arms in the NFL.
Let’s get one thing clear. When I say “great arm,” I’m not writing about technicians or field generals, like Joe Montana. Great arms belonged to quarterbacks who could absolutely drill a football into any spot on the field.
The first great arm I saw in the league was Joe Namath’s. If you look up Namath’s stats, they aren’t too impressive by today’s standards. Please note the qualification.
Back in those days, his were very good stats, primarily because of the rules at the time, which allowed defenders to mug receivers anywhere and everywhere on the field. Pass interference was not an infraction frequently called. Namath was a riverboat gambler who was so good, and his arm was so strong, he took a lot of risks by throwing balls into coverage he shouldn’t have, betting that he could still gun the ball in there.
To this day, one of the best passes I have ever seen was a bomb he threw, which traveled 70 yards in the air through the swirling winds of Shea Stadium and into the hands of Don Maynard. It was the play which propelled the Jets to Super Bowl III.
Terry Bradshaw had the arm of the seventies. Despite winning four Super Bowl rings, Terry never got the respect I feel he deserved. But as Ken Stabler wrote, only Namath and Bradshaw had arms which were given out by God.
Hall of Fame coach John Madden wrote that Namath and Bradshaw were the best quarterbacks he ever coached against. High praise indeed.
John Elway and Dan Marino, both quarterbacks from the fabled Class of ‘83, had arms that excelled for two decades and eventual Hall of Fame induction. One story I like about Marino was from his rookie year. His coach, Don Shula, was changing the game plan on a Sunday morning due to rain. Marino told him not to bother, because he could still make all the throws, despite the weather. He did.
Elway had the strongest arm I had ever seen, prior to seeing Brett Favre. It was nice to see him leave the game on his own terms, after a long and storied career and two Super Bowl wins.
Troy Aikman, another Hall of Fame quarterback, also had a hell of a strong arm. At the Pro Bowl one year, he was throwing balls in practice one day to teammate Michael Irvin. Other players marveled, both at Aikman’s mustard on the ball and Irvin’s ability to catch the bullets. They kept asking Irvin how he was able to catch those balls.
And then along came Favre. Many people forget that he wasn’t a lifetime Packer, and was drafted by the Atlanta Falcons. His first NFL coach, Jerry Glanville, had a practice of making bets with out of town sportswriters that he had a quarterback who could throw a football up into the stadium’s upper deck. Glanville was not referring to his starter, the well renowned Chris Miller.
After being traded to the Packers just one year later, it’s easy to say in the retrospect which 20-20 hindsight provides, that the trade was a colossal blunder for the Dirty Birds.
Green Bay had an established quarterback at the time, the “Magic Man” Dan Majkowski, who became the NFL’s version of Wally Pipp. After the Magic Man was injured, he was never able to reclaim his starting job from Favre, who held onto it for 16 years. Not even a first-round draft pick, selected two years ago, could replace him.
Will there ever be another quarterback with an arm like Brett Favre’s? The only guy in the league I see right now is Jay Cutler in Denver. He has a chance, maybe, to be included one day in the superstar status which Favre holds.
Should we remember Favre simply for the strength of his arm? No, that would be unfair and an injustice to him. Brett Favre has been an incredible quarterback in many more respects.
If I had my choice of quarterbacks to be my starter in a Super Bowl, I’d want John Unitas in his prime. My second option would be Joe Montana.
But if I needed a quarterback to rifle a ball into a tight spot on a crucial play, or to make something happen when no receivers were open, there would be no better selection than Brett Favre.
http://mvn.com/nfl-source/2008/03/05/reminiscing-about-brett-favre-and-other-greats/
.
.
.
.
So we recognize there are many good arms and then there are a few great arms. Then there’s Brett Favre, who holds a ton of NFL records, some of which will probably never be broken.
Brett Favre is a freak of nature to have accomplished what he has at his age. And he can still do the job, or could, if he wanted to return to the game for another year.
A few months ago, I heard former Packer great Jerry Kramer say he talked with his former teammate, Hall of Fame quarterback Bart Starr. Kramer said it looked to him like Favre could still make all the throws, but he was “just a lineman,” so what did he know? He asked Starr for his opinion and Bart replied that Brett Favre could make throws now from his knees that Starr could never have made in his best days.
And this opinion came from a Hall of Fame quarterback, who ought to know a thing or two about playing the position, and in reference to a 38-year old man, who should have been washed up quite a few years ago.
After seventeen years in the NFL, his accomplishments are many and storied. Before writing anything more about Favre, I’d like to put his arm and his career in perspective by reviewing some other legendary arms in the NFL.
Let’s get one thing clear. When I say “great arm,” I’m not writing about technicians or field generals, like Joe Montana. Great arms belonged to quarterbacks who could absolutely drill a football into any spot on the field.
The first great arm I saw in the league was Joe Namath’s. If you look up Namath’s stats, they aren’t too impressive by today’s standards. Please note the qualification.
Back in those days, his were very good stats, primarily because of the rules at the time, which allowed defenders to mug receivers anywhere and everywhere on the field. Pass interference was not an infraction frequently called. Namath was a riverboat gambler who was so good, and his arm was so strong, he took a lot of risks by throwing balls into coverage he shouldn’t have, betting that he could still gun the ball in there.
To this day, one of the best passes I have ever seen was a bomb he threw, which traveled 70 yards in the air through the swirling winds of Shea Stadium and into the hands of Don Maynard. It was the play which propelled the Jets to Super Bowl III.
Terry Bradshaw had the arm of the seventies. Despite winning four Super Bowl rings, Terry never got the respect I feel he deserved. But as Ken Stabler wrote, only Namath and Bradshaw had arms which were given out by God.
Hall of Fame coach John Madden wrote that Namath and Bradshaw were the best quarterbacks he ever coached against. High praise indeed.
John Elway and Dan Marino, both quarterbacks from the fabled Class of ‘83, had arms that excelled for two decades and eventual Hall of Fame induction. One story I like about Marino was from his rookie year. His coach, Don Shula, was changing the game plan on a Sunday morning due to rain. Marino told him not to bother, because he could still make all the throws, despite the weather. He did.
Elway had the strongest arm I had ever seen, prior to seeing Brett Favre. It was nice to see him leave the game on his own terms, after a long and storied career and two Super Bowl wins.
Troy Aikman, another Hall of Fame quarterback, also had a hell of a strong arm. At the Pro Bowl one year, he was throwing balls in practice one day to teammate Michael Irvin. Other players marveled, both at Aikman’s mustard on the ball and Irvin’s ability to catch the bullets. They kept asking Irvin how he was able to catch those balls.
And then along came Favre. Many people forget that he wasn’t a lifetime Packer, and was drafted by the Atlanta Falcons. His first NFL coach, Jerry Glanville, had a practice of making bets with out of town sportswriters that he had a quarterback who could throw a football up into the stadium’s upper deck. Glanville was not referring to his starter, the well renowned Chris Miller.
After being traded to the Packers just one year later, it’s easy to say in the retrospect which 20-20 hindsight provides, that the trade was a colossal blunder for the Dirty Birds.
Green Bay had an established quarterback at the time, the “Magic Man” Dan Majkowski, who became the NFL’s version of Wally Pipp. After the Magic Man was injured, he was never able to reclaim his starting job from Favre, who held onto it for 16 years. Not even a first-round draft pick, selected two years ago, could replace him.
Will there ever be another quarterback with an arm like Brett Favre’s? The only guy in the league I see right now is Jay Cutler in Denver. He has a chance, maybe, to be included one day in the superstar status which Favre holds.
Should we remember Favre simply for the strength of his arm? No, that would be unfair and an injustice to him. Brett Favre has been an incredible quarterback in many more respects.
If I had my choice of quarterbacks to be my starter in a Super Bowl, I’d want John Unitas in his prime. My second option would be Joe Montana.
But if I needed a quarterback to rifle a ball into a tight spot on a crucial play, or to make something happen when no receivers were open, there would be no better selection than Brett Favre.
http://mvn.com/nfl-source/2008/03/05/reminiscing-about-brett-favre-and-other-greats/
.
.
.
.
