2016 NFL off-season thread

Ask Matteau, man.

 

Field Yates ‏@FieldYates 7m7 minutes ago
The Lions announce that WR Calvin Johnson has officially retired from the NFL.

 

All right, I'm going full Whitman here: Megatron, HOF?

His totals are not that high: 731/11619/83TDs. 15.9 avg. Led NFL in receptions once, TD receptions once, yards twice. First-team All-Pro three times.

He finishes 43rd all-time in receptions and 27th in yards. Big WR logjam too.

He is pretty strong on the eye test.

I say no, though. I feel bad that he had to spend his whole career with that shit team, but all in all he did not have a huge amount more impact than Herman Moore.

 

He passes one of the Bill James baseball Hall questions. Was the player regarded as the best at his position when he played.

 

So should this Titan fanboi think Murray has anything left in the tank?

And is there a worse cliche in football than "anything left in the tank?"

 

Yes but don't get giddy to question one, no to question two.

 

The Cowboys really did a number on him in 2014. I'd be a little surprised if he ends up leading the Titans in rushing. Think you're headed to a committee there.

 

I'm as big a Herman Moore fanboi as there is on this board - Moore to Moore was incredible at UVA! - but Megatron had 63 more catches, nearly 2,500 more yards and 21 more touchdowns. They both played nine full seasons, with Moore adding on the equivalent of about 2/3 of a season when he was injured/playing out the string. That's not particularly close. He was basically a Moore and a quarter.

 

Yeah. Megatron had higher impact. But not a huge amount higher. Spread over their nine seasons, he averaged 7 more catches, 250 more yards and two more TDs. Better, but not exactly in a different world.

 

That's fair. And I found myself nodding at your analysis of his HOF case.

 

Wow. Looking at it more closely, Johnson's stats are nearly identical to Brandon Marshall's. The only significant difference between the two is YPC (Megatron's 15.9 to Marshall's 12.8).

So, if one is in, it's a tough argument to keep the other out.

 

Hall of Very Good, unless he comes out of retirement and grabs a ring with the Patriots.

That also puts Matthew Stafford in definite make-it-or-break-it territory for 2016.