GOAT WR

Longtime Packers PR guy Lee Remmell famously would call anybody who referred to Brett Favre as "the best Packers player of all-time" and say, "Brett Favre couldn't carry Don Hutson's jock." A TV guy once asked Favre about it and he smiled and said, "If Lee says I can't then I can't..."

If you were ever lucky enough to know Lee, you know this would be done with a wink and a nod in the most friendly manner possible, but the point would come across. Here is someone who covered Hutson and has seen more football during his life than almost anybody else and he knew how great some of those old-time players were.

 

Yeah, old timers never have a bias toward the older players.

Don Hutson was fantastic for his time.

Do you honestly think, with an offseason to get up to speed, an in-his-prime Don Hutson could compete today?

I don't think there's a chance in hell.

You put Jordy Nelson back in time and play in Hutson's era, and he'd be all-Universe, let alone Megatron.

 

You can't judge them like that. You have to judge them based on how they dominated their era. You could easily say, "Can you imagine how good Don Hutson would be if he didn't have to work a second job during the off-season and he had better equipment and better trainers and better nutrition?"

Hutson was the best of his era and that counts for something. Megatron is the best WR in the NFL right now and that counts for something.

 

Completely agree. Did they dominate their era? When they're debating the HOF merits of Andre Reed, Tim Brown and Marvin Harrison in a couple weeks do you think they're going to be compared to Hutson, Berry and Alworth, or Rice, Carter and Irvin?

 

Then the whole discussion is asinine.

Look at place kickers. They used to be spare offensive linemen.

Now, there's frigging high school camps for kickers. The skill level between today's kickers and even a generation ago is quantifiably enormous.

Don Huston was selling insurance for six months a year. Today's wide receivers are perfecting their technique in the offseason and running with parachutes attached to them for training.

There are few things that any of the old timers could do that today's players excel at. These GOAT lists are asinine.

Except for the PK holder one.

 

And you are in a position of knowledge to put player x from today at #5 and player y from 1930 at #6.... sure, makes tons of sense.

And this isn't a HOF discussion, this is a list from 1-10.

 

Don Huston still selling insurance full time:

http://insurance-agency.amfam.com/CO/don-huston/default.aspx?sourceid=yp9

 

GOAT Insurance Agents

 

You are correct that the lists are generally worthless. But when making the conclusion that the old-timers couldn't do the things today's players can do, remember it works both ways.

How many of today's players could do what the old-timers did under the conditions of the time? If Jordy Nelson, to use your earlier example, was selling insurance six months of the year and wasn't doing weight or speed or agility training (and never had) and had to invent his pass routes from scratch and deal with defenders smacking him 15 yards down the field with the ball in the air (with no flag coming), etc., would he really be "all-universe"?

 

I get your point, and I love the old guys.

 

Would you buy insurance from Santonio Holmes?