Earlier this week Philip Rivers announced his retirement from the National Football League after 17 seasons. Rivers spent 16 of those seasons with the San Diego ow Los Angeles Chargers before joining the Indianapolis Colts this past season. Now when I heard this news I immediately thought that Rivers would end up in the Hall of Fame, but I’ve heard some other people who aren’t so sure he’ll get their because of one reason and one reason only. Rivers never won a Super Bowl!
Now this would be a very slippery slope for Hall of fame voters to go down. I’m sure like me the first two names you thought of where Dan Marino and Jim Kelly who never won a Super Bowl. Now I don’t think that Rivers is the same caliber quarterback as either Marino or Kelly, but I do believe he belongs in the Hall of Fame.
Rivers finished his career 5th in all time passing yards with 63.440. He was also 5th in career passing touchdown with 421. Rivers made 240 starts in the NFL and has a record of 134-106. Rivers led 29 4th quarter comebacks during his career along with 35 game winning drives. Rivers made 12 post season appearances going 5-7. He threw for 2965 yards with 16 touchdowns in those post season games.
Do those sound like Hall of Fame credentials?
Now if Rivers isn’t considered a Hall of Fame quarterback because of not winning a Super Bowl you have to wonder if quarterbacks like Trent Dilfer. Mark Rypien and Jim McMahon deserve Hall of Fame consideration because they quarterbacked teams that did win a Super Bowl. Also is it only quarterbacks that are held to that standard or do we now have to start looking at every player and asking if they’ve won a Super Bowl. It just seems like there’s a lot more to an NFL career than winning a Super Bowl.
Rivers retirement also adds the Colts to the list of teams with quarterback questions for next season. Jacob Eason is currently the only quarterback on the Colts roster as Jacoby Brissett is headed into free agency. Eason was the Colts 4th round draft pick in last years draft and hasn’t taken an NFL snap. Somewhere down the line this off season you have to think the Colts will add a quarterback, but they won’t be the only team looking to do that.
You can add the Colts to teams like the Chicago Bears, New England Patriots, San Francisco 49ers and Jacksonville Jaquars and The Washington Football team as teams that might not have next seasons starting quarterback on their roster right now. Of course the Jaquars have the #1 pick in the upcoming draft and look to select their franchise quarterback with that pick and develop him under new head coach Urban Meyer.
You can also add teams like the Atlanta Falcons, Detroit Lions and Philadelphia Eagles who seem unsure what they’ll be doing at quarterback next season even though each team has a solid quarterback on their roster and in the Eagles case they might have two. Of course what these three teams have in common is they all hired new head coaches and you have to take into consideration that they might want to go with their own guy.
There’s also been talk that teams like the Miami Dolphins and the New York Jets might be interested in different quarterbacks either through the draft or through a trade, but I don’t know how much value I put on these reports as both teams have young quarterbacks that where high draft picks and probably need to be giving a chance to play.
Now depending on which NFL mock draft you read there could be four or five quarterbacks drafted in the 1st round; so maybe some teams will go that route to try and solve their issues under center. I guess will have to wait and see what teams decide to do.
While most of the NFL is setting up their off season plans there are still four teams with the opportunity to win the Super Bowl. Tomorrow the NFC game has the Green Bay Packers hosting the Tampa Bay Buccaneers. While over in the AFC the Buffalo Bills go on the road to face the Kansas City Chiefs. Of course the winners of these two games will go on to meet in the Super Bowl; so who do you have winning?
Yesterday on the Sports Time Radio podcast Schaumburg Stu picked the Packers to win and cover; Green Bay is a 3 1/2 point favorite. Stu also took Kansas City to win and cover; the Chiefs are a 3 point favorite. What do you think of Stu’s picks?
You can listen to the Sports Time Radio podcast live on BlogTalkRadio.com, but if you miss the podcast live just head over to TuneIn.com and you can listen whenever you’d like.
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Stew’s picks are usually spot on but don’t go betting a huge amount on them!
It’ll be touch and go for Rivers but he might just sneak into the hall of fame.
McMahon probably would have made it, but he was injury prone and that prevented him from getting into the HOF. Remember in those days, they didn’t protect the QB like they do now. (I can still see the late Charles Martin body slamming him to the turf long after the play was over.)
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