Manning for me – just because he beat McNair in the season race for postion and head to head – it would be much harder w/o that.
But I gotta say among those not mentioned yet, is one who I beleive deserves an honorable mention. He is the leader of the NFL’s number 1 offense and the number 3 rated QB behind McNair and Manning — Dante Culpepper.
BFarve leader of the number 4 offense (behind MN, KC, IN) & the Number 5 ranked QB in the league desreves at least a mention
Issidiqui,
Harrison is having a solid season, but far from an MVP season, this year and has comparable numbers this year (in fact, almost identical except for TDs) to Derrick Mason, the #1 receiver on the Titans. See the "Enough, Berman" thread for all the stats that I pulled up and you will see that there is no credible evidence to the argument that McNair does more with less around him than Manning. Plus, again, ONE WR by himself hardly equates to a huge amount of talent all around Manning to support this argument.I was actually hoping Dante Hall would make it into final consideration. To bad teams were able to kick away from him and pooch kicks. Sure the Cheifs recieved good field position out of this tactic change, yet, Dante was not able to dance and run thru lines and make all the highlights.
I like Manning anthough McNair is also worthy.
Talks of Manning not able to win the Big game are childish and humorous at best. Elway took quite a few years before he took Denver to two Super Bowls.
Dante Hall ceased to be an MVP candidate about 1/3 of the way into the season. I like the Jamal Lewis angle, but I expect Manning or McNair to get it.
No serious candidates from the NFC. Daunte Culpepper hasn’t been consistent enough to be a serious candidate. Randy Moss was talked about early, but the awards never been given to a wide-out, and if Jerry Rice and Cris Carter never got one, then they never will give it to a wide-out.
I think it depends on what Jamal Lewis does on sunday. If he breaks Dickerson’s record he would have to be MVP. If he comes up short it will probably be Peyton Manning.
Personally, I would still vote for JL even if doesn’t break the record. 2000 yards and a single game rushing record in the same year is enough all by itself, IMO.
Arbitrary? From NFL.com: “The NFL rates its passers for statistical purposes against a fixed performance standard based on statistical achievements of all qualified pro passers since 1960.”
Ok, let’s do the math.
What’s a good completion percentage? 60%. 60-30 x .05 = 1.5
What’s a good yards per attempt, not completion, as you incorrectly stated? 10. 10-3 * .25 = 1.75
What’s a good TD’s per attempt? Figure 35 passes in a game, three TD passes is good, so 3 out of 35 is 8.5%. 8.5 * .2 = 1.7
What interceptions are good? Since you threw 3 TDs, one pick is still a good game. 1 out of 35 is 2.8%. 2.8 *.25 = .7; 2.375 - .7 = 1.675.
So your four numbers are 1.5, 1.75, 1.7, and 1.675.
Do you, by chance, see a pattern here?
The whole point of the rating is to quantify all four aspects of passing to a similar scale; I refered to this as “normalizing”. The scale, for the curious, is 0 - 2.375. (Which should explain the interceptions calculation.)
Average them all together and blow it up to the 100s level. 1.5+1.75+1.7+1.675=6.625. Hmmm, that divide by six step is starting to make sense. 6.625 / 6 * 100 = 110.42; A passer rating of 110.42 does indeed reflect a good passer.
How is this arbitrary, other than the fact that they arbitrarily wanted a 1-100ish scale?
They do not “assign” arcane or any other type of value to the stats; they merely convert them all to the same scale. Once on the same scale, they combine them together evenly and blow them up to the 100s scale.
You sound like you are advocating using the stats unmolested. How, pray tell, do you propose combining the four stats in my example, which are 60, 10, 3, and 1?
Um, no. Nothing in that paragraph is correct except the 1960 part. Nothing was “decided”. The formula is based on actual performance of all passers since 1960. (It was adopted in 1973, btw.) On second glance, you are also correct that 158.3 is perfect.
And if you say they arbitrarily picked the “best possible” performance as the boundary for the scale; they did not. They based the “best possible” on the best actual performance of real life QBs.
The fact that you do not understand it doesn’t make it wrong.
… they’ll probably do something bizarre like split it between McNair and Manning. Yeah. A TIE. That’s what they’ll probably do.
(I could be wrong, though)
Tom Brady is the third most valuable player in the league, but isn’t getting a trip to Hawaii or even much mention in this thread. I’m sure he’ll find some consolation in his second ring, though.
Wow RealHoops … give me the Powerball numbers next time, Okay?
Yeah, okay, Ellis Dee. I admit that I never really understood why it was calculated like that, and I’d like to thank you for explaining it better than anyone else ever has. That said, it’s still dumb. My point was that there is no compelling reason to combine those four stats when you can look at them seperately and it tells you everything you need to know. I don’t see the need to “simplify” things into one number.
Don’t lose heart. Steve McNair didn’t make the Pro Bowl last year either.
I respect both Manning and McNair and maybe the decision was fair. My knowledge of Manning comes mostly from his days with the University of Tennessee and from the fact that he and the Colts have been Tennessee’s nemisis this year. The stats are good, but that doesn’t tell the whole story.
There is something about McNair that is different from any player that I’ve seen. He lights the fire that is the Titans – not just the offense or the team, but the fans too. If the choice were based on grace of spirit, Steve would stand above anyone.
Sometimes he reminds me of that fighting knight in Monty Python’s The Search for the Holy Grail – the one who is still wanting to fight despite having lost three of his appendages.
Well McNair sure was not the “fire” in the Titans today. He did nothing to help them win this game. It was all the defense of the Titans limiting Jamal Lewis and making Anthony Wright win the game.
Oh, but I forgot, that can't be true because the Titans are apparently just dreadful without McNair. He has no support. He does it all himself.Apparently he inspires. 
I would never have been one to say that the Titans are dreadful without McNair. That kind of talk can get you on the first ox cart out of Nashville. Both times that we’ve had to have other quarterbacks this season, both have been successful.
If you look at the stats from the game, you can’t say that it was “all” Titans defense. Overall, we played a better game. And, well, we did win.
I was really impressed with Lewis’s ability though. Gee, that guy plays his heart out. I understand that he and Eddie George are friends.
Its not really the Titans fans that have claimed they have no one except McNair that is any good. Its been mainly from the national media, ESPN and such, that came up with that as a reason why they would still vote for McNair over Manning.
You're right, it was not all the defense. It was the defense and Eddie George. McNair did have the one long pass play, but that was more a great adjustment by the receiver than a great throw by McNair. It was underthrown and the receiver made a better play on the ball than the defender. Maybe he underthrew it on purpose.
Still, if Manning goes for one TD and three INTs today, as McNair did yesterday, there is little chance that the Colts will even be able to keep it close, let alone win.