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Do you really think Chad would tie his name to such a thing? 1-888-FTC-HELP versus 1-800-FTC-HELP? C’mon. Its an administrative issue, and the only reason Hines Ward wouldn’t get this kind of exposure is because he’s past his prime and he’s a cheap shot artist!
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We talk about the Steelers because we, collectively as fans of the 31 other teams, fucking HATE your team!
Yeah, I know, everybody hates a winner, which is why Steeler fans don’t bother with the Bengals, just the Ravens. It’s your tough luck that your trophy case is as empty as Chris Henry’s head.
(Too soon?)
If I had named coordinators, then Dick LeBeau and Monte Kiffen would be my only two options.
The Steelers players get marked down because they trot out a top ten defense every year, regardless of who’s on the roster. Bit like the Pats.
Anyway, Joey Porter made the list. I didn’t really get into 3-4 nose tackles, but Big Snack would have been my second choice after Jamal Williams.
As far as Harrison goes, I hope you’re kidding. This is only his fourth season as a starter. One (admittedly incredible) year and two very, very good years is not enough for an all-decade team.
Quite. Although I’ve done my part to hijack my own thread. Let’s get off the quarterbacks and the Steelers, please - there are a dozen other positions to discuss.
I find it funny that the Eagles had the third best record of the decade, the second most playoff trips, a Super Bowl appearance, and five Conference Championship game appearances, but not a single Eagle is even getting mentioned in this thread. I guess Terrell Owens half counts since he played one full season and just under half of another in Philly, but not really. At least the HoF guys remembered Brian Dawkins.
Just goes to show how average the talent was on those Eagles teams and how much McNabb had to carry them to what success they had. McNabb is obviously one of the most under-appreciated players in NFL history, but I’d even go as far as to say that perhaps no other player has done so much with so little. Sure, he doesn’t belong on the All Decade team or anything, but if he played on the Steelers or Colts he’d a title or two and then WOULD be in this discussion. Unfortunately for him he got stuck with an awful coach and a decade of average players with an occasional flash in the pan standout season here and there.
Probably part of the reason no Eagles are getting mentioned is that they tend to favor a high-turnover appropoach to their roster, with a lot of solid, above average players who don’t get to stick around for a dozen years. They build for depth, not superstars. And, also, I guess they just happened to have a bunch of guys who’d be on All-Decade 2nd or 3rd team, but not the first. Luck of the draw type thing.
Also, yet another hijack, but: if the Eagles had the third most wins with, as you put it, a roster full of mostly average guys for the whole decade, I don’t think you can ALSO hold that Andy Reid is a “terrible” coach. I’ll grant that he at least SEEMS like a pretty shaky game-day coach, but that’s actually a very small part of the job, especially for someone like Reid, who’s also the de facto GM.
Ouch! At least, that’s what he said…
The two Eagles who merit the most consideration IMO are Brian Dawkins and McNabb. Dawkins is in the top 5 for the decade. Personally I think McNabb was the third best QB behind Manning and Brady.
I just forgot Dawkins. No question he’d be my second choice at FS. Troy Vincent would have been my #1 CB if I was making this list in 2004… but I wasn’t. Asante Samuel would be in the conversation for the second half of the decade if he’d make a tackle once in a while.
I considered Jeremiah Trotter, but he was basically washed up by mid-decade; just bad timing.
A very good argument could be made for McNabb as the #3 quarterback.
Brian Westbrook never impressed me much. I always thought of him as a glorified scatback. I think my thinking is also affected to a degree by how much fantasy football I play, because I can’t think of Westbrook without thinking about having to stare at the inactive ticker every Sunday morning because he was always on the fucking injury list.
ETA: I think I used the word think entirely too much in that sentence.
My bad. I didn’t mean to hijack your thread. The reason I brought him up is that he doesn’t ever get a fair shake in the QB discussion. I’ve had this conversation with many friends in the past, and we’ve at least agreed that he deserves a lot more credit than he gets. BTW, I’m the only real Steeler fan amongst my close friends. The Georgia incident makes his case even harder, as people’s emotions start to get in the way of objectivity. People always attribute Pittsburgh’s success to its defense, solely. But Ben has led his team back to a victory many times after his defense gave up a lead. And he looks completely natural in pressure situations. He truly believes that he will lead his team to victory every single time, just like to Brady, Montana, Elway and Warner. Peyton looks like a deer-in-headlights. He starts pouting even before his team gives up the lead. His body language is awful in pressure situations. In the last 2 minutes of a playoff game, I believe that even the most diehard Colts fan would take BB over PM (although most won’t admit it).
But I won’t say any more about BB, in the best interest of the OP.
Thanks for ending the hijack with dignity and not trying to get the last word in or anything. :rolleyes:
Hey, it was my hijack. 
I don’t just think Peyton Manning is the best quarterback of the last decade, he’s the best I’ve ever seen. I don’t think anyone has mentioned his toughness yet in this thread (apologies if I’m mistaken). The guy has taken some frightful hits and never missed a game. He was hit by two guys against the Redskins once and I think a lot of QBs would have been done for the season. As great as he is and with all the accolades I still think he’s somewhat underrated.
Were you planning to include Special Teams on your list BTW?
Fuck, fuck, fuck. I was 90% done with a long, detailed list, but then I accidentally closed the tab containing my post. There is no remedy for this. Fuck. So, here’s a probably somewhat abbreviated version. As you’ll see, I’m treating 4-3 and 3-4 DEs, DTs, and OLBs as entirely different positions – it’s silly to try and compare Dwight Freeney to Ty Warren, even though they both technically play Defensive End.
4-3 DE 1: Michael Strahan.
4-3 DE 2: Julius Peppers. Strahan I take as an obvious selection: a sure HOF’er (though maybe not a first-ballot caliber type), phenomenal against both the run and the pass. For the second spot, Peppers gets the nod over Freeney because he actually had responsibilities in the run game, and even dropped into pass coverage a fair amount, as evidenced by his 6 interceptions (compared to Freeney’s zero), yet still racked up just 3 fewer sacks than Freeney over the same time span (81 to 84). And Freeney would have had plenty more opportunities for sacks, given the number of blowouts his team was a part of. Considering all that, I don’t think it’s particularly close between them.
4-3 DT 1: Warren Sapp.
4-3 DT 2: Kevin Williams. Again, #1 is obvious. #2 is actually a toss-up for me. Also in the running are Kris Jenkins, Pat Williams, and even Albert Haynesworth. And also that guy that I’m completely forgetting but shouldn’t be. You know who I’m talking about…
3-4 DE 1: Richard Seymour.
3-4 DE 2: Aaron Smith. 3-4 DEs tend to live in anonymity, in large part, I think, because pro bowl rosters are designed with 4-3 Ends in mind. Seymour gets enough ink, but he’s just about the only one. Meanwhile, Aaron Smith has been a rock all decade long, every bit as much a foundation of the Steelers’ defenses as Porter, Polamalu, or Hampton. For his trouble, he’s been to 1 Pro Bowl, and even a lot knowledgeable fans will barely recognize his name. The other player in contention for the #2 spot was Ty Warren.
3-4 NT: Casey Hampton. Other reasonable choices include Jamal Williams and Vince Wilfork.
4-3 OLB 1: Derrick Brooks.
4-3 OLB 2: Julian Peterson. Another position that tends to get overlooked, because the glory and the pro bowl berths go to their 3-4 counterparts, and these guys collect unsexy tackles instead of sacks. Anyway, unless I’m forgetting someone obvious (possible), after Brooks the only worthy candidates I could come up with were Peterson and Lance Briggs (an underrated part of those excellent Bears defenses – a phenomenal coverage linebacker).
3-4 OLB 1: Jason Taylor.
3-4 OLB 2: DeMarcus Ware. You could make a good case for Joey Porter in the #2 spot; certainly he accomplished more in the 00’s, playing twice as many seasons and winning a Super Bowl in the process. However, my thinking is that each of Ware’s 5 seasons seem as good as the best Porter seasons ('08 likely excepted), and better than his “average” seasons. So I’m going with Ware. I don’t see a reasonable 4th option – Harrison: short peak; Merriman: injuries and steroids (or at least getting caught with steroids).
ILB 1: Ray Lewis.
ILB 2: Brian Urlacher. Yawn, too obvious. And I’m just not going to go searching for excellent ILBs who played specifically in the 3-4, as their roles are only marginably different than 4-3 ILBs. Besides, Baltimore has played a sort of hybrid 3-4 for a few years, so Lewis qualifies a little bit.
CB 1: Champ Bailey.
CB 2: Ronde Barber.
CB 3: Nnamdi Asomugha. Yes, I have a nickel back. It’s a modern offensive environment, he’l be on the field at least half the time, probably. Anyway, Bailey is pretty obvious. I go with Barber #2 because of his key role in the best defense of the first half of the decade, and because he was the undisputed King of Run Support; no other corner even came close in the 00’s, and probably not in the 90’s either. Finally, despite his relatively short peak (so far) Asomugha goes ahead of Ty Law, Asante Samuel, and Charles Woodson because he was the only true shut-down corner of the decade. Teams have simply not thrown the ball towards him for the past few years – Oakland’s defense plays 10 on 10. Sometimes people argue that that’s not so impressive because teams just don’t *have *to throw at him, as Oakland’s defense is otherwise so easy to beat. I’m sure there’s a degree of truth to that, but there have been plenty of good CBs on bad defenses, and ain’t none of them had the kind of results (or lack thereof) that Asomugha has had. He’s a special player.
S 1: Ed Reed.
S 2: Troy Polamalu. I was so, so close to putting Adrian Wilson ahead of Polamalu, but I had to concede that that would have been largely a message selection, there to pointedly showcase the underrated guy instead of the over-hyped superstar. They’re closer than you probably think, though. Brian Dawkins would be 4th at best, though I would grant that he’s a more interesting and important player than Wilson.
Punter: Shane Lechler.
Kicker: David Akers. Vinatierri was a very good Kicker who had the opportunity to make a few historically important FGs, and came through. David Akers never got those opportunities, but he was a better overall kicker, kickoffs being the place where he accrued most of his advantage. (There, are you happy now, Eagles fans?)
Kick Returner: Josh Cribbs.
Punt Returner: Devin Hester. Hester not returning kicks because he’s a fumble machine. He is returning punts because otherwise his margin over every other punt returner is large enough to overcome the extra fumbles.
Oh, and how crazy us it that we’r eon post #73, and I’m the first person to even mention Jason Taylor?
I was going to do them separately.
Hey, he can’t be that good. You had to play him out of position - he’s mostly played as a 4-3 end. I did overlook him unfairly, though.
He’s both, but it’s certainly not that I had to play him out of position to get him on – he’d be miles ahead of Peppers if I listed him as a DE (and *maybe *even ahead of Strahan, though probably not). If anything, it’s about 3-4 OLB being weaker overall than 4-3 DE. That is, I could wind up with either Julius Peppers or Shawn Merriman on my team depending on where I slotted Taylor, and that was a no-brainer in my book.
Fair enough, then.
Time for me to do special teams.
Long Snapper: David Binn. He, uh, snaps the ball. Long. Snaps for Nate Kaeding, the most accurate kicker in history, and Mike Scifres, arguably the best punter in the game today. Honorable mention: James Harrison. 
Kicker: Adam Viniatieri. The only place kicker of the decade who belongs in the Hall of Fame. Never had the strongest leg, and was never the most accurate, but he’s money when it counts.
Punter: Shane Lechler, Raiders. With Asomugha, the only reason the Raiders don’t go 0-16 every year.
Punt Returner: Hester would win this at a trot if he’d retired after the 2007 season… which is good, because he hasn’t done anything since.
Kick Returner: Dante Hall, the Human Joystick. How quickly we forget. I will not answer questions regarding whether I only picked him to annoy SenorBeef.
Gunner: Kassim Osgood. He’s proved he was no fluke in San Diego by instantly improving the Jaguars’ coverage teams… which is good, because the Jaguars will be punting a lot this year.