I still stand by my choice: Bob Griese. Of all the quarterbacks I’ve seen and watched, and I’ve seen them all since 1971, Griese is the least great of the HOF QBs.
But let’s look at a couple of other lists. Not my lists, they’re from SI and NFL Network.
In 2010, NFL Network’s The Top 100: NFL’s Greatest Players. The HOF QBs on this list were: #4. Montana, Joe #6. Unitas, Johnny #8. Manning, Peyton #14. Baugh, Sammy #16. Graham, Otto #20. Favre, Brett #23. Elway, John #25. Marino, Dan #33. Luckman, Sid #46. Staubach, Roger #50. Bradshaw, Terry #51. Starr, Bart #80. Aikman, Troy #81. Young, Steve #83. Van Brocklin, Norm #90. Warner, Kurt #91. Tarkenton, Fran #100. Namath, Joe
There are eight (8) HOF QBs who played 1971 and later and are not on either of these lists:
George Blanda (Also PK) 1949-1958, 1960-1975
Len Dawson 1957-1975
Dan Fouts 1973-1987
Bob Griese 1967-1980
Sonny Jurgensen 1957-1974
Jim Kelly 1986-1996
Warren Moon 1984-2000
Ken Stabler 1970-1984
And of these 8 HOF QBs, who is the worst? Griese is right there. If not the absolute worst, he’s among the worst three (the other two being Dawson and Blanda).
Actually, I’m just disagreeing with your nominations, in particular. (And, I apologize if I’m coming across as argumentative.)
My vote is either Namath or Blanda, leaning towards Namath.
As I noted in post 15, Namath is almost undoubtedly in the Hall for one game, as well as providing “legitimacy” to the AFL, and for being a rock-star celebrity in New York. His stats were never great, and injuries undoubtedly impacted his skills after around '68 or '69.
Blanda is likely in the Hall due to his longevity, his late-career heroics as a backup quarterback with the Raiders, and for being one of the early stars of the wide-open AFL (but, man, he threw a lot of interceptions then).
Joe Namath was far and away, leaps and bounds, a better QB than Bob Griese. It’s not even close. Namath was a prolific passer, great arm, fine runner too before the knee injuries caught up to him. Griese was efficient and poised, but mostly a game manager. Namath was a passer, he was quarterback.
It’s important to note that Super Bowl III is not a Namath showpiece. On offense, the Jets beat the heavily favored Colts mainly because of a line mismatch and they exploited that with RBs Matt Snell and Emerson Boozer. In Super Bowl III, Namath was more a game manager in the mold of a Bob Griese, because that’s what the Jets needed to do to beat the heavily favored Colts. Broadway Joe made headlines because of his bold pre-game prediction, and he made that prediction because of that line mismatch. He knew they could control the ball.
Super Bowl trivia bit: The Jets remain the only winning Super Bowl team to score only one touchdown (by RB Matt Snell).
Another Super Bowl trivia bit: The Dolphins remain the only team to never score a touchdown in a Super Bowl game (Super Bowl VI, losing to Dallas 24-3).
Namath had a fantastic arm, an incredibly quick release, and he led the Jets to victories with his passing. The Dolphins won because of their running game, and not because of Griese’s passing. Namath was a quarterback. Griese was a game manager.
Namath is on The Top 100: NFL’s Greatest Players, the 2010 list of greatest players of all time. Griese is not.
In the Dolphins’ undefeated 1972 season, Earl Morrall started and won more games than Bob Griese did. Morrall started 11 of the 17 games that season. Griese only started 6. Griese broke his ankle in Week 5, and recovered and was able to play in the final regular season game. But Morrall continued to start in two playoff games. Griese, finally, started in the Super Bowl (Super Bowl VII).
Hands down, Joe Namath was a far better quarterback than Bob Griese. It’s not even close.
You know what, I could be convinced that Namath was better than Griese. I wasn’t around to really see either one of them, but from looking at stats, yeah Griese has a slightly better comp% and better TD/INT ratio. But it looks like he just didn’t throw the ball very much at all.
Namath led the league in Y/G 3 times and Griese averaged 155 Y/G over his career. That’s pretty low.
Slightly better in the same sens that I am slightly shorter than Karl Anthony-Towns, yes.
I mean, I can’t let this go without at least presenting the opposing view (I disagree with someone on the Internet! Sound the alarms!). In my view, Bob Griese was much, much better than Joe Namath, to the same order of magnitude that Drew Brees is better than Joe Flacco.
First of all, I’m not sure where the narrative, offered by Bullit upthread - that Joe Namath was a “fine runner” - comes from. In his entire 13-year career, Joe Namath ran for 140 yards. That’s significantly fewer rushing yards than Bob Griese… had in 1968. Namath’s most prolific year as a runner was 1966, where had 1 carry for 39 yards and five more for a total of 3. Bob Griese was not a “running QB” or anything like that, but he was far more effective as a runner than Namath.
Yeah, Namath had a huge arm and a quick release - the one place where Namath really stands out is that he took very few sacks throughout his career. But maybe he should have taken a few more sacks, because a very distressing percentage of the time he was using that big arm to throw the ball to the other team. It was bad but manageable for the first half of his career, but after 1970 his knees were shot and he put up graphically bad interception numbers. He was also a fumble machine. In his career, he was tackled 180 times (71 rushing attempts and 109 sacks) and is credited with 33 fumbles - which means he fumbled 18.3% of the times he was tackled. Griese, by contrast, was hit 528 times and fumbled only 52 times, a percentage of 9.8%. Add it all together, and Namath was giving the ball up to the other team a lot.
Griese was awesome. He was pretty routinely putting up completion percentages ~60% at a time when other guys just weren’t doing that, at all (with the exception of a couple of really special guys like Ken Anderson or Fran Tarkenton). And it’s not like he was a dink-and-dunk passer - on the conservative side, yes, but almost always right around league average in yards per completion (and some years much higher!). I’m not sure where you get the idea that Griese didn’t pass very often; for his career he threw the ball around 300 times fewer than Namath. Figuring in the rushing attempts and sacks, that means that Namath and Griese actually dropped back to pass about the same number of times in their careers… it’s just that Griese was smart enough to take a sack or take off running instead of forcing the ball to a cornerback or linebacker. He threw for touchdowns at a much higher percentage, too; he led the league in that category twice!
Griese was an All-Pro twice (Namath once), made 8 Pro Bowls (Namath made 5), and won 2 Super Bowls (Namath one). He also started more than 20 games more than Namath - and when judging two guys against each other, longevity counts! And, obviously, Namath’s career record as a starter isn’t even in the same league as Griese’s, although I acknowledge there are complicating factors there.
And, of course, Bob Griese never got wasted and drooled all over Suzy Kolber on live television.
I close with this, from Bullit, which I actually think is the most definitive evidence that Bob Griese was a better quarterback than Joe Namath:
I agree with this paragraph. But if you think about it, what it’s actually saying is that the one time Joe Namath looked less like Joe Namath and more like Bob Griese is the one time Joe Namath won the Super Bowl.
I hate to argue in favor of Namath, because I probably still would vote for him as the worst QB in the HOF. But, I would acknowledge that Griese is closer than I thought at first glance.
Their comp% are Namath 50.1% (abysmal) and Griese 56.2% (eh, ok). Both guys’ comp% are outside the top 100 all time, and I know that is skewed by today’s passing game. I believe Stabler has the highest comp% for a guy whose career ended in the 80s or earlier and he’s 44th.
Namath averaged almost 27 passes per game, Greise averaged almost 23. And Griese’s 155 yards/game is quite low, even for guys of his era. So that’s why I said it doesn’t seem he threw much.
As a Steelers fan, I’m going to be banished from Pittsburgh forever for saying this, but I go with Bradshaw. He was a very solidly above average quarterback and lead the team to four Superbowls, but he was HOF material. He made plays when it counted, but again, just simply very above average and not one of the all time greats.
I hope there are no roadblocks at the Ft. Pitt Tunnel looking for me.
That sentence makes everything in your post not worth reading.
Y’know why?
Because it’s BULLSHIT.
Richard Caster SUCKED and NO ONE thinks he was invention of the modern tight end as a passing weapon, whatever the hell that means.
Caster made 3 second team All pro and 2 first team.
Now you want to talk about the actual qb and tight end who invented the modern tight end as a passing weapon whatever the hell that means, you go to Baltimore with Johnny Unitas and John Mackey.
Not a Steelers fan here. Disagree. Bradshaw could pass effectively, and deep. He stretched the field. Lynn Swann and John Stallworth didn’t get into the Hall of Fame by themselves, they needed a quarterback to get them there.
The Vikings had the Purple People Eaters, Carl Eller, Alan Page, Jim Marshall and Gary Larson, who along with the Steel Curtain and the Doomsday Defense were probably the best group of pass rushers in the NFL.
So naturally according to you, the Dolphins game plan should have been to drop back and throw the ball a bazzillion times because that would prove what a “real man” Griese was, that he was a FOOBAW!!! player and not some mamby pamby game manager.
And if they had done that the Dolphins probably would have lost badly.
But Shula and Griese and the Dolphins didn’t do that, instead they went with their running game, which at the time was the best group of rbs in the NFL, and they, mainly Csonka blew the doors off the Vikings.
Shula qb’d the Dolphins to three straight Super Bowls, winning two of them. The only qb who has equaled or done better is Jim Kelly who took the Bills to four straight, where they got their doors blown off in 3 of them.
I’m curious as what exactly is so horrific about being a ‘game manager’ as a qb? If it means you don’t throw the ball a bazzillion times a game and throw a bazzillion interceptions like Namath or Favre or Stabler or other gunslingers, but only throw the ball when you need to, give me the game manager every time.
I’m gonna have to call the PA State Police and tell them to look for a WV license plate that says UltraVires (of course if it’s on the Eastern side of PA, they probably won’t care).
Bradshaw doesn’t get enough respect. It’s true that in the early years from 1970 to say 1976, the Steelers leaned on their defense and running game. But the Steelers opened up the aerial attack in the late 70s, and Bradshaw transformed Pittsburgh’s offensive identity from that of a running team to a more balanced running and passing team. Statistically, Bradshaw wasn’t great, I agree. But there are some important things that don’t appear on the stat sheet. His confidence, his ability to make big plays at the right time, against the best defenses…was legendary.
(of course if it’s on the Eastern side of PA, they probably won’t care).