Ward vs. the Seahawks

There are plenty of football fans in the office, two Steelers, two Seahawks, a Vikings, a Broncos, a Dolphins, a Chiefs, a Cowboys, a Chargers, and a whole bunch of Panthers fans. It is pretty good environment, no real rivals and very few AFC teams. I don’t really dislike the Seahawks despite having to go through them to win a Super Bowl but the two Seahawks fans can make it quite difficult. They are beyond cocky about their team and almost no one else in the office is, almost everyone realizes most people just want to enjoy football.

The Seahawks fans have spent the week complaining about the lack of Shaun and Hasselbeck. Sure it sucks to be without your two best skill position players but recent memory in our team isn’t going to cut them any slack. The Vikings lost their starting QB last year for the season, the Steelers lost theirs for four games last year and at least one this year, in addition to starting their 3rd HB for most of the year.

The topic of WR came up and it was brought up that a backup QB will really expose a bunch of mid-tier WRs, like what the Seahawks have. Well the Seahawks fan quickly defended that Darrell Jackson and Deion Branch were not mid-tier WRs, they were true #1 WRs. I wasn’t really going to argue, I couldn’t much, those two are pretty good WRs. Then as a continuation of the same service we went around the teams picking the good WRs, the #1s if you will. We get to the Steelers and I saw they have a #1 (Ward), two #2.5s (Wilson and Washington), and a potential #1 (Holmes, although not with punt returns). The Seahawks fan quickly counters that four time Pro Bowler, #1 on the Steelers all time receiving chart, Super Bowl MVP, Hines Ward is not a very good WR, especially not a #1. He continues to go on about how Ward has never put up very good numbers and only recently got good PR because he had one good game in the Super Bowl. Huh, did I just feel the gloves slapping me across the face? You’re going to spend time defending Darrell “I drop the ball even when it hits me in the numbers” Jackson and Deion “I’ve never had 1000 yards receiving” Branch and then quickly jump all over Hines? I will grant you Hines started slow and he isn’t fricking Jerry Rice but come on. Typical of the two Seahawks fans we have in the office, quick to offer their opinion without any real facts.

Let’s compare Jackson, Branch, and Ward. It is a little difficult obviously. They play in different systems, different leagues, and have had different lengths of their careers. But I will just put the raw numbers up and let you decide.

Deion Branch, 2002-2006
Played mainly with the Patriots up until this year
Led his team in receiving yards twice
Career Numbers, 228 receptions, 2960 receiving yards, 16 TDs
Top year, 78 receptions, 998 yards, 5 TDs
Years with 1000 receiving yards or more - 0
Top four years for receptions, 78, 57, 42, 35
Years with 10 Tds or more – 0
Super Bowl MVP

Darrell Jackson, 2000-2006
Seattle Seahawks
Led his team in receiving yards four times
Career Numbers, 411 receptions, 6012 yards, 42 TDs
Top year, 87 receptions, 1199 yards, 7 TDs
Years with 1000 receiving yards or more - 3
Top four years for receptions, 87, 70, 68, 62
Years with 10TDs or more - 0

Hines Ward, 1998-2006
Pittsburgh Steelers
Led his team in receiving yards six times
Career Numbers, 600 receptions, 7408 yards, 57 TDs
Top year, 112 receptions, 1329 yards, 12 TDs
Years with 1000 receiving yards or more - 6
Top four years for receptions, 112, 95, 94, 80
Years with 10TDs or more - 3
Super Bowl MVP
13th Best Season in terms of number of receptions

I think Ward stacks up pretty well. Ward has played two more years than Jackson and four more years than Branch so the career numbers can be misleading, even though Ward was a special teams player in year one and the #3 WR in year two. If you add two of Jackson’s best year (87, 1199, 7) and four of Branch’s best year (78, 998, 5), making all players have the same length career here is what they look like.

Receptions Yards TDs
Ward 600 7408 57
Jackson 585 8410 56
Branch 540 6952 36

The above numbers are of course junk also, who knows if Jackson or Branch will repeat their career highs, much less for a quarter or half of their careers respectively. Hell they could even get better. It does pretty clearly illustrate that Hines might not be Jerry Rice he at least stacks up well to the top two Seattle WRs. I guess the moral of the story is don’t rip one of my favorite players without being able to back it up.