We’re into the throes of the offseason, folks, and we’re still about two months away from the start of training camp, so a lot of what we’re going to be talking about between now and then has to do with what other people are saying about the Minnesota Vikings. To that end, we’ve found one recent entry from a prominent analysis site that’s a bit of a head-scratcher.
Pro Football Focus has put together their “All-PFF” team, which they label as “The NFL’s Best Players of the Past 25 years.” If I were to tell you that only one member of the Minnesota Vikings had been named to the team, even as an Honorable Mention, who would you assume it was?
Adrian Peterson? Nope.
Jared Allen? Sorry.
Harrison Smith? Try again.
Well, surely it’s Randy Moss, right? No, it isn’t him, either.
The only Viking who made a team comprised of the best NFL players of the past quarter century is. . .Antoine Winfield.
Winfield’s NFL career began in 1999, though even his seven remaining seasons in the PFF era yielded one of the best career marks of all time. He was among the 10 highest-graded players for his position in five out of seven years, and the top-graded player at his position three times between 2006 and when he retired in 2012.
While Winfield owns a top-10 PFF coverage grade all time (92.3), where he’s unique on this list of cornerbacks is that he also owns the best PFF run-defense grade (94.7) out of 355 qualifiers at the position since 2006. Winfield’s 107 run defense stops are tied for the second most of all time among cornerbacks, while his 2.47-yard average depth of tackle against the run ranks as the best mark among 137 qualifiers since 2006.
I’m as big a Winfield fan as you’ll find, and it’s nice to see him get some recognition on a team like this. However, the team as a whole is a pretty solid example of why this sort of analysis is a little tough to understand at times.
I’m going to focus on Moss’ exclusion here because. . .well, because it’s ridiculous. Randy Moss was a first-ballot Hall of Famer. That alone gets him on a list of the best players of the past quarter century, or at least it should. However, because this is based on PFF grades, he doesn’t make the cut. Heck, he doesn’t even get an Honorable Mention.
The three wide receivers who did make the cut were Julio Jones, Antonio Brown, and Tyreek Hill, with Calvin Johnson getting the Honorable Mention spot. First off, Calvin Johnson was/is better than the three guys who made the team, and Moss was/is above him on the hierarchy, so we’re already into weird territory here. I’m not saying that Jones, Brown, and Hill aren’t great wide receivers, or weren’t in their time. But none of those three guys are on Randy Moss’ level.
As we usually say when we cite Pro Football Focus for stuff, a lot of their numbers are guidance, not gospel. No matter what grading system you use, if Randy Moss isn’t on your short list of the best wide receivers of the past 25 years, your system probably needs to be revisited.