![]() ![]() ![]() Twenty concussions, total, including high school. He’d experienced some numbness after the Pittsburgh game. But Lord knows, it wouldn’t be such a bad idea. He was tired and his head hurt and his team had just been eliminated from the playoffs. to be named first-team All-Pros in the same season by a major organization. And for trivia buffs out there: Harris and Charlie Waters remain the last pair of safety teammates Even the Legion of Boom Seahawks haven’t matched this yet. Harris was a Hall of Fame caliber safety and the best player at his position from ’76 to ’78. The PFRA inducted him into their Hall of Very Good in 2011, and was a finalist in ’04 but has not yet been inducted. Z - arguably the foremost authority of his time - called Harris an almost certain Hall of Famer. Staubach, who was an obvious first ballot Hall of Famer, still had the 4th best era-adjusted passer rating of his career in his final season, and had just finished leading the NFL in ANY/A for the third year in a row.īut what about Cliff Harris? These are the sorts of gems I love about reading old articles. And he had one of the greatest final seasons among players at all positions. Staubach has a heckuva case for having the best final season of a quarterback’s career, at least based on passing statistics. But Harris, the definitive safetyman of the ’70s and an almost certain Hall of Famer, caught the Cowboys by surprise when he told them he had a good opportunity with a young and energetic oil company, and there comes a time in every man’s life… Tom Landry decided that 13 seasons was enough. Offensive Tackle Rayfield Wright, 34, and Free Safety Cliff Harris, 31, with nine years of combined All-Pro behind them, each called it a career. His announcement overshadowed two other major Cowboy retirements, each of which could have commanded a major press conference of its own. But when he retired, that total ranked 3rd among all players since 1960, behind just Fran Tarkenton (34) and Johnny Unitas (27).īut last week Staubach put an end to it, joining a very small fraternity of NFL stars who quit when they could still command a big salary-Jimmy Brown, Fran Tarkenton, Whizzer White if you want to go way back. He still ranks 7th in era-adjusted passer rating (which includes Graham’s AAFC days).ģ) The 23 times refers to his game-winning drives total, which is tied for just 39th today. And I talked about this quirky piece of trivia in July: Staubach is the only one of the 29 modern era HOF QBs who was never named a 1st-team All-Pro by a major organization at one point in their career.Ģ) Staubach did retire as the career leader in passer rating, at least if you exclude Otto Graham’s AAFC production. ![]() Brad Oremland talked about this earlier this year, when he mentioned that Staubach actually ranked 1st in four different seasons by his preferred metric. I love photos of the ’76 Cowboys, wearing a red, white, and blue helmet stripe in honor of the Bicentennial.1) Yep, Staubach was never a first-team All-Pro. Hey, what does a guy have to do?Īll of those facts are true, of course. And brought the team from behind to victory 14 times in the last two minutes or in overtime, 23 times in the fourth quarter. And you quarterbacked the Cowboys in four of their five Super Bowls, winning twice. Higher than Unitas, than Tarkenton or Jurgensen, than Tittle or Baugh. Now that’s a bad call right away, because all you did was end up as the NFL’s top-rated passer-in history, the whole 59 years. That’s we, the writers, the pickers, the guys who vote on the AP and Pro Football Writers ballots. For openers, we never picked you All-Pro. So long, Roger, we gave you a bum deal, kid. I recommend you read the whole article first. Z in April 1980, and it covers the retirement of Roger Staubach. So I’m introducing a new feature at Football Perspective: reviews of historical articles. As much time as I spend working on era-based adjustments, you can’t beat reading about a player in (his) real time. I love reading old articles, and reading old articles about football history is a particular passion of mine. ![]()
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