Brady vs Starr

[pbmax]

When we talk about bests of all times, I think of athletes who delivered in important situations when opponents knew that the key to stop their teams was to stop them. Brady does not compare to Starr in that regard, or to Montana.

That's a fair point, and you are right, with more data on Brady as the focal point of the offense, his career looks different now than it did after the 3rd Super Bowl win.

But I wonder if Starr had an advantage over Brady in what he was asked to do? Going just from memory (of pro football reference, not old enough to remember them playing), Lombardi stuck to his run first principles throughout his tenure, even as that run game wore down and became less effective either because of opponent adjustments (Landry's flex defense) or players getting old (Hornung). Was Starr more effective because he was not called up to be the offense until late in close games (or when behind)?

Did Starr resemble early career Elway in that his coach was not interested in putting the game on his back until he had no choice? I know this is not apples to apples as Reeves was calling plays for his QB and Starr was calling his own. But did he benefit from any surprise effect when they had to throw? Or was he considered the primary threat during those last 3 championships?

I suppose his MVP award might answer that question, but did teams ever stop planning for the Green Bay running game first?

[Patler]

That's a fair point, and you are right, with more data on Brady as the focal point of the offense, his career looks different now than it did after the 3rd Super Bowl win.

But I wonder if Starr had an advantage over Brady in what he was asked to do? Going just from memory (of pro football reference, not old enough to remember them playing), Lombardi stuck to his run first principles throughout his tenure, even as that run game wore down and became less effective either because of opponent adjustments (Landry's flex defense) or players getting old (Hornung). Was Starr more effective because he was not called up to be the offense until late in close games (or when behind)?

Did Starr resemble early career Elway in that his coach was not interested in putting the game on his back until he had no choice? I know this is not apples to apples as Reeves was calling plays for his QB and Starr was calling his own. But did he benefit from any surprise effect when they had to throw? Or was he considered the primary threat during those last 3 championships?

I suppose his MVP award might answer that question, but did teams ever stop planning for the Green Bay running game first?

Well, most every team had a run first mentality in those days, but actual productivity was another matter.

Consider this: For the five years from 1960 to 1964, the Packer running game gained no less than 2150 yards in any season. Remember too, that these were 14 game seasons, not 16, so they were gaining better than 150 yards/game running the ball and had more running yards than passing yards. That changed dramatically in 1965. In '65 and '66 they gained 1488 & 1673. In 1967 there was a resurgence of sorts with 1915 yards, but no one ball carrier had even 500 yards for the season. If anything, the running game in 1967 may have benefited from teams playing to stop Starr, because from '65 on, the offense went as Starr went, for the most part.

SI had a great article during that time frame, outlining how the Packer offense had changed from one driven by the run, with passing as a diversion, to one that revolved around Starr. More than anything else, that article opened up the eyes of many fans to appreciate what Starr really meant to the Packers

[pbmax]

SI had a great article during that time frame, outlining how the Packer offense had changed from one driven by the run, with passing as a diversion, to one that revolved around Starr. More than anything else, that article opened up the eyes of many fans to appreciate what Starr really meant to the Packers

If you can give me a time frame, or the cover, we can find the article in the SI Vault.

[Patler]

If you can give me a time frame, or the cover, we can find the article in the SI Vault.

I would try '67 first, then '68, followed by '66.

[Pugger]

Let us know if you find it pbmax. If you do I'll go look at it too.

[Upnorth]

Heres something

http://sportsillustrated.cnn.com/vault/article/magazine/MAG1080318/index.htm

[Upnorth]

and this

http://sportsillustrated.cnn.com/vault/article/magazine/MAG1079211/index.htm

[pbmax]

Heres something
http://sportsillustrated.cnn.com/vau...0318/index.htm

Well, I suggest the next time any Packer Rat gets guff about claiming Starr as one of the greatest QBs of all time, they refer to the fact that during the 1967 season, none other than Sid Gilliam, father of the modern passing game (along with Paul Brown) said that Starr had surpassed Unitas as the top passer in the League.

Good find Upnorth, I hadn't even gotten that far.

[Upnorth]

Well, I suggest the next time any Packer Rat gets guff about claiming Starr as one of the greatest QBs of all time, they refer to the fact that during the 1967 season, none other than Sid Gilliam, father of the modern passing game (along with Paul Brown) said that Starr had surpassed Unitas as the top passer in the League.

Good find Upnorth, I hadn't even gotten that far.

Thank you. I was on hold with an investment company which I hate. A client is transferring from them too me so I got to do two great things. Take money from those who treat their clients poorly and read about the Lombardi packers. That is win win I tell ya!

[mmmdk]

There's a Danish rock band called 'I Got You on Tape' and it always make me think of Hoody!

[Patler]

Well, I suggest the next time any Packer Rat gets guff about claiming Starr as one of the greatest QBs of all time, they refer to the fact that during the 1967 season, none other than Sid Gilliam, father of the modern passing game (along with Paul Brown) said that Starr had surpassed Unitas as the top passer in the League.

Good find Upnorth, I hadn't even gotten that far.

I tend to forget about the SI Vault as a source for corroboration of the stories some of us old guys tell. I have sensed some people rolling their eyes when I have argued for years that Starr was truly someone special in his playing days.

[pbmax]

I am perplexed that SI's Vault, one would think a very valuable resource, languishes in many ways on SI's site. Each issue, including current ones are scanned in manually and you can read the fun OCR errors in a lot of the text.

Their photo vault gets a more loving treatment and they have a curator for it with a Twitter account that sends out regular reminders of what is there (I would hope Life and Time do the same thing).

It should really get more play because SI has had some fabulous sports writers. There are many literary types (Updike, Wolfe and Foster Wallace) that have done sublime work for newspapers, but for long form magazine pieces, SI leads the way (or led, anyway).

One of the first things they should fix is the search feature which is next to useless. Makes PackerRats seem user friendly (hi Mad!). If you don't know a specific time frame or words in the story, good luck. I went searching for something by Rick Reilly once and could not find it under his name and had to literally look through each issue, Table of Contents by TOC, until I found it. Some items in those electronic editions don't seem indexed.

[Pugger]

Heres something
http://sportsillustrated.cnn.com/vau...0318/index.htm

The Lombardi Packers are not the first team to win 3 consecutive NFL championships.

[Upnorth]

Pugger, nice catch. the writer probably didn't want the rest of the league to feel shame.