The selections should be limited to one player. Joe Namath helped build the NFL. I never saw him play in his Prime but no other Jets player even comes close. Joe Namath transcended the sport.
I have one MAJOR problem with Curtis Martin being considered the greatest Jet. He was drafted by and played for the New England Patriots 3 full years, over 25% of his career. He was the AFC offensive rookie of the year and went to the Pro Bowl as a Patriot. His greatest "run" was also as a Patriot, a 70 yarder. SO, Parcells puts together a brilliant contract offer (working with Tannenbaum) to "steal" him away from the Patriots and he becomes an adopted Jet. Its almost like asking a mother who is her favorite son, the adopted one (Martin) or the one she conceived (as the Jets did in drafting Namath to be the face of their franchise).
Joe only had 2 seasons where he threw more TD's than Ints. For his career he has 173 TD and 220 INT. He was a career 50.1% passer. I would hope that our greatest player of all time would at least be able to put up better stats than Vinny T.
I voted for Curtis, but Wayne Chrebet is a close second. He is only behind Don Maynard on the all-time team list with 580 receptions (meaning ahead of Toon) and third with 7,365 yards. His 41 career touchdowns rank eighth. The Jets could always go to him when they absolutely needed to convert on third down: 379 of his career receptions went for first downs. He played through numerous concussions. His most impressive catch might have been his last. He made a diving catch against San Diego in 2005, and proceeded to land on his head. But despite being knocked cold, he maintained possession of the ball. Other than Curtis, who as a JET has shown more heart and guts? Wayne is pure JETS and more than deserves to be on the list.
I voted curtis, but im too young to have seen the others play minus chrebet and mawae. edit: whers benny graham?
The ONLY reason the Jets have ANY prestige in the league is because they won the Super Bowl in January of 1970. Joe Namath was the man....Curtis, as beautiful a human being he is, NEVER raised the Jets to any level. Joe Namath got the JETS invited to the WHITE HOUSE and on the national conscious as a SUPER underdog that refused to relinquish on somebody elses reputation. If you were not into sports in 1969 you cannot understand how Namath and the Jets became a national story.
Even my freaking mother...who I have inheritance issues with......who is 92 years old...if you ask her who Joe Namath is.....will tell you was the quarterback of the Jets when they won the world championship.....
Namath was the face of our Championship Team of course, and the benefactor of the Guarantee, but am I crazy for thinking people give him too much credit for Superbowl III? He was a pretty efficient 17/28 passing for 206 (0 TDs, 10 FDs). Well and good. A Pennington-like game that doesn't lose the game for you, but definitely won't always win it. We also had 142 on the ground. Moreso than anything else, defense won us Superbowl III. Unitas and Morrall were picked off four times and were 17/41 passing, horrible games from great QBs. Regardless of whether I have seen him play live or not. I will continue to think Broadway Joe is overrated. I thank him for being the leader of the team that gave us our only championship to date, but his behavior built his reputation more than his performance. And as for the passing-in-the-time-period argument, Unitas trumps Namath in every passing area.. significantly in some. Completion percentage: Unitas +4.5% Yards per attempt: Unitas +.4 TD/INT Ratio: Unitas: 1.45:1 - Namath .79:1 TDs per game: Unitas: 1.44 - Namath 1.29
OFFICIAL NOTICE: Anyone not voting for Joe Namath, especially those with lame excuses such as "I'm too young to have seen him," are hereby disqualified from voting in this poll. Please proceed to the back of the line and participate when you're old enough to vote. Thank you. THE MANAGEMENT
I am definitely not getting into the whole argument once again about whether Namath was great or not - I've contributed my fair share to that, and I don't feel like repeating it again. We oldtimers simply need to accept that unless you saw him play, it is impossible to truly understand just how good he was. You can probably tell from my avatar that Maynard was my favorite player, but I'd be willing to put $100 down right now that he'd pick Namath. Namath will always suffer from having a shortened, injury-plagued career. This goes back to the whole peak value versus career value argument. If you look at career value, Martin and Maynard seem to stand out, but to me when you say "greatest Jet," career value is not what counts most. This is precisely the reason why Pete Rose is not in the conversation for greatest Cincinnati Red ever - remarkably consistent over a very long period of time, but often not the best player on his team, and virtually never the best player in the league at his position. As I said in the other thread, until the Jets win the Super Bowl again and are led by a superstar, IMO Namath is the choice, period. As to the comparison with Johnny Unitas - well, since Johnny U was probably the greatest quarterback who ever lived, the fact that Namath doesn't match up to him is hardly an argument that he wasn't a great player.
You need to consider the era in which Namath played. league passer rating during Namath's career: 1965 (AFL)- 58.0 1966 (AFL)- 63.0 1967 (AFL)- 61.6 1968 (AFL)- 62.6 1969 (AFL)- 64.5 1970- 65.6 1971- 62.2 1972- 66.3 1973- 64.9 1974- 64.2 1975- 65.8 1976- 67.0 1977- 61.2 Compare those numbers to recent numbers- 2000- 78.1 2001- 78.5 2002- 80.4 2003- 78.3 2004- 82.8 2005- 80.1 Check out the touchdowns to interceptions ratios: 1965 (AFL)- 163/203 1966 (AFL)- 199/217 1967 (AFL)- 190/227 1968 (AFL)- 189/227 1969 (AFL)- 194/233 1970- 427/510 1971- 289/544 (Oilers games: 23/60) 1972- 404/480 1973- 378/470 1974- 376/500 1975- 433/533 1976- 432/497 1977- 388/562 (Buccaneers games: 13/53) Compare those numbers to the 2005 numbers- 2005- 644/506
