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My Top 5 Performers *
1. Rich Gannon,
Raiders
2. Priest Holmes,
Chiefs
3. Brett Favre,
Packers
4. Jeff Garcia,
49ers
5. Aeneas Williams,
Rams
* with four weeks to go in the NFL
season
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Overrated
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Tennessee Titans
I thought I'd seen everything until, in Week 13 this year, I saw a Jeff Fisher
defense get steamrolled. No impact from Jevon Kearse. Coverage like a sieve. No
linebacker play. The Titans gave up 42 to a team led by a backup quarterback
from St. Cloud State making his first NFL start. Now, I knew Tennessee would
struggle a bit this year because Eddie George wasn't entering the season healthy
with his reconstructed big toe. But to be out of the playoff hunt, essentially,
by Thanksgiving, was beyond everyone's expectations, and to have a defense
inferior to Jacksonville and Cincinnati in the AFC Central is, well,
ludicrous.
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Underrated
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Priest Holmes, Kansas City Chiefs
After he took over the NFL rushing lead in mid-December, you could hear much
gnashing of teeth back in Baltimore. The Ravens, after all, let Holmes go in a
cap crunch, thinking they were set at running back with Jamal Lewis. Then they
lost Lewis to a summertime knee injury. Holmes spent the season putting up
better numbers with the Chiefs than Lewis likely would have accumulated with the
Ravens. Heading down the stretch of the season, Holmes was leading all backs in
rushing-receiving yards, and the only reason more of America didn't know this
was that the Chiefs were so lousy. Combining surprising shiftiness with a power
running style and good hands, Holmes became a poor man's Marshall Faulk -- and
even put up better numbers than the Rams'
superstar.
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Annoying
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Randy Moss, Minnesota Vikings
He chafes at having his work ethic questioned,
chafes at dealing with the press -- though it's part of the $75 million contract
that he's supposed to be honoring -- chafes at suggestions (facts, actually)
that he doesn't play hard on every down, chafes at taking sideline lip from
mentor Cris Carter. He is the Rickey Henderson of football. If, like Rickey, he
wasn't such an unparalleled talent, he'd be easy to ignore. But he is truly one
of the great players of our day. I just wish he'd take some lessons from the
classy players of our time, on and off the
field.
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Breakthrough
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Tom Brady, New England Patriots
He was passed over for the starting QB job at
Michigan twice by Brian Griese -- and when he finally won it, had to split time
down the stretch with Drew Henson. He lasted until the sixth round of the 2000
draft. And so what happens when Drew Bledsoe, the Franchise in New England, gets
knocked silly in Week 2? Brady takes the reins, goes 9-3 with a better
completion percentage than Bledsoe ever put up -- 65 percent -- to stake a claim
on a starting job, somewhere, in
2002.
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Uplifting
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Jerry Rice, Oakland Raiders
I'm at Raiders camp in Napa, Calif. one July
morning around 7:45. Practice is at 8:45. I look out on the practice field.
There's a solitary player near the end zone, running and stopping, running and
stopping, toweling himself off when he has to. "I just wish,'' quarterback
Rich Gannon told me later, "the young players had been out there to see
that. What Jerry does is what makes players great.'' The 49ers wanted to put
Rice out to pasture, as did most every football mind in the game. Retire, they
all said. No, Rice said. I can still do it. When a guy has 65 catches and nine
touchdowns through 14 weeks, you know Rice was
right.
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MVP
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Rich Gannon, Oakland Raiders
Around Thanksgiving, I was doing some research on
what a great run Gannon was having with the Raiders. Since the start of last
year, Oakland had gone 19-6 with Gannon under center, plus he had one of the
great year-and-a-half touchdown-to-interception ratios I'd ever seen: 43-to-13.
And what a leader. As much as other quarterbacks matter -- and there are none
who mean more to their teams, including Gannon, than Kurt Warner and Brett Favre
-- no great player played better, and in such a clutch way, week in and week out
this season than the steely
Raider.
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Storyline to follow in 2002
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Here come the Texans
The NFL's 32nd franchise comes to life in February with
the expansion draft, in March with free-agent raids on established teams, in
April with the draft, in July with training camp, and in September with the
first game in club history. Best guesses: Look for GM Charley Casserly to settle
on Fresno State quarterback David Carr as the team's first draft pick. Look for
the franchise to overpay to build an offensive line first. And look for
patience. Lots of it. After all, the Browns were 5-27 in their first two years
after their resurrection. All the same, owner Bob McNair says he expects the
Texans to be competitive by Year
3.
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