Month: February 2021

Pistol Pete Maravich’s Play Amongst The Greatest

When thinking of sporting records that will never be broken, there are a few that come to mind instantly. Usain Bolt running a 9.58-second 100-meter dash would be one of those. Wilt Chamberlain dropping 100 points in an NBA game would be another. Cal Ripken Jr. playing in 2,632 consecutive games – a streak that began in 1982 and lasted until 1998 – would be a third. The general population should have some idea about these well-known records.

However, one premier player feels like he may not get his due when it comes to his legendary achievement. That player is ‘Pistol’ Pete Maravich, and his record is his insane scoring average as a college basketball player in the late 1960s.

The second-highest scorer in the history of D1 Men’s Basketball is Freeman Williams. Williams played for Portland State from the 1974-75 season through til the 1977-78 season. In this time, Williams accounted for 3,249 points, and he maintained a scoring average of over 30 points per game in his final three seasons at the school. It is a stunningly impressive number – until you look at what Maravich did at LSU.

‘Pistol’ Pete went for 3,667 points with the Tigers. This is a total of over 400 points more than Williams, or the equivalent of 13 or 14 more games, with Williams scoring at his over 30 point average. If that isn’t crazy enough, Maravich put up his 3,667 points as a premier player from the 1967-68 season through the 1969-70 season. That means that Maravich scored more points than anyone in the history of the sport, even though he was only able to play for three years because, at the time, first-year players had to play on the freshman team at their school and weren’t eligible for varsity play.

Maravich’s averages were as follows:

  • 1967-68 – 43.8 ppg
  • 1968-69 – 44.2 ppg
  • 1969-70 – 44.5 ppg

Maravich never had a single collegiate season where he averaged under 43.8 POINTS PER GAME. Adding to the insanity of this accomplishment is that Maravich played when there was no three-point line. He also played when there was no shot clock so opposing teams could kill the ball in games as and when they wanted. In other words, his scores were kept lower by the rules in place at the time. Given his shooting stroke and with more possessions per contest – plus an extra year of varsity eligibility – it isn’t unreasonable to think that Maravich could have scored over 5,000 points with a different set of rules in place. Former LSU coach Dale Brown once charted every shot ‘Pistol’ Pete made at LSU and said his career average would have been a video game level 57 points per game if the three-point line was drawn in.

Some of Maravich’s game totals were absurd too. He scored at least 60 points in a game four times – against Vanderbilt (61), Kentucky (64), Tulane (66), and Alabama (69) – with no other player ever having more than two such games against other D1 opponents. His score of 69 points as a senior against Alabama is the second-most in history behind Kevin Bradshaw, who scored 72 points for U.S. International against Loyola Marymount in 1991.

Maravich was one of the youngest ever inductees into the Naismith Memorial Basketball Hall of Fame. Part of this is due to a knee injury that saw him play just 658 games in 10 NBA seasons, but even in that time – and constantly battling with the knee problem – he became a five-time NBA All-Star and was the NBA scoring champion in 1977 when he averaged 31.1 points per game. A fascinating snapshot of what this premier player could have been comes from the NBA installing the three-point line in Maravich’s final injury-ravaged season. He was able to take just 15 shots from behind the arc, but he hit 10 of them, meaning he had a career three-point percentage of 66.7%.

Perhaps the best creative player in the game’s history, Maravich passed away at just 40-years-old in 1988. This means that the legend didn’t make it to the age of the internet and social media – where it is easy to be remembered – but this premier player and his sheer ability to score the basketball was on par with anyone to ever play the game.

Article By Premier Players

Fans Add Another Title
To Mahomes’ 2020 Season

Kansas City Chiefs’ quarterback Patrick Mahomes got the nod from fans that he is The 2020 Premier Player of Pro Football.

There aren’t too many superlatives that we can give to Mahomes that haven’t already been said. He was the NFL MVP in 2018. He was the MVP of Super Bowl LIV as he led the Chiefs to their first Super Bowl title in 50 years. He is a one-time first-team All-Pro, a one- time- second-team All-Pro, and a three-time Pro Bowler. Oh – and least we forget – Mahomes will still be just 25-years-old at the beginning of the 2021 NFL Season. To say there is more to come is almost moot at this point.

Mahomes’ numbers in 2020 were once again outstanding. They were below his 2018 numbers – but that was an all-timer of a season that saw over 5,000 passing yards and 50 touchdowns passed which is the sort of stat line that a player can even dream to reach once in a career. This fall, Mahomes passed for 4,740 yards, 38 touchdowns, and six interceptions. Those numbers are outstanding despite Mahomes sitting in the final contest with the Chiefs already having wrapped up the top seed in the AFC. He also rushed for a career high 308 yards and another two touchdowns. Interestingly, his completion percentage of 66.3% – completing 390 of 588 passes – was the best of his career so far.

Mahomes has the advantage of having Travis Kelce at tight end – the best pass catching player at that position that the NFL has ever seen – and Tyreek Hill at wide receiver who is almost impossible to cover when he puts on the afterburners. These two outlets are ones any quarterback would want, but it is the genius of Mahomes – and his relationship with the ultra-inventive pair of head coach Andy Reid and offensive coordinator Eric Bieniemy – that makes the Chiefs the most feared offensive team in the NFL.

Mahomes plays without the benefit of a consistent running game the likes of which most other high volume passers – see Aaron Rodgers this year with Aaron jones in his backfield – rely on. Yes, he Chiefs use more motion, options, and plays that are schemed into easy completions than anyone else in the league, but it is the skill of the premier player that they have under center that allows this type of offense to be successful. Mahomes led the Chiefs to a 14-1 season – we aren’t counting the last game where he didn’t play – and the Texas Tech product continues to outperform the incredibly lofty ceiling that he has created for himself in his three years leading the Chiefs’ offensive machine.

What sets Mahomes apart are the head-scratching, miracle plays that no other quarterback in the league can pull off. The most famous of these was his no-look pass to Demarcus Robinson against the Baltimore Ravens in 2018, but Chiefs fans will know that there is at least one such play – be it a no-looker, a mad scramble followed by an impossible completion, or (as is often the case) something brand new and indescribable – each and every week. This is the stuff that energizes a fan base and – in better times – sells out stadiums. Mahomes has an aura about him, but he also has a humility that belies his skill and status to the point that he just fits as a quarterback in a hardworking, football and barbeque loving place like Kansas City.

It is not just that Mahomes wins games – which he does with a seemingly easy regularity – it is how he goes about doing it. He is a gunslinger, yet he is one who seems to have little regard for traditional mechanics as he completes almost as many passes with funky motions as expected ones. Mahomes is a transformative player, a generational talent, and now he was the Premier Player of NFL Football in 2020.

Article by Premier Players

Schottenheimer Leaves Lasting Impact On The NFL

If there is one NFL premier coach who has a legacy defined by winning in great numbers and then losing in the bigger games, then that would be Marty Schottenheimer. Schottenheimer enjoyed an astonishing 200 career wins as a head coach as he led four teams to become the eighth-winningest coach in the history of the NFL. Those four teams – the Cleveland Browns, Kansas City Chiefs, Washington Redskins, and the San Diego Chargers – combined to go 200-126-1 under the premier coach who died at the age of 77 on February 9, 2021.

You know that a coach has had an impact on the game when an entire style of play is named after him. Schottenheimer believed wholeheartedly in “Martyball”. This method of winning football games relied on a hard-nosed approach from hard-nosed players. As the league was evolving around him in the late 90s and through the 2000s, Schottenheimer continued to preach “Martyball”, building the success of his teams – and their entire roster – around an overpowering running game and a defense that would lay their bodies on the line whether it was 3rd-and-30 in the first quarter or 4th-and-one with the game on the line.

Schottenheimer – a man who lived by his mantra of “one play at a time” – could never find the success he deserved in the postseason. The coach with a career winning percentage in the regular season of 61% was never able to make his style of football work in the playoffs. Schottenheimer went 5-13 when coaching in the postseason, a career winning percentage in those games of just 28%. This included first-round playoff exits with teams such as the 13-3 Chiefs in both 1995 and 1997, along with the 14-2 Chargers in 2006.

That Chargers team – perhaps the best overall squad that Schottenheimer ever coached led by NFL MVP LaDanian Tomlinson – imploded in what was to be Schottenheimer’s final NFL game. They lost a home divisional round game 24-21 to Tom Brady (that guy again) and the New England Patriots. It was a loss – combined with the tension between Schottenheimer and general manager A.J. Smith –that saw Schottenheimer fired in a move that shocked the NFL world given the team they had put together and Schottenheimer’s obvious ability to win football games and have his team believe in his methods and his tactics.

While some of the losses may have been down to poor clock management or a stubborn belief in the power of his system, it is hard to look at this premier coach as not being a tad unlucky to have never reached a Super Bowl. He lost twice to John Elway-led Broncos teams in the AFC Championship Game while coaching the Browns in games that became known as “The Drive” and “The Fumble”. To have one game lost in a way that gives it a name that lasts down the decades is rough, to have it happen twice is downright cruel.

It is with the Chiefs that Schottenheimer is synonymous with most fans. You can lay a direct path from the work that Schottenheimer produced in Kansas City through the Dick Vermeil era and to the Andy Reid-led team that is one of the most feared in the league today.

“When Marty arrived in 1989, he reinvigorated what was then a struggling franchise and quickly turned the Chiefs into a consistent winner,” Chiefs chairman and CEO Clark Hunt said in a statement. “Marty’s teams made Chiefs football a proud part of Kansas City’s identity once again, and the team’s resurgence forged a powerful bond with a new generation of fans who created the legendary home-field advantage at Arrowhead Stadium.”

After that, it was to San Diego and another brutal playoff loss that came from a player mistake and not a coaching one. With the Chargers up by eight and with six minutes to play, Marlon McCree picked off Brady and the game should have been sealed. Instead of dropping to the turf, however, McCree was hit and fumbled with the Patriots recovering. On such small margins are playoff football games won and lost and Schottenheimer, for all his outstanding coaching, often seemed to be on the wrong side of them.

To dwell on that, though, is to diminish a career. The NFL is a better place for Schottenheimer having been involved and when premier players like Tomlinson and Drew Brees speak of Schottenheimer’s work ethic, wisdom, and attention to detail it tells you everything about what kind of coach he was.

Article by Premier Players

Rivers Takes His Stellar NFL Career To St. Michael Catholic HS

Philip Rivers might have just been a quarterback playing at the wrong time. The 17-year NFL veteran decided to retire this offseason after a glittering career that was denied multiple Super Bowl berths thanks to a combination of Tom Brady and Peyton Manning (and now Patrick Mahomes) dominating that spot in the AFC.

Rivers has retired at a point where he seemingly has plenty left in the tank. He didn’t choose to bow out after a down year or two, with this premier player calling it quits after guiding an Indianapolis Colts team that was 7-9 in 2019 back to the playoffs with an 11-5 record in 2020. Rivers took to Indianapolis like a duck to water after 16 seasons on the West Coast with the Chargers. He passed for 4,169 yards, 24 touchdowns, and 11 interceptions and there were many who expected him to be back in a Colts uniform in 2021. Instead, Rivers has chosen to meander off into the sunset with his Indy stint a footnote in a career that will see him go down as one of the greatest Chargers to ever play the game.

The 39-year-old passer will be one that is strongly discussed when it comes time to vote on Hall of Fame matters after his five years of non-playing are up. This could – and probably will – be five years from now, but you have to imagine that if a legitimate contender in the next two seasons needs a quarterback late in the season after an injury that Rivers will be one of the first calls they make. This is especially true because while Rivers is retiring from the professional game, this premier player is going to give back to the sport and he has already been hired as a high school coach at St. Michael Catholic just outside of Mobile, Alabama.

Rivers’ legacy is secure because of his numbers. He was an eight-time Pro Bowler. He ranks fifth all-time in the NFL (upon his retirement) in both passing yards (63,440) and in touchdown passes (421). Rivers would be considered one of the NFL’s all-time greats at his position in terms of toughness. The quarterback made 240 consecutive regular-season starts, a stat that puts him tied for third on the all-time list with center Mick Tinglehoff. The only more durable players in the history of the league – by this measure at least – are legendary tough guy quarterback Brett Favre and legendary all-around tough guy Vikings defensive lineman Jim Marshall.

The only taint to his legacy – a legacy that includes an NFL record for touchdown passes between a quarterback and a tight end for the 89 times he and Antonio Gates hooked up for scores in San Diego – is Rivers’ post-season woes. Rivers had an astonishing 12 seasons where he passed for over 12,000 yards, yet he was never able to lead the Chargers (or Colts) to a Super Bowl and his career 5-7 record in the playoffs contains just one AFC Championship Game appearance.

Even that, however, comes with a caveat when Rivers is considered. It was the 2007 AFC Championship Game that Rivers reached with the Chargers and nothing was going to stop this premier player from taking the field against the New England Patriots. The Chargers lost 21-12. Rivers was not at his best as he passed for just 211 yards with no touchdowns and two picks. It was a hard-fought win for Brady and the Patriots, one that they achieved with Rivers limping through the game with a torn ACL. Rivers’ knee had to be unlocked after the injury suffered just one week before in the Divisional Round but it is that level of toughness and mental fortitude that will remain the defining features when Rivers’ name comes up in debates about quarterbacks.

Article by Premier Players