If Fran Tarkenton played today
doubledragon
Posts: 23,269 ✭✭✭✭✭
in Sports Talk
he would light up the NFL, Fran Tarkenton turned 84 years old yesterday. If you haven't seen him play then I suggest you watch highlights of him in action, he makes Lamar Jackson look like a joke. The man invented scrambling, he's like Houdini on the gridiron, the consummate escape artist that had a gift for avoiding defenders. He could sling the pill as well, held most of the records until Dan Marino came along. He's one of the best I've ever seen at the position period, I tried to post his highlights on the forum, but the stupid NFL has some kind of copyright thing and won't allow it. Anyway, happy 84th Fran.
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Comments
You know, I have to say, it angers me that I can't post a simple Fran Tarkenton highlights video for people to enjoy because the NFL is a piece of trash. Boo, hiss!
DD - I think you may be misinterpreting the message:
"Video unavailable", yadda yadda.
Just click "Watch on YouTube", and it plays fine.
Unless you have some sort of pop-up blocker, malware prevention software, or whatever installed on your computer, and you're seeing something different on your screen, than I'm seeing on my screen?
@stevek, I can post the video like you did, but it makes you go to YouTube to watch it, and that's what I dislike because most people probably don't want to venture over to YouTube. I don't understand why the NFL won't allow you to just watch the video right here. Very frustrating!
I think that message is more likely a specific software thing, from the CU software rather than a NFL or YouTube thing. Otherwise the video would have been removed from YouTube. I've seen that exact message once in a while on other websites, but not too often.
YouTube normally quickly honors a request from the video owner, or from users because of obscenity reasons, etc, to take down a video. That's my understanding anyway.
It's certainly not the first time this has happened when I try to post an NFL video on the forum. I'm not sure who's behind this, the NFL or CU, but not to fear.
Fran was phenomenal, a very underrated player whenever all time greats are mentioned
Fran made a career running for his life... And he lived to establish he was good at it. And then there is the entertainment value in watching him which is really hard to value. He was a great QB that must be seen to be appreciated.
Experience the World through Numismatics...it's more than you can imagine.
game used...
That's Incredible!
NFL is bigger, faster, and better coached than the generation Fran played in. I suspect now he might not have any where near the success as then - 6.0 ft 190 lbs. would not do as well now at qb. His overall QB rating is 80.4 all time which would put in the bottom of staring qb's in the NFL these days - 24th this year for example among qb's playing in 10 or more games. But different times and hard to do an outright comparison. He was great for his time and fun to watch.
I agree and this is my same type of argument when older players are mentioned compared to today's players but for overall skill level against his peers, Fran was a stud
I believe Tarkenton had ALL the passing records when he retired.
His first 12 seasons, he played for pretty bad teams, the expansion Vikings and the even worse(?) late 1960's Giants.
His first 6 seasons with Minnesota the defense averaged 11th in the league in points allowed. The Vikings had one receiver (Paul Flatley) make the Pro Bowl one time.
His next 5 years in New York their defense averaged 14th in the league in points allowed and they had one receiver (Homer Jones) make the Pro Bowl 2 times.
Back to Minnesota where the Vikings had a top 3 defense for 4 straight years and one receiver every year go to the Pro Bowl (John Gilliam 4x, Sammy White 2x, Ahmad Rashad 1x).
Fran led them to the Super Bowl in 3 of the 4 years he had a great defense, and was almost 4 for 4 if not for a disputed loss to the Cowboys in the playoffs, who then made it to the big game, losing to the Steelers.
No quarterback did anything close to what Fran did when you consider he played on horrible teams for 14 (maybe only 12 were horrible) out of his 18 years and ZERO Hall of Fame receivers, Tight Ends or even Running Backs.
He's 6th all time in Approximate Value of every player who ever played, behind 4 quarterbacks (Brady, Brees, Manning, Favre) and Jerry Rice.
The only player considerably higher in AV is the annointed one.......Tom Brady.
Fran would be a very top tier elite QB if he played now, just as he was during his time. Similarly, Mahomes, Allen, Burrows etc would all be elite had they played in the 60s. Players are not bigger, stronger, faster because of some evolutionary change (if you even believe in evolution) According to that belief system, it would take tens or hundreds of thousands of years to change a living being.
The reason they are bigger, stronger, faster is because of nutrition/supplements from when they were born and modern training methods/equipment/time to train year round. Modern people would be physically smaller had they been born in the 1920's for instance when the quantity and quality of food was different. My Tommy almost certainly would not be 6'4 or 5" and Fran almost certainly would be a few inches taller. there are always outliers, but that is what they are, outliers.
Same holds true for strength and speed. If Jim Thorpe, or Ruth or Fran had the advantage of modern supplements and training techniques they would be just as strong and fast as anyone today. At the same time, if Lamar Jackson had to work a job in the off season and couldnt train 365 with the worlds best trainers, he would not be nearly as fast and athletic as he is today.
George Brett, Roger Clemens and Tommy Brady.
80.4 isn’t his QB rating it’s his passer rating which is actually very good for those days. Len Dawson had an 82.6
passer rating and led the league 6 seasons in that category and played in the same era as Fran. Also Fran’s and Dawson’s completion percentage was above average for that era.
Tarkenton LOST all of those Super Bowls, he turned me away from being a Vike fan, because he totally sucked in those SB's and made my days miserable. It was unpleasant to watch the complete ineptness he exhibited in those 3 games, LOL.
So what Approximate Value? Tark choked in the big game, 3 times.
Kinda reminds me of current V qb, Cousins, another guy who looks great in flashes, then lousy in flashes, but can't win the big game. Yup that is Minnesota in a nut shell, mediocre, all times..................
"Fran would be a very top tier elite QB if he played now"
It is a fallacy to believe that athletes from the past would all benefit enough from modern training, nutrition, etc. to be equally successful today.
All athletes have a peak athletic ability. Modern training, nutrition, supplements, etc help more current athletes come closer to their peak. This doesn't mean that athletes from the past were not able to come close to their peak without modern training, nutrition, supplement. Many, if not most, of the standouts from yesteryear managed to reach close to their peak athletic ability in the absence of modern methods. This is why they stood out amongst their peers. Personally, I believe many of those athletes would only marginally improve with modern training, nutrition, etc.
The difference now is that many more athletes are near their peak than ever before. This raises the playing field across the board and for people to stand out now, they have to be truly exceptional. From a pure athleticism perspective the average athlete now is lightyears ahead of the average athlete before.
There is a point of diminishing returns for modern training, nutrition, supplements, etc. I think we are probably closing in on that point unless something significant occurs in the next 10 - 20 years in those fields. We may see marginal improvements going forward but nothing like the difference between now and 60 years ago.
Robb
Erik
@fergie23
"From a pure athleticism perspective the average athlete now is lightyears ahead of the average athlete before."
why do you think that would be? What would make an athlete from 50-75 years ago vastly inferior to current ones?
there are only a few possible reasons:
1. The human species has evolved in the last 75 years. (if you believe in that) I would say this one is 100% false. any evolutional changes would take tens or hundreds of thousands of years.
If we can agree that the human species has not evolved to be larger/faster/stronger in the last 75 years, there MUST be other factors at play.
Take Tarkenton, have him be born in 1996 with all of the advantages that come with it, and he would absolutely be one of the bigger/faster/stronger athletes of modern times.
George Brett, Roger Clemens and Tommy Brady.
craig44 we will just have to agree to disagree. You don't seem to have understood what I wrote and you always seem to lead with the evolution nonsense which I don't believe anyone on these forums has ever suggested.
I don't modern training, nutrition, etc. would necessarily have benefited Tarkenton as much as you believe.
Robb
if you dont believe we, as a species, have evolved in the last 75 years (and I do not) why do you think humans are bigger, faster, stronger now than 50-75 years ago? I am genuinely curious
George Brett, Roger Clemens and Tommy Brady.
Super Bowl VIII;
Tarkenton is 18/28. 1INT. Sets record for most completions in a SB.
Vikings rush for a total of 55 yards and lose a fumble on the Miami 6 yard line.
Csonka runs for 145 yards. 4.4 YPC
Vikings penalized for 65 yards.
Super Bowl IX;
Vikings rush for 17 yards (less than 1 yard per carry), Franco Harris runs for 158.
Fran is bad, 11/26 with 3 int.
Super Bowl XI;
Fran 17/35, 1TD, 2INT.
Vikings fumble early on Oakland's 3 yard line.
Vikings rush for 67 total yards while Clarence Davis carries 26 times for 137 yards, 8.6 YPC! Van Eeghan gains another 73 on the ground.
When you can't run the ball, can't stop the run and fumble in the red zone, I don't care who you have at QB, you're going to lose.
Vikings actually had the best chance to win in the game Tarkenton played the worst. Vikings were down 9-6 in the 4th quarter against Pittsburgh, but couldn't do anything against the Steelers defense.
Blaming Tarkenton for those losses only shows you don't understand team sports.
The Vikings defense played horribly in the first and last games and the offense couldn't even gain 1 yard per carry against the Steelers.
Looking back on those games was painful 😖
My wife has read that people in the USA are taller and bigger than the WW2 and earlier generations due to the presence of preservatives, hormones, and other things added to the foods we eat.
That may be true.
Fran's smartest off-the-field business move was investing in Apple stock early - and lots of it.
Timing.
Erik
People have gotten bigger and taller over the centuries, including of course the past century.
I think the two main reasons are simply a more abundant food supply. And also Darwin's theory of natural selection. IE the females of our species would for the most part, rather mate with a big tall male, than somebody short. Except for maybe Leonardo DiCaprio - LOL.
Correct. Some 'might' benefit. Most, it would not matter because it doesn't matter what era Danny Devito was born because he would never be a professional athlete in any era(unless he is good at Pickleball
)
The population of the American Colonies in 1770 was just over 1 million people total. There is no amount of nutrition that would make the 20 best athletes from that population pool anywhere near the 20 best athletes from the current population pool of 340 million in the US(plus taking the best of the best from around the world as well).
Jim Brown simply could not run over guys like he did then, even if Brown got a boost from nutrition and training today, because there are simply more guys bigger and faster, thus harder to do that. Brown would need to be big enough, fast enough, and strong enough, to overpower 290 pound lineman who run nearly as fast, to replicate what he did back then.
Also, using baseball hitting as an example since so many people are down on these guys for striking out more. Even if a player from 1930 was put into baseball now with the same nutrition and training benefits, that player would still be facing more guys throwing 99MPH with command, regardless if that speed and command was achieved from evolution, training, nutrition, or more viable population in the world...becauase it is simply harder to hit in league populated with that type of pitching ability compared to not. So those players would be striking out more too(Just like they did agains the the few guys that were throwing 95 back then). Just like the guys in the 1970's who struck out more facing Nolan Ryan than they did against the average pitcher, and there are now a league full of guys with Ryan's arsenal(and many taller too).
1000% agreed
This is a subject that seems to come up quite often, and I fail to see the point.
A player (Tarkenton for example) cannot just be transported from 1974 into the future to compete with today's players. Can we at least agree on that?
Average height of men in the 1960's was 5'8", now it's 5'9". Not a big deal.
Fran dominated the best of the best for 18 years, he would have done the same had he been born in 2000. He would have been an inch taller and maybe 15-20(?) Pounds heavier, but so what, EVERYONE is an inch taller and 15-20 pounds bigger.
On the other hand transporting a modern player BACK in time (still not possible) he's going to lose an inch of height and more importantly, 15-20 pounds of muscle.
Let's look at the team Francis was up against in SB 9;
Joe Green, HOF, L C Greenwood, 6x pro bowl, Jack Ham, HOF , Jack Lambert, HOF, Andy Russell 7x pro bowl, Mel Blount, HOF, 3 other players who had gone to the pro bowl two times in Dwight White, Mike Wagner and Glen Edwards.
Teams of the current time are not able to afford 4 HOFer's 2 more guys that go to 6-7 pro bowls.
The Baltimore Ravens 2000 defense (called by some the best of all time) had 2 HOFer's.
The league is watered down. Today's players are bigger and maybe faster, but that doesn't mean they are better.
The biggest difference between then and now are the rule changes designed to help the QB and modern surgical advances that can repair damaged knees that would have ended many players careers back then.
Tarkenton might have been even better if he played now, might even win a Super Bowl! 😂
Tarkenton is probably the most underrated QB of all time.
Tarkenton is a guy who's skill set would carry well to today's game.
Agree, and Tark was lousy, no way around it. And expected when a city loses so much as there is always a reason why LA is LA and Minnesota is Minnesota............ There are decades of multiple sports and franchises showing the history of success and the history of failure in this.
I will always remember him for his scrambling.