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Fortunately, I Don't Have a Vote in This One, Either

The sports take industry owes Eli Manning a massive debt of gratitude. Just as stupid arguments about the baseball Hall of Fame faded away, the Giants quarterback announces his retirement, allowing a seamless pivot to stupid arguments about the Pro Football Hall of Fame.

Is Eli a Hall of Famer is a perfect plaything for the industry, far better than a nationwide dragnet for the brain-damaged baseball writer who didn't vote for Derek Jeter (BTW, this is a big improvement for the Cooperstown electorate. Dozens of scribes didn't vote for Willie Mays, Hank Aaron, Ted Williams, etc.). For one thing, fans adore Hall of Fame arguments to the point of mania. For another, Eli's case doesn't just offer arguments to both sides, it offers precedent as well, making for approximately 194 percent more relevant facts than the typical Hall debate in any sport.

Indeed, if one was to envision the perfect athlete for an endless Hall argument, one would probably come up with Eli. Barry Bonds, Roger Clemens and the PED-era baseball players don't count. People who argue their cases are battling about drugs, not baseball. Eli is a pure football issue, one that's irresolvable and therefore the ideal springboard for disputes ending in barroom stabbings. Are moments of historic greatness in a long career enough to make a pretty good but hardly great athlete a Hall of Famer? Ask that question to the next person you meet. It's an 80-20 bet he or she will have a different opinion than your own.

The cold statistics at pro-football-reference.com tell the dueling Eli stories quite neatly. Regular season Eli played for 16 seasons for the Giants and was a starter for 14 of those 16. He was amazingly durable, missing only two games until New York benched him for Daniel Jones this season. Due to this combination of longevity and good health, he is among the top 10 quarterbacks in many of the compiler stats, career passing yards, TD passes and so on.

However, Regular Season Eli wasn't exactly dominant. He made four Pro Bowls. He was never a first team All-Pro, let alone an MVP. His record as a starter was a flat .500, 117 wins, 117 losses. He wasn't ever thought of as a top five quarterback. Manning was not a fantasy football darling. Regular season Eli is basically a Vinny Testaverde who only played for one team.

Big brother Peyton could probably get Regular Season Eli a comped pass for spectator admission to the Hall in Canton, but that's as close as he could ever get.

But click to Manning's page on the postseason, and we see a new person, the one whose devotees insist should have his bust enshrined in his first year of eligibility. That of course is Super Bowl Eli, the quarterback who was MVP of Super Bowls 42 and 46, two historic upsets of pro football's most amazing dynasty, the 21st century New England Patriots and that team's quarterback Tom Brady, who has about the best Hall of Fame case ever created.

(In fact, Brady has two such cases in one career, the best argument for proclaiming him history's top quarterback. Cut Brady's career in two, 2001-2010 and 2011-2019. If each half was produced by a different person, both of them would waltz into Canton on the first ballot).

For extra credit, each Eli Super Bowl featured a game-winning drive led by him and those drives each featured impossible miracle throws and catches by David Tyree and Mario Manningham respectively. Those plays and those games will be famous as long as people care about the NFL. The root word of famous is "fame."

That's what fans and media who believe Eli is a Hall of Famer point to. For two months in a 16 year career, Eli Manning was a championship caliber quarterback, each time in the month of the NFL year in which championships are decided. That is his case for a yellow sports jacket.

There are worse cases. There is only one other quarterback who was on the winning team in more than one Super Bowl or NFL title game and isn't in the Hall -- Jim Plunkett. Many (misguided IMO) football fans and media say Joe Namath is in the Hall of Fame for only one game.

Well, Super Bowl III was kind of an important game. You can't tell the story of the ALF-NFL war , the merger of the two leagues and the Super Bowl itself without Broadway Joe. Namath was considered the best quarterback in his league, the AFL, which Eli never was. And beyond all that, Namath was always a celebrity (there's fame again). He still is. Namath's on cable TV 100 times a day hawking Medicare supplement insurance and making people my age feel their mortality.

 It is impossible to imagine Eli Manning doing that in 40 years time. He barely had any endorsements in his playing career.  Former teammate and Michael Strachan is a big TV star. Unless somebody does a remake of the "Andy Griffith Show" that's not happening for Eli, either. He is by all accounts a wonderful teammate and good person. Charismatic? Please.

This shouldn't matter. There are athletes who were and are dull as the Federal Register in the Halls of Fame of every sport. But it does matter, a little. It's one reason why "No Hall for Eli" folks emphasize the parts of his career, the very long parts, where Manning was an unmemorable quarterback. Manning didn't force himself on the public mind. One is strongly tempted to argue that alone should get him into the Hall of Fame.

But for two winter Sundays, Eli Manning was as memorable and charismatic a player as the NFL possessed. He was the most important (not best) player on a championship team. He was a Super Bowl hero. Quarterbacks get to put that on their resume. Malcolm Butler ain't making the Hall for being one, and neither is David Tyree. Quarterbacks get all the breaks and one of them is how their performance is judged. Being great in the right games can make up for being just OK in 20 others.

So would I vote for Eli were some awful twist of fate to put me on the selection committee? I don't think so. But I would listen respectfully to his presenter's arguments and those arguments might, just might, change my mind.

(For those who don't know, a member of the selection committee, usually someone who regularly covered the player, serves as the player's advocate, making a formal presentation before debate and voting begins).

In the meantime, I make the following recommendation. If you're out for a cold one at your neighborhood local and somebody down the bar starts talking about Eli Manning and the Hall of Fame, settle up your tab as fast as you can and get the hell out of there.

posted by Michael Gee @ 11:30 AM