Michael Vick was a game-changer in real life and in Madden, but does that warrant a Hall of Fame induction?
Everything considered, even with one rescue dog already adopted and a second on the way soon, I can’t bring myself to hate or root against Michael Vick.
Sure, he killed dogs. Fine, he wasn’t the amazing quarterback in real life that he was in classic Maddens. Still, the guy has seen the highs and lows that came with fame and revived his career after he nearly lost everything. As he says…
And with Michael Vick announcing his retirement this past week, one of the deadliest dual-threat quarterbacks in both NFL and video game history is likely gone for good. There will be no more deep passes after scrambling in the Dirty South, no more rushing for 100 yards in a game as a quarterback in Madden. It’s over, folks.
Michael Vick is gone, and we’ll forever remember him as a player whose career was stopped because of idiocy but rebounded thanks to his own inner strength and his football talent. Like an addict fighting the urge to do one more line or take another drink, Vick fought back and became an NFL star again.
Oh, and if you ask Vick, he thinks we’ll remember him in Canton.
Wait, what??? Michael Vick as a Hall of Famer? For what? Why? How?
There’s having optimism and self-confidence, and then there’s having intelligence on the same level of Roger Goodell. Michael Vick in his prime was a great player, one that defenses had every right to fear, but a Hall of Famer? Really?
I mean, the Baseball Hall of Fame voting is bad, but the one for football is so much worse. How does Brian Dawkins get snubbed for Morten Andersen? What about John Lynch? And sure, even though I don’t think it was a snub, T.O. counts too. And Vick thinks he’ll get in?
But then, let’s think about this for a second. Vick’s reasoning is that he was a game-changer and, when the guy was in his prime and at his best, he was dangerous. Is there actually a chance that, come Feburary 2021, Michael Vick is inducted into the Hall of Fame?
For the sake of wanting to actually analyze this question, let’s hold off on the whole dog fighting thing for now. Obviously, it’s going to come up when the voters discuss it in three years and I’d be forgoing any journalistic integrity I still have (which is why I’ve yet to ask Lane Kiffin if he plans on bringing the visor back for the 2017 season) if I skipped over the dog fighting.
Because we all essentially know Vick’s story — TL;DR he was drafted first overall after playing at Virginia Tech, started in Atlanta, went to prison, came back to the Eagles, was benched, and retired — this isn’t meant to be a full biography. We don’t need to do a full biography on Michael Vick. Instead, let’s look at the facts. the stats, and the puppies. I mean, the wins. Because puppies are as good as wins.
Men lie. Women lie. Numbers don’t. Barring a last-minute comeback from Michael Vick, which would make sense if the XFL was still around, the former Virginia Tech star finishes his career with a 61–51–1 record in 115 starts over 143 games. In the passing game, Vick threw for 22,464 yards and completed 56.2 percent of his passes with a 133–88 TD-INT ratio. Those numbers aren’t too spectacular, especially when one is reminded that Vick was better in Philadelphia thanks to having some fantastic targets in Philadelphia — DeSean Jackson, Brent Celek, LeSean McCoy when he went out for passes, etc.
When Vick was an Atlanta quarterback, he was too hit or miss; and I’m not saying that because his average completion percentage with the Falcons was 53.8 (as opposed to 59.5 with the Eagles). Even if his career approximate value is 113 with 68 of that coming in Atlanta, his only seasons as a Dirty Bird that truly stand out passing wise are 2002 (16–8 TD-INT ratio with 2,936 yards and a 54.9 completion percentage) and 2006 (20–13, 2,474, and 52.6).
Playing in six playoff games and starting five, Vick was mediocre in January football with a 2–3 record and a 5–4 TD-INT ratio. Yes, there was the upset in Green Bay over the heavily-favored Packers, but Vick couldn’t turn it on in the postseason the way other quarterbacks could.
Although, that one playoff game Vick didn’t start may have had one of his best career moments…
But wait, you say, Vick was best known for his rushing ability. How someone can rush for 1,000 yards in a season as a quarterback still amazes me, but that’s the type of athlete Michael Vick was; he did the impossible. On 873 total carries — I’m not the only one who thinks this is too low for Vick, right? — the three-time Pro Bowler ran for 6,109 yards and 36 touchdowns; that’s seven yards flat per carry, though I’m sure plenty of Madden players had it around 15 yards per rush in Vick’s video game prime.
But, for as good as Vick was in the rushing game during his prime, the rest of the stats don’t really hold up? If the average career for an NFL Hall of Famer is ten seasons and at least seven or so of those should be when a player is at their best, then where does a player who peaked in his fourth season fit?
Now I know the idea is that Michael Vick was always this badass, elusive quarterback who was third behind Tom Brady and Peyton Manning on the best quarterbacks list, but things weren’t always that simple. More often than not, the guy was nothing more than an average to slightly above average quarterback who could dazzle here and there with an explosive run. You may not have noticed it…
What, you don’t believe me? Take a look at the career stats for these three quarterbacks.
Quarterback A: 79–56–1 in 136 starts (141 games) with 27,846 passing yards (completing 61.7 percent of his passes), a 157–91 TD-INT ratio, 2078 rushing yards with 13 touchdowns (4.4 yards per carry), and a 2–4 playoff record. In the playoffs, this quarterback has thrown for 1481 yards and a 12–2 TD-INT ratio. Quarterback A’s approximate value is 95.
Quarterback B: 41–59 in 100 starts (105 games) with 24,153 passing yards (completing 63 percent of his passes), a 149–106 TD-INT ratio, 2652 rushing yards with 34 touchdowns (5.2 yards per carry) and a 2–2 playoff record. In the playoffs, this quarterback has thrown for 980 yards (completing 54.5 percent of his passes) with an 8–5 TD-INT ratio. Quarterback B’s approximate value is 97.
Quarterback C: 82–52–1 in 135 games (161 starts) with 29979 passing yards (completing 56.6 percent of his passes) with a 207–134 TD-INT ratio, 4928 rushing yards with 35 touchdowns (6.4 yards per carry), and a 3–6 playoff record. In the playoffs, this quarterback has thrown for 2426 passing yards, a 12–9 TD-INT ratio, and also ran for 273 yards on 49 attempts. Quarterback C’s approximate value is 134.
When I look at those comparisons, I’d say that Vick is probably closest to quarterback A. Rushing wise, there’s obvious similarities to QB C, but overall? I’d have to think quarterback A is the guy. Those three quarterbacks are, in order, Alex Smith, Daunte Culpepper, and Randall Cunningham.
As much as I’d love to ask if you see a Hall of Famer when you look at Alex Smith’s stats, I’ll also admit that the eye test is a large part of how we’ll remember Vick. For every great running play he had, there was also a poor throw that either went for an incompletion or worse. If a defense could stop Vick from running, then they pretty much had already won the game.
The problem with Vick’s Hall of Fame candidacy is that the modern era dual-threat quarterbacks who have gotten inducted were also consistently great passers. Let’s not act like Steve Young, who held the all-time rushing touchdowns record for a quarterback until Cam Newton broke it this past September, was JaMarcus Russell in the pocket. The same goes for John Elway and the truth is, Vick is neither of them.
At least with Young and Elway, they could beat you in ways other than running; they had leadership, they had passing sills, and they knew this game. Again, if you stopped Vick from running, you most likely had already won the game.
With a player like Vick who never was the guy at his position and doesn’t have any All-Pro listings to his name, I have to look at the other Hall of Fame questions:
Was he ever the best at his position in a single season? No.
Did the player change the game in a way never before seen? No.
Does the player have a positive legacy among fans and players, even those who never rooted or played alongside him? Yes.
If he played his entire career without any pauses or problems, would he have been a Hall of Famer then? Doubtful.
And, I’d be doing everyone a disservice if I didn’t show some classic Vick highlights from Madden. The guy was a damn cheat code.
With regards to the dog fighting, here’s what you have to remember. Things that may not have bothered voters in the past — usage of ‘greenies’ or amphetamines, drug addiction, or serving some jail time for something like a DWI or even domestic violence — could be dismissed and waved away as ‘mistakes.’ If Dwight Gooden and Darryl Strawberry didn’t let their careers die because of drug abuse, I have no doubt that the voters would have chalked the 1980’s cocaine usage by those Mets team up as a ‘mistake’ and inducted the two in anyway.
But with something like dog fighting, how do you wave that away and even use the word ‘mistake’ as an excuse? We’re not talking about failing a drug test because you legitimately didn’t know the drug you were taking had a banned substance or that you snapped and nearly attacked your wife. This is something organized, something that trained over 50 pit bull dogs and ran a gambling ring.
Oh, and if the dogs lost? As a Federal Indictment about the dog fighting syndicate reports, Vick “executed the losing dog by wetting the dog down with water and electrocuting the animal.”
There’s also Vick’s complicated legal history which includes hanging out with bad company, giving a woman herpes and calling himself Ron Mexico, and filing for bankruptcy in 2008. In a time where voters put every little thing under the microscope, are those things going to escape when his name comes up in 2021.
When Michael Vick was Michael Vick, there was no stopping him. But when there’s really three or four memorable years to speak about, not even being a video game cheat code can save you. Sorry, Ookie, but the Hall of Fame isn’t for you. I don’t think you’ll be in the Hall of Very Good either, unfortunately.
And with the choices you made, well, I guess that being left out of the Hall of Fame is….Karma.
Want more from me? Follow me on Twitter so you know when I post, what I’m doing, and why The Wire is the greatest show in history.
