Why did Terrell Davis win 1998 MVP?

[diamondbull424]

So in 1998 the Minnesota Vikings offense put up historic numbers.

In the last two seasons offenses that scored on above 50% of their drives for the year have produced the MVP winner every time.

The other offenses in the past twenty years with above 50% scoring were the 2018 Saints (Brees loss to Mahomes), 2018 Chiefs (Mahomes won MVP), 2017 Patriots (Brady MVP), 2016 Falcons (Ryan MVP), 2013 Broncos (Manning MVP), 2011 Packers (Rodgers MVP), 2011 Saints (Brees loses to Rodgers), 07 Patriots (Tom Brady won), 2006 Colts (Manning MVP).

The only QB who DIDN’T win the MVP in a season his offense hit this mark was Drew Brees... and only because he was unlucky enough to achieve the feat when a younger upstart taking the league by storm accomplished it the same year in Mahomes and Rodgers respectively.

By comparison the Broncos offense wasn’t nearly as efficient. I didn’t watch football at that point. So why did Randy Moss or Randall Cunningham not win the MVP that season over Terrell Davis? Was the race close? What were the dynamics back then?

Edited November 19, 2019 by diamondbull424

[Elky]

Cunningham wasn't even the MVP of his own team, that would be Randy Moss. You could have swapped Cunningham with Brad Johnson and gotten similar, possibly even better, results.

TD won MVP because he ran for 2k yards and 20+ touchdowns. How many RBs have done that?

Edited November 19, 2019 by Elky

[diamondbull424]

5 minutes ago, Elky said:

Cunningham wasn't even the MVP of his own team. That would be Randy Moss.

I didn’t watch football back then. But as far as I’m concerned this “creative” retort likely made for the likes doesn’t answer the overall question.

I will edit the OP so as to hopefully get a good discourse as to why anyone from that Vikings offense didn’t win the MVP for that ridiculously historic offense. It’s offensive gap was seemingly as far a difference as the 07 Patriots and 06 Colts.

Edited November 19, 2019 by diamondbull424

[Jakuvious]

A couple of things held back the Vikings in the MVP voting. And even then it was still close, mind you. 25 votes to Davis, 14 to Cunningham, 4 to Moss.

The main issue really was the division of credit. The Vikings saw 7 of their 11 offensive starters make the 1998 pro-bowl. An 8th was Jake Reed, who was incredibly productive years prior, and just got pushed down the depth chart by Moss. Cunningham, as the QB, would be the intuitive guy to go with, but how impressively Moss broke out captured a lot of the attention on that roster.

And for voters who might consider Cunningham, it would've been a compelling argument to make that he was largely a product of the Moss/Carter duo, and the elite OL in front of him. Cunningham was about 8 years removed from his last genuinely impressive season. And even '98 wasn't a complete season for him, as he only really played about 13 games that year, starting the year behind Brad Johnson on the depth chart. So you had a guy who didn't play the full year, he hasn't been good in ages, and he puts up a staggeringly elite statistical season. An easy all-pro, an easy pro-bowl berth, but the value portion of MVP was difficult to quantify because it would've been hard to tell at the time what percentage of it was him, and what percentage of it was the situation. It'd be like if next year, the Rams signed Joe Flacco to back up Goff. Goff gets benched to start week 3, and Flacco just goes off, with Cooks and Woods and Gurley all matching their career years, with half their OL stepping up and making the pro-bowl. It would be impressive, but the impression would also be, obviously this guy isn't that good, it's just McVay and supporting cast magic.

But on the flip side, you're not going to give MVP to Moss or Carter, because they're WRs. That's really all there is for that. Rice never won MVP. No WR ever has. I doubt one ever will. So Cunningham not getting it means no one would. And Moss stealing 4 votes honestly just hurt Cunningham's chances.

[Split the Sticks]

And his running in the super bowl was friggin' electric.

That Packers/Broncos super bowl was about the best I ever saw, putting personal biases aside (patriots).

[Elky]

7 minutes ago, Jakuvious said:

A couple of things held back the Vikings in the MVP voting. And even then it was still close, mind you. 25 votes to Davis, 14 to Cunningham, 4 to Moss.

The main issue really was the division of credit. The Vikings saw 7 of their 11 offensive starters make the 1998 pro-bowl. An 8th was Jake Reed, who was incredibly productive years prior, and just got pushed down the depth chart by Moss. Cunningham, as the QB, would be the intuitive guy to go with, but how impressively Moss broke out captured a lot of the attention on that roster.

And for voters who might consider Cunningham, it would've been a compelling argument to make that he was largely a product of the Moss/Carter duo, and the elite OL in front of him. Cunningham was about 8 years removed from his last genuinely impressive season. And even '98 wasn't a complete season for him, as he only really played about 13 games that year, starting the year behind Brad Johnson on the depth chart. So you had a guy who didn't play the full year, he hasn't been good in ages, and he puts up a staggeringly elite statistical season. An easy all-pro, an easy pro-bowl berth, but the value portion of MVP was difficult to quantify because it would've been hard to tell at the time what percentage of it was him, and what percentage of it was the situation. It'd be like if next year, the Rams signed Joe Flacco to back up Goff. Goff gets benched to start week 3, and Flacco just goes off, with Cooks and Woods and Gurley all matching their career years, with half their OL stepping up and making the pro-bowl. It would be impressive, but the impression would also be, obviously this guy isn't that good, it's just McVay and supporting cast magic.

But on the flip side, you're not going to give MVP to Moss or Carter, because they're WRs. That's really all there is for that. Rice never won MVP. No WR ever has. I doubt one ever will. So Cunningham not getting it means no one would. And Moss stealing 4 votes honestly just hurt Cunningham's chances.

That's absolutely sad.

[FinSting]

2 hours ago, diamondbull424 said:

So in 1998 the Minnesota Vikings offense put up historic numbers.

Pro tip: the key word in 'MVP' is 'player.' I mean, it's right there in the name. Nobody cares what an entire offense does. 

[MKnight82]

2 hours ago, diamondbull424 said:

I didn’t watch football back then. But as far as I’m concerned this “creative” retort likely made for the likes doesn’t answer the overall question.

I will edit the OP so as to hopefully get a good discourse as to why anyone from that Vikings offense didn’t win the MVP for that ridiculously historic offense. It’s offensive gap was seemingly as far a difference as the 07 Patriots and 06 Colts.

He's right though.  Randy Moss probably deserved it more than Cunningham.  

I think you had multiple things working against the Vikings players:

#1 - WRs just don't win MVPs.  

#2 - Cunningham stats were propped up by two amazing WRs in Moss and Carter.

#3 - The mentality back then was different from now, the HB was considered a premium position. 

 

[vikingsrule]

27 minutes ago, MKnight82 said:

He's right though.  Randy Moss probably deserved it more than Cunningham.  

I think you had multiple things working against the Vikings players:

#1 - WRs just don't win MVPs.  

#2 - Cunningham stats were propped up by two amazing WRs in Moss and Carter.

#3 - The mentality back then was different from now, the HB was considered a premium position. 

 

Reed was very good too and had multiple 1,000 yard seasons prior to 1998.

The Vikes OL was incredible though and the run game was just as prolific with Robert Smith.

Edited November 19, 2019 by vikingsrule

[diamondbull424]

1 hour ago, Jakuvious said:

A couple of things held back the Vikings in the MVP voting. And even then it was still close, mind you. 25 votes to Davis, 14 to Cunningham, 4 to Moss.

The main issue really was the division of credit. The Vikings saw 7 of their 11 offensive starters make the 1998 pro-bowl. An 8th was Jake Reed, who was incredibly productive years prior, and just got pushed down the depth chart by Moss. Cunningham, as the QB, would be the intuitive guy to go with, but how impressively Moss broke out captured a lot of the attention on that roster.

And for voters who might consider Cunningham, it would've been a compelling argument to make that he was largely a product of the Moss/Carter duo, and the elite OL in front of him. Cunningham was about 8 years removed from his last genuinely impressive season. And even '98 wasn't a complete season for him, as he only really played about 13 games that year, starting the year behind Brad Johnson on the depth chart. So you had a guy who didn't play the full year, he hasn't been good in ages, and he puts up a staggeringly elite statistical season. An easy all-pro, an easy pro-bowl berth, but the value portion of MVP was difficult to quantify because it would've been hard to tell at the time what percentage of it was him, and what percentage of it was the situation. It'd be like if next year, the Rams signed Joe Flacco to back up Goff. Goff gets benched to start week 3, and Flacco just goes off, with Cooks and Woods and Gurley all matching their career years, with half their OL stepping up and making the pro-bowl. It would be impressive, but the impression would also be, obviously this guy isn't that good, it's just McVay and supporting cast magic.

But on the flip side, you're not going to give MVP to Moss or Carter, because they're WRs. That's really all there is for that. Rice never won MVP. No WR ever has. I doubt one ever will. So Cunningham not getting it means no one would. And Moss stealing 4 votes honestly just hurt Cunningham's chances.

This is a really good answer. It was just interesting to see that the 98 Vikings are alone in the 20 years I looked back on to not have an MVP for an outlier offense (except for in years of redundancy). And their offense absolutely demolished the second place offense like the 06 Colts and 07 Patriots did. Must’ve been something to behold.

[diamondbull424]

57 minutes ago, FinSting said:

Pro tip: the key word in 'MVP' is 'player.' I mean, it's right there in the name. Nobody cares what an entire offense does. 

Pro tip: the key phrase  is “I didn’t watch football back then” like I said in the OP. Also key phrase was “It was the ONLY statistical outlier of this result happening in the history I went back to. When I have more time I will see if there was ever ANOTHER time this happened. Cunningham and Moss also had great statistical seasons as well.

Whats more the MVP doesn’t always go to the most valuable... because that is hard to quantify, however the best player on the best offense... which is generally the QB... is what we’ve seen from the MVP in most sports. Which is again, why I asked the question seeking to be enlightened as to this result.

Point is, if you don’t have anything constructive to add to the conversation then be a tool somewhere else. Thanks.

Edited November 19, 2019 by diamondbull424

[diamondbull424]

54 minutes ago, MKnight82 said:

He's right though.  Randy Moss probably deserved it more than Cunningham.  

I think you had multiple things working against the Vikings players:

#1 - WRs just don't win MVPs.  

#2 - Cunningham stats were propped up by two amazing WRs in Moss and Carter.

#3 - The mentality back then was different from now, the HB was considered a premium position. 

 

Oh. He may have been correct, which is why I changed the OP. But delivery matters and also being right doesn’t answer the question. If an exam asks what is $1+$1 and the answer given says: “$3 is more than the answer to the question you asked and that’s all that matters.” While it’s not wrong, it’s also not “correct” when considering the underlying question being asked. Which was about Davis winning.

But answers like yours and @Jakuvious gave some good insight.

[Soko]

Cunningham was playing on a loaded offense with receivers any QB would kill for. I think voters took that into account just enough to give the crazy season by Davis the nod. 

[SkippyX]

Davis dominated in the Super Bowl the year before and he finished with 2008 yards and 21 TDs and 5.1 a pop.

Cunningham did not start the first 2 games of 1998 (he replaced a far, far, far, far ,far ,far ,far ,far lesser Brad Johnson who was injured in week 2)

Cunnigham put up an MVP level season in 1998 but Davis put up a better MVP level season. 

I think the 1990 MVP award was the big joke. It was a Joe Montana popularity contest since Cunnigham destroyed him statistically.,

 

If you want to see a real joke, go to 1987 when 18 idiots supporting the 49ers split the votes between clear MVP Jerry Rice and Scab Joe

• Joe started 9 real NFL games and 2 replacement games. His 102 rating was 18 points lower than Steve Young (3 real starts with 10 TDs and 0 picks)
• 5 of Joe's 31 TDs and 393 of his 3054 yards came in replacement games
• Rice had 22 TDs and 1 rushing TD in 12 real games. 
  • Montana threw 13 of them (in 351 passes), Young threw 8 (in 69 passes), and Harry Sydney threw 1 on a trick play.

Since the vote was split by ignorant clowns voting for Montana, Elway took the MVP award.

• Elway 36 votes??? (as a QB he combined for 23 TDs, the same as Rice at WR and his passer rating was 83.4)
• Rice 30
• Montana 18
• Note: Reggie White wiped the floor with Montana in the real games too (21 sacks in 12 real games)

The Voters get an absolute F for this voting. The real MVP was Rice with White in 2nd.

[SkippyX]

2 hours ago, MKnight82 said:

He's right though.  Randy Moss probably deserved it more than Cunningham.  

I think you had multiple things working against the Vikings players:

...

#2 - Cunningham stats were propped up by two amazing WRs in Moss and Carter.

...

 

The propped up angle is so lame. Every RB is propped up by his QB and his line.

Every player is propped up by their head coach and their offensive coordinator.

As Giselle once famously said, "the QB can't throw and catch the ball"

Montana had Rice and Young had Rice and Owens for a while. Are they fakes now?

Peyton Manning had first Harrison and then Harrison and Wayne. Do we take back his MVPs?