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Rank the top 25 defensive primes 1980-present


LuckIsGOAT

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12 hours ago, diamondbull424 said:

Other people are taking care of the Bob Sanders stuff, but I’d love your argument as to why those guys are rated above Ray Lewis.

If his intent was the same as mine, he put Kuechly and Lewis as equal.  I could understand this rating if it was post-prime Lewis, so if that's the bulk of what OP saw from Lewis then that makes sense.  But Lewis led one of the best defenses of all time to a SB with Dilfer at QB, and the only other person on that D who's even close to this list is Woodson (who was in his 14th season already.)  Best MLB to ever play in my opinion, and also in my opinion clearly the best in the last 40 years.  Singletary was good but not as good, and he pretty much had one assignment most of his career in that 46.  

 

9 hours ago, TecmoSuperJoe said:

Bob Sanders was a great player, but not a generational impact talent. I'd group him with guys like Nolan Cromwell, Carnell Lake, or Darren Sharper. Maybe if Sanders had stayed healthy my thinking would be different. But since he didn't I'm lukewarm about the shooting star type players. Probably why I'm not that enthralled with someone like Bo Jackson. 

There have been plenty of good safeties since 1980 and only room for 25 players from defense on this list.  That means you'd have roughly 2 players from each position (4 from positions with 2 starters on the field like CB.)  So you're probably talking only room for 4 maybe 5 safeties on this list (unless we think there's been more standout safeties in the league since 1980 compared to other positions) and I don't think Sanders makes the cut.  There's even guys not  mentioned I might put ahead of him like Joey Browner or LeRoy Butler.  My order would probably go something like: Lott, Reed, Dawkins, Polamalu, Easley, Butler, Browner, Sanders, E. Berry, E. Thomas, D. Woodson, Lake, Cromwell, Atwater, Sharper, D. Smith, Lynch.  All of those guys were really good, and to be honest I wouldn't take offense if people said I mangled the order of the last 12 or so, or that I blatantly left someone off the list.

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48 minutes ago, Jotun_Fan said:

If his intent was the same as mine, he put Kuechly and Lewis as equal.  I could understand this rating if it was post-prime Lewis, so if that's the bulk of what OP saw from Lewis then that makes sense.  But Lewis led one of the best defenses of all time to a SB with Dilfer at QB, and the only other person on that D who's even close to this list is Woodson (who was in his 14th season already.)  Best MLB to ever play in my opinion, and also in my opinion clearly the best in the last 40 years.  Singletary was good but not as good, and he pretty much had one assignment most of his career in that 46.

True. Wasn’t sure of how he was doing it. But nevertheless, I agree with your conclusions. I’m just interested in hearing him explain himself as to how Kuechly is on par with Lewis. I would have been willing to concede the post prime argument if he didn’t have guys who played well before Lewis or his contemporaries, above him. Derrick Brooks being one of them. Perhaps I could concede an argument that had them on the same level (maybe). But I’m just interested in his arguments overall. Perhaps there will be some logic behind it, but I’m curious nonetheless.

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