What was the Gap between T.O and Marvin Harrison during their prime?

[SkippyX]

On 5/17/2022 at 8:20 PM, FinSting said:

Whoo lawdy. Difficult to remember this old stuff but after checking the stats...imagine Marvin Harrison having to share passes with Reggie Wayne in 2002, QB handing the ball off constantly to RB Edgerrin James and *still* Marvin explodes for 1,722 yds receiving. 

I wish we had a stat called targets that negated all of that. Marvin had 205 targets that year.

His yards per target was 8.4 and his targets per TD was 18.6

He had 8 targets 4 catches and 47 yards in the playoff game that year... EPIC!

 

I will take Owens 2000, 2001, 2002, 2004, and 2007 over Harrison 2002.

[Soggust]

They are neck and neck, so the correct answer is clearly C.

I personally would probably favor Harrison's 99-02 over Owens 00-03 by the slimmest of margins, but I have no problem with someone else preferring Owens.

[SkippyX]

To be clear I am pointing out the overvalue of the high targets low efficiency seasons.

Larry Centers

Michael Thomas

Harrison 2002

 

This does not mean Harrison was not a great HoF WR, just that you don't get that from only looking at 2002 or putting too much value on 2002's volume.

[sammymvpknight]

People will always pick the bigger athletic freak in these situations. Harrison was a bigger contributor in games that mattered more. If I was running an organization, the guy I would want would be pretty clear. 

[sammymvpknight]

On 5/31/2022 at 8:42 PM, SkippyX said:

To be clear I am pointing out the overvalue of the high targets low efficiency seasons.

Larry Centers

Michael Thomas

Harrison 2002

 

This does not mean Harrison was not a great HoF WR, just that you don't get that from only looking at 2002 or putting too much value on 2002's volume.

If Michael Thomas didn’t get injured…we’d be talking whether he’s a first ballot HOF right now. I’m not sure exactly how your post helps your argument…it’s an incredibly low sample size. 

[ThatJaxxenGuy]

Marvin Harrison was amazing and consistently one of the best receivers for most of his career.

TO is a top 3 receiver all time. 
 

while they’re both awesome players, TO was a monster of a different kind.

[AlexGreen#20]

On 5/17/2022 at 9:15 AM, SHONUFF said:

Harrison was a superior player because he was a franchise cornerstone. TO just didn't have the mental make up to be a long term cornerstone, evident by his turbulent career. I consider Harrison to be a great, TO as being a good receiver. 

Didn't Marvin Harrison kill a guy?

[HerbertGOAT]

On 6/7/2022 at 3:36 PM, AlexGreen#20 said:

Didn't Marvin Harrison kill a guy?

Yeah but T.O. is loud, so he's worse.

[biggie.]

To put in perspective how much Harrison disappeared in the playoffs, he has just TWO career postseason touchdowns...both came in 2003 against Denver. After that he never scored another postseason touchdown.

[CKSteeler]

On 6/8/2022 at 7:17 PM, biggie. said:

To put in perspective how much Harrison disappeared in the playoffs, he has just TWO career postseason touchdowns...both came in 2003 against Denver. After that he never scored another postseason touchdown.

THIS. Someone suggested Harrison was underrated because of the playoffs as if that isn't reason to knock him. I can't even fathom anyone picking Harrison over Owens if they watched the two play. Harrison was maybe the biggest playoff choker in NFL history.

[HerbertGOAT]

On 6/8/2022 at 6:17 PM, biggie. said:

To put in perspective how much Harrison disappeared in the playoffs, he has just TWO career postseason touchdowns...both came in 2003 against Denver. After that he never scored another postseason touchdown.

Not to mention, he played 16 postseason games. 65 Catches, 880 Yards, 2 TDs, Playoff Marvin Harrison was essentially a down year of T.J. Houshmandzadeh. T.O. went for 122 in the Super Bowl with a broken leg, and with a better QB possibly wins and goes down as one of the gutsiest and clutchest performances of all time.

[lancerman]

On 6/9/2022 at 8:48 PM, CKSteeler said:

THIS. Someone suggested Harrison was underrated because of the playoffs as if that isn't reason to knock him. I can't even fathom anyone picking Harrison over Owens if they watched the two play. Harrison was maybe the biggest playoff choker in NFL history.

Eh if you go by efficiency TO wasn't a whole lot better in the playoffs. 

TO has a Catch% of 53.5% and a Yds/R of 13.9

Harrison has a Catch% of 48.9% and a Yds/R of 13.6

And while Harrison only has 2 playoff TD's, TO only has 5 and 4 of them were when he played for San Fran his. Also while Harrison played 4 more games, you have to consider instances like 2007 where Harrison was nearly out all season long and only came back for the playoffs (when he probably shouldn't have) and he had his playoff low of 2 receptions and playoff low of 3 targets. TO was also usually on better teams. I know it's weird saying that since Harrison was on the Manning Colts. But TO was on the San Fran 49'ers when they had Young and were still top contenders. That's what he came into the league on. Then he was on the Eagles when they were the best team in the NFC and had made a bunch of conference title games consecutively. And then he was on the Cowboys when they were the #1 seed in the NFC and were the favorites to get out of the conference.Those are all 3 teams he had playoff appearances for. Harrison started on a mediocre Colts team years before Manning got their, made the playoffs his rookie year when they were 9-7 and just snuck in, then he was on those mediocre early Manning teams in 99,00, and 02. Then in 07 he was injured in that game and was pretty much done by 08. Really 03, 04, 05, and 06 were the only playoff runs where he wasn't on a meh team or wasn't injured/washed. And in two of those he had the misfortune of running into dynasty Patriots defense. 

Not saying we should ignore that Harrison underwhelmed in the playoffs, but for this comparison, there is quite a bit of context that should considered.

[Jakuvious]

Receiving touchdowns are also just about as team dependent a stat that you can find. There are some really great WRs pretty low on the all-time receiving TD list because you just aren't going to score a ton of TDs as a WR if your team as a whole isn't scoring many points. Harrison was there for the peak of the "Can Peyton Manning win in the playoffs?" years. You aren't going to get much for TDs when you're losing 14-42 and 16-19 and 17-23 and 0-41. He produced in '03 when the offense as a whole actually did perform in the post season. And then they lost 3-20 and 18-21, before the 06 run which really wasn't offensively fueled anyway. You don't win many superbowls with a 9 turnover playoff run, but they managed. And then by 07 he was steeply declining.

Similar to Lancerman's disclaimer, this isn't to fully absolve Harrison of blame. But there was plenty of not producing in the playoffs to go around on those 2000s Indy teams. Whether you want to blame scheme or coaching or competition or Peyton, it was an offense as a whole that didn't perform in the postseason, unless they drew Denver in the wildcard round. 

[biggie.]

TO at least had the excuse of having a revolving door at QB (part of that is his fault). Harrison was paired with one of the all time greats for a decade and the two went together like eggs and bacon.

[CKSteeler]

12 hours ago, lancerman said:

Eh if you go by efficiency TO wasn't a whole lot better in the playoffs. 

TO has a Catch% of 53.5% and a Yds/R of 13.9

Harrison has a Catch% of 48.9% and a Yds/R of 13.6

And while Harrison only has 2 playoff TD's, TO only has 5 and 4 of them were when he played for San Fran his. Also while Harrison played 4 more games, you have to consider instances like 2007 where Harrison was nearly out all season long and only came back for the playoffs (when he probably shouldn't have) and he had his playoff low of 2 receptions and playoff low of 3 targets. TO was also usually on better teams. I know it's weird saying that since Harrison was on the Manning Colts. But TO was on the San Fran 49'ers when they had Young and were still top contenders. That's what he came into the league on. Then he was on the Eagles when they were the best team in the NFC and had made a bunch of conference title games consecutively. And then he was on the Cowboys when they were the #1 seed in the NFC and were the favorites to get out of the conference.Those are all 3 teams he had playoff appearances for. Harrison started on a mediocre Colts team years before Manning got their, made the playoffs his rookie year when they were 9-7 and just snuck in, then he was on those mediocre early Manning teams in 99,00, and 02. Then in 07 he was injured in that game and was pretty much done by 08. Really 03,4, 05, and 06 were the only playoff runs where he wasn't on a meh team or wasn't injured/washed. And in two of those he had the misfortune of running into dynasty Patriots defense. 

Not saying we should ignore that Harrison underwhelmed in the playoffs, but for this comparison, there is quite a bit of context that should considered.

This post is highly misleading. 

Let's start with the argument that Owens played on better teams.

Most of his time in San Franciso was spent with Jeff Garcia, not Steve Young. He played three years with Young, and he wasn't the primary receiver as a rookie. He was, if memory serves me correctly, SF's third WR in his rookie season playing behind Rice and JJ Stokes (who was a higher draft pick). The 49ers after 1997-98 were hardly what they were in the early 90's and 80's. I don't know how anyone could claim the late 90's 49ers were bigger contenders than the colts teams Harrison played on in the 00's which were routinely highly seeded. Those 49ers teams were playing second fiddle to a number of teams in the conference, often times in their own division. They didn't even make the playoffs in three of his seasons in SF. 

In SF, Owens came up with one of the most clutch catches in the franchises history when they beat a Green Bay team that had had their number for years. That alone beats anything Harrison ever did in the playoffs unless you want to regale me with tales of how he racked up some stats against completely overwhelmed AFc West teams that  made the playoffs by default. 

From 2003-2005, Indy was the favorite among a lot of fans and analysts to win it all. Rightly or wrongly, and it was largely because people were so in love with the passing attack that racked up stats in the regular season. They would go on to win it all in 2006 when they were viewed as a more shaky bet. The 2008 team was still thought of very highly, and they were considered favorites in 2007 alongside NE (they went 13-3 and were the 2nd seed to NE, played in the most hyped game of the year against them in the regular season). If not for NE's historical season, they would have been the easy betting favorites to win it all that year. 

The Dallas teams Owens was a part of had one season where they were the first seed. And they were bounced in the first round. You describe them as if they had some multi-year run where they were dominant. They were a wild card team another year (9-7) when Tony Romo burst onto the scene and lost on the road to an underwhelming Seattle team. 

Owens had ONE season in Philly before things fell apart. He had a monstrous season before his injury that should have been season ending. Then he fought his way back and put up a pretty heroic performance in the Super Bowl. By comparison, you make excuses for Harrison in a similar situation.

You try and have it both ways statistically using efficiency stats in terms of targets and success rates and then give overall touchdown numbers while ignoring the fact that Harrison played in four more playoff games (which kind of undermines the notion that Harrison somehow played on inferior teams). 

Owens did not light it up consistently in the post-season, but he had his moments, two that I would consider legendary. He played his best in the Super Bowl whereas Harrison was, as usual, a no show. If we look at Owens after his rookie season (when he was third on the depth chart, compared to Harrison who was already the teams starting WR as a rookie and first round pick), the numbers look like this:

Owens - 10 games played

53 cathes - 744 yards - 5 TD's (averages out to 1190 yards over a 16 game season with 8 TD's on 85 cathes)

Harrison in 15 playoff games (I'll throw out his rookie season, too, to be fair, even though he was already his teams #1 target)

62 cathes - 812 yards - 2 TD's

So, yes, Owens clearly has Harrison beat. In 5 fewer games, he basically equals/exceeds what Harrison did. 

Owens is a top 5 WR since 1990. One of the most physically dominant players ever at the position. Harrison was a dime a dozen, a talented guy who was lucky to play in ideal circumstances with Peyton in a dome and who racked up the stats against weaker competition but vanished against the best.