What warrants the public to deem someone as having been “great” in their respective sport when their career comes to an end. Is it championships, statistics, overall talent? There is no clear answer, and every fan can decide for themselves which factors play the most important role.
In general, “greatness” is an accumulation of the three factors previously mentioned. However, when Derek Jeter was asked in a sit down with Brandon Steiner a couple of years back what he thought was the most special accomplishment of his career, his response was simply “winning”. This comes from a man with nearly 3500 career hits and tons of golden glove and silver slugger awards.
Jeter goes on to explain that having made the world series and lost and not having made the playoffs at all, both mean the same thing to him because you did not do your job to win it all. This is truly the mentality of someone GREAT. A future HOFer, loved by his teammates, opponents, and his city.
So as the “great” Peter Griffin would ask viewers, wanna know what really grinds my gears? Why the fuck are the headlines this week about Tony Romo’s retirement (temporary or permanent) when the UNC Tarheels just pulled off a great redemption story by winning the NCAA championship a year after a heartbreaking buzzer-beater loss to Villanova in last year’s Finals?
Sure we know Tony is a great guy, plays the playboy like Jeter, and had some great numbers also like Jeter, but likeability doesn’t make one great. I could throw some numbers out there to show you how Romo did have some great statistics that were comparable to some of the top QBs in the league, but that’s not the point I am trying to make here.
Great players have always said that winning is the single most important predictor of greatness. Plain and simple, Romo has 2 career playoff wins for one of the most successful and lucrative franchises in all of sports being the Dallas Cowboys. Sure, football is a team sport, but a great QB has the ability to lead his team to success. He has not one NFC championship game played in (or Super Bowl obviously) and is only 2/6 in playoff games played in 13 NFL seasons. That is not a winner folks, and that is why he is not great in my opinion.
-Doc D signing out
