Premium ContentMouse over Home then click on Premium Content for information.• Troy Aikman: Dallas quarterback won Super Bowls XXVII and XXVIII over Buffalo, and XXX over Pittsburgh — three in a four-year span (1992-95) after helping to revive a sagging franchise. Elected to the Pro Football Hall of Fame in 2006. He's currently Fox's lead color analyst.
• Roger Staubach: Prolific 1970s Dallas quarterback won Super Bowl VI over Miami and XII over Denver. Lost Super Bowls X and XIII to Pittsburgh. If the two four-point losses to Pittsburgh were reversed, Staubach, not Terry Bradshaw, would be on the QBs' Mount Rushmore.
• Kurt Warner: As the St. Louis Rams' quarterback, won Super Bowl XXXIV over Tennessee and lost XXXVI to New England. As Arizona's QB, lost XLIII to Pittsburgh. The undrafted Northern Iowa product joined Craig Morton and Norm Van Brocklin as starters in NFL championship games for two franchises.
• Fran Tarkenton: Minnesota quarterback lost Super Bowl VIII to Miami, IX to Pittsburgh and XI to Oakland. Fran the scrambler had two eras with the Vikings. He was a great young star on a 1960s expansion team. Then, after five years with the Giants, he was traded back to Minnesota and piloted a powerhouse that always came up short.
• Ben Roethlisberger: Pittsburgh quarterback won Super Bowl XL over Seattle and XLIII over Arizona. Lost XLV to Green Bay. He was the youngest (age 23) Super Bowl-winning quarterback in NFL history. He turns 30 next month, so there's time for more.
• Jim Kelly: Buffalo quarterback lost four consecutive Super Bowls — XXV through XXVIII — to the Giants, Washington and Dallas (twice). Played his first two pro seasons with the USFL's Houston Gamblers. Buffalo made the playoffs in eight of Kelly's 11 seasons as the starter.
• Bob Griese: Miami quarterback lost Super Bowl VI to Dallas. Won Super Bowls VII over Washington (the perfect 1972 season) and VIII over Minnesota. He's the only Dolphins quarterback to start and win a Super Bowl.
• PDF: Full version of The World-Herald's front page for Sunday's Super Bowl XLVI, celebrating the great quarterbacks in NFL history.
• Interactive: Click here to see World-Herald Super Bowl coverage through the years
• Photo Showcase: Midlanders in the Super Bowl
• Interactive Map: Where to watch the game
• Vote: Who is the greatest QB of all time?
• Video: Bo Pelini discusses Prince Amukamara's Super Bowl appearance
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The NFL's greatest quarterbacks are usually ranked by the number of rings they've won.
But should "4" — which New England's Tom Brady is shooting for Sunday against the New York Giants — be the end-all measuring stick?
It would seem so, looking at a World-Herald panel's compilation of the five greatest, a Mount Rushmore of quarterbacks, so to speak (the real thing has only four U.S. presidents). The QBs aren't assigned a rank, so let's list them by Super Bowls won:
• Joe Montana (four)
• Terry Bradshaw (four)
• Brady (three)
• John Elway (two)
• Bart Starr (two)
Montana, San Francisco's superstar of the 1980s, and Bradshaw, who led Pittsburgh's dynasty in the 1970s, are safe. They are the only ones with four titles in the Super Bowl era that started with the 1966 season.
There are two schools of thought on Brady, who piloted the Patriots to titles after the 2001, 2003 and 2004 seasons.
Some say he has to get that fourth ring to be in the "greatest ever" discussion.
Then again, there are reasons to suggest he's already there:
• If you include Elway, you have to include Brady — for longevity as dominant players.
The Jan. 22 AFC title clincher over Baltimore lets Brady tie Elway with five Super Bowl starts. Elway lost in three Super Bowls before his 1997 and '98 Denver teams beat Green Bay and Atlanta to close his Hall of Fame run.
While Elway won big in the twilight of his career, the 34-year-old Brady and the Patriots have caught a second wind. Until this season, they hadn't won a playoff game since the 2007 AFC championship. That was the prelude to their loss to the Giants in Super Bowl XLII, denying them a perfect season.
• Brady has tied Montana with 16 postseason wins. That statistic takes into account added numbers of teams (and games) in the playoffs through the years. Sometimes this waters down the talent in the playoffs, other times it makes the road to the Lombardi Trophy tougher.
Some would put Starr at the top of the mountain. He directed Vince Lombardi's Green Bay powerhouse to NFL championships in 1961, 1962 and 1965, and then triumphed in the first two Super Bowls (1966 and 1967). Starr's only postseason loss was his first championship game, to Philadelphia, in 1960.
So, you may prefer our first Mount Rushmore. But, since Starr bridges two eras of pro football, let's also offer a revised set.
The 10 greatest, regardless of era
• Joe Montana
• Johnny Unitas
• Bart Starr
• Terry Bradshaw
• Tom Brady
• Otto Graham
• Roger Staubach
• John Elway
• Troy Aikman
• Sid Luckman
Unitas drove the Baltimore Colts to NFL titles in 1958 and '59, the first one in the sudden-death overtime battle with the Giants. It may not have been "the greatest game ever played," as it was dubbed, but it ushered in the television era. Unitas, injured in the 1968 season, didn't start the Colts' upset loss to the New York Jets in Super Bowl III. He started, threw a touchdown pass and was injured in the second quarter of the Colts' Super Bowl V victory over Dallas.
He may have played a bit too long, but as long as Unitas was at the helm, the Colts were a factor. He was widely regarded as the best tactician at the position.
Graham's presence in championship games for the Cleveland Browns is unmatched — 10 seasons, 10 title games. Cleveland won all four titles (1946 through 1949) in the All-America Football Conference before that league dissolved and the Browns joined the NFL.
The Browns won the NFL crown in 1950, quieting criticism that they were inferior. They lost the next three title games, then won in 1954 and '55 to give Graham seven championships overall.
Staubach's Dallas Cowboys lost twice to Bradshaw's Steelers in entertaining Super Bowls during the 1970s. Staubach engineered Super Bowl victories over Miami and Denver in that decade and was a young backup on the Super Bowl V losers.
A Heisman Trophy winner at Navy whose NFL career started late because of a military commitment, Staubach helped the Cowboys turn the corner with their Super Bowl VI triumph over the Dolphins. Before that, "America's Team" couldn't win the big one.
Staubach was a master at fourth-quarter comebacks — before Elway and Dan Marino.
Aikman is one of the most underrated of the all-time greats. He led Dallas to three Super Bowl crowns in the 1990s, re-invigorating a franchise that had declined for a decade after Staubach's retirement. A lack of great statistics and the presence of super runner Emmitt Smith tend to push Aikman down the ladder.
Luckman directed the Chicago Bears to titles in 1940, '41, '43 and '46. He and the Bears were pioneers of sorts when they brought back the T formation to whip Washington 73-0 in the 1940 game. The T was the first offense where the quarterback took the snap from under center.
Honorable mention, pre-Super Bowl
• Sammy Baugh: Led Washington to NFL championships in 1937 and '42. Considered one of the greatest players of all time, he was also a top defensive back and punter.
• Norm Van Brocklin: Of the multiple-title QBs, only Van Brocklin won with two teams, the 1951 Los Angeles Rams and the 1960 Philadelphia Eagles. For a time, he shared snaps with Bob Waterfield in L.A.
• Bobby Layne: His Lions defeated Graham's Browns in the 1952 and '53 title games, and a broken leg sidelined him for Detroit's 1957 championship. When he retired after the '62 season, he held most major passing records.
Other Hall of Famers
Len Dawson, a Starr contemporary, won three American Football League titles with the Dallas Texans/Kansas City Chiefs and split two Super Bowls. George Blanda quarterbacked the Houston Oilers to a pair of AFL titles and served as a backup on the Raiders' 1967 Super Bowl loser. Bob Griese led Miami to two titles, including a perfect season in 1972.
They are Hall of Famers, like all from the lists above (except Brady).
It doesn't take multiple titles to get into Canton. In the cases of Marino, Dan Fouts and Sonny Jurgensen (Van Brocklin's backup in Philly), no titles. Fran Tarkenton and Jim Kelly lost multiple Super Bowls.
Joe Namath and Steve Young each won one; Young was Montana's backup in two others. Brett Favre will get in with one in two tries. So will Peyton Manning, even if he never plays again. Kurt Warner, who split two in St. Louis and also took Arizona to the big game, is expected to make it.
The Raiders' Jim Plunkett is a two-time champion spurned by the Hall.
Among active QBs, the Giants' Eli Manning is trying to pass his brother and catch the Steelers' Ben Roethlisberger with two rings.
A final thought on Brady
After missing almost the entire 2008 season with a knee injury, he's had to change some things: Run offenses with no deep threats like Randy Moss or featured backs like Corey Dillon. Utilize his tight ends and possession receivers more. Run some no-huddle. Without a lot of the defensive stars of the earlier clubs (Tedy Bruschi, Richard Seymour, Willie McGinest, Rodney Harrison), recent Patriots teams were more dependent than ever on the offense and its leader.
Just getting to Sunday has been one of Brady's finest hours.
Prediction
N.Y. Giants, 26-21
Championship week: 1-1. Playoffs: 5-5. Regular season: 174-82 (.678)
Contact the writer:
402-444-1032, john.rodino@owh.com
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