If you have or find #18, the Dolphins quad with Oronde Gadsden, Travis Minor, Jay Fiedler, and Zach Thomas on it, please get in touch with me! I am so darn close to completing this thing!
As for the card at hand, I've long described the Steelers quad in this set as one of the more expensive cards to chase. Even back when I had like half the set to collect, this card regularly was $20-30 more than any other card in the set online. Blame it on Steelers fandom, blame it on 1-2 Hall of Famers, blame it on what you will, but dang if this card wasn't a pricey one. The only other card I can compare to it is the Patriots quad with Tom Brady that I purchased a while back.
So it should come at no surprise that this Steelers quad was the second most I spent on a quad from this set. But I was finally able to talk one of the Ebay sellers down a bit from their price, so thankfully that Brady quad remains the priciest to date.
The card:
Plaxico Burress had a ton of potential as a WR, with loads of off-field situations limiting what he ended up accomplishing. Through his first two seasons, which this card represents, Burress was a first round pick with a 1,000 yard seasons under his belt. His future seemed really bright. Burress then fell off a bit in 2003-2004 and was briefly suspended by the team, leading to him seeking a new team in 2005. Plaxico signed with the New York Giants, and was similarly up and down with his new squad, with highs of a game winning touchdown catch in Super Bowl XLII and lows of his nightclub shooting incident that caused his release and two years out of the NFL. He spent a year each with the Jets and Steelers upon returning to the NFL before hanging up his cleats after 11 seasons. He finished ranked 123rd in receptions, 90th in yards, and 70th in career touchdowns among WRs - one can only imagine how much higher Burress could've climbed without missing all the games he did due to various shenanigans.
Jerome Bettis is a Hall of Famer, and was one of my favorite RBs as a kid. I was born a Patriots fan and became a Browns fan later in life, so "The Bus" shouldn't really have been a favorite of mine, but his personality was huge and his bruising running style was so fun to watch back then.
His career overall had pretty wild beginnings. I always forget that Bettis started as a Rams first round pick, who rushed onto the scene with a 1,400 yard rookie of the year season and two Pro Bowls in his first two seasons. Of course the Rams passing game was awful at the time, so teams focused a lot on Bettis. His third season was a 637 yard, 3.5 Y/A one, and the Rams figured they might've seen all there was from Bettis. They asked him if he'd move to FB, he asked for a trade, and the result was Bettis + a 3rd round pick for the Steelers 2nd and 4th round picks, which is definitely one of the more lopsided trades in history. Of interesting note - the Rams also considered trading Bettis to the Titans, but gave Bettis a choice, with him choosing the Steelers. Real curious how he would've done in Houston/Tennessee!
Post trade, Bettis ran off six straight 1,000 yard seasons and an overall total of 10,571 yards and 78 touchdowns with four more Pro Bowl nods over 10 seasons. He won a Super Bowl in his final season, and finished his career 5th in total carries and 8th in rushing yards overall. Not bad for a guy who was asked to convert to FB early in his career!
A 2nd round pick in 1995 out of Colorado, Stewart originally had a tough time unseating more traditional QBs like Neil O'Donnell and Chris Tomczak. The Steelers actually used him instead as a gadget player and he responded with some big numbers, including a 1996 where he scored five touchdowns (Including an 80 yard scamper) on just 39 carries and caught 17 passes for 293 yards. That season convinced the Steelers to give Stewart the reigns at QB, and from 1997-2001, Stewart (Mostly) was the lead QB in Pittsburgh. His passing prowess never quite lived up to his general athleticism, but he did have a pretty nice 2001 where he led the Steelers to a 13-3 record and made his only NFL Pro Bowl.
2002 was less kind to Stewart, and after being benched for XFL whiz kid Tommy Maddox, he was released in the offseason. Stewart then spent one season battling for QB1 honors before finishing his career as a backup for two years in Baltimore.
The second WR on this list, Hines Ward, is always an interesting career comparable to the aforementioned Plaxico Burress of the front of the card. When Burress was drafted in 2000, it was as a complement to the 1998 3rd round draft pick Ward, who had made a decent name for himself as a consistent possession WR for the Steelers. Drafting Burress did seem to unlock something of a next level for Ward, as he had a 94 catch-1,003 yard season the first season the Burress went over 1,000 yards, which started a string of four straight years where Ward was sent to the Pro Bowl.
Unlike Burress though, Ward continued to play games and catch footballs. Between that 2001 season and 2010, Ward never played less than 13 games and never had less than 59 catches or 732 yards. Ward was a model of consistency for the Steelers from 1998-2011, and although he only went to the Pro Bowl those four times, he did with two Super Bowls with the Steelers and finished his career 14th in receptions (With 1,000), 27th in yards, and 16th in receiving touchdowns. There's a world where Burress keeps his ish together and Ward and him go down as an all time Thunder and Lightning type receiving duo. But Ward certainly kept up his end of that bargain, and has great odds of being named the NFL Hall of Fame in the near future.
Who wins the card? Honestly this is closer than it seems, with Mr. Consistency Hines Ward deserving a lot of praise for his career. But I gotta go with Bettis here - definitely one of the all time great RBs, and his story of near FB to Hall of Fame RB is a pretty great one.
Now this card is stacked with talent. I'm a big Ward fan... but also rooted for The Bus and Slash.
ReplyDeleteIt was hard not to root for them back then!
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