NFL.com's Chris Wesseling says no. http://www.nfl.com/news/story/0ap1000000210224/article/ranking-the-nfl-wide-receivers After taking a look at all the names I would have to agree, I think every receiver on this list is better than Hartline. 1. Calvin Johnson 2. Larry Fitzgerald 3. A.J. Green 4. Julio Jones 5. Dez Bryant 6. Brandon Marshall 7. Demaryius Thomas 8. Percy Harvin 9. Andre Johnson 10. Vincent Jackson 11. Steve Smith 12. Roddy White 13. Reggie Wayne 14. Hakeem Nicks 15. Jordy Nelson 16. Mike Wallace 17. Dwayne Bowe 18. Victor Cruz 19. Randall Cobb 20. Marques Colston 21. Greg Jennings 22. Torrey Smith 23. Cecil Shorts 24. Pierre Garcon 25. Jeremy Maclin 26. Antonio Brown 27. Eric Decker 28. Steve Johnson 29. Wes Welker 30. Miles Austin 31. DeSean Jackson 32. Sidney Rice 33. Kenny Britt 34. Danny Amendola 35. Mike Williams 36. James Jones 37. Denarius Moore 38. Josh Gordon 39. Anquan Boldin 40. Danario Alexander
Uhm, yeah, "projection". And we had Brandon Marshall, he's not a top 10 player. Miles Austin? Really? Ah, haters gonna hate.
Some of those guys are there on merit like Austin and Jennings who I would absolutely not take over Hartline and other like Shorts, Moore and Maclin are there based more on projection and I wouldnt take them over Hartline either. Moore and Maclin are injury prone and Shorts got a lot of garbage time yards though I wont take too much away of him because hes actually good and I like him. Desean Jackson is also too low for my liking. Sidney Rice is borderline. Hartline should probably slot in at like 32 or 33 right around where Britt is.
Hartline is definitely better than some of those WRs. Maclin, Rice, Britt, and a few more. Hartline aside, the list isn't very good IMO. There is no way I would ever take Dez Bryant over Victor Cruz, for example.
Depends on the criteria you're judging them by... now, say, you were judging them by whether they can fall down the most making routine plays, then you'd definitely have to move Hartline pretty high up there... ;-) No argument on those on that list given the criteria they were ranking them by...
What difference does it make? Hartline has suffered from poor QB play his whole career. Let's see what happens this year.
Jesus you guys are homers. Hartline better than Miles Austin, Maclin etc??? Put down the pipe my friends, and a healthy Kenny Britt poops all over BH. There are 32 teams so if you ONLY took the 1's and 2's that's 64 names. I would have Hartline borderline 40-45, and make no mistake I love the guy.
As soon as I got to Andre Johnson I knew I wouldn't enjoy this list. Guy was second in the NFL in yards last year. WTF was this guy smoking? Finishing it confirmed it for me. EDIT: I don't know how the receiver with the 16th most yards in the NFL isn't a top 40 receiver. This is a horrible absolutely ****ty list.
IMO after about 22 you could debate most any of them, in a general sense. And if you consider Hartline's rapport with RT then he'd be higher on the list for us. Fans tend to forget that you can't just take a player from one system, transplant him and get the same stats he had before or have your team's offensive stats increase by the same amount. Fit is a huge part of things. A guy like Marshall is IMO a far superior WR to Hartline, but he probably wouldn't be a better fit for us right now. So if you were making a list of the best WRs for Miami and for RT I think the list would look very different.
Underline "healthy", Austin and Britt have issues with staying healthy. Maclin..eh..same issues. Put it this way, his argument is "..i'm not talking about 2012 production, I'm talking about 2013 PROJECTION..." Basically meaning what he THINKS they will do in 2013, inow, just an opinion piece.
Sorry but I don't put Austin ahead of Hartline by much at all if any. Austin with 943 yards on 118 targets, 2012. Hartline with 1083 yards on 128 targets, 2012. With Dez Bryant drawing double-teams and Jason Witten working the middle of the field I'd say Hartline did a decent job. EDIT: Whatever your smoking. Well never mind. Changed I am enjoying a few beers sorry. Dallas fan?
austins been injured what? Two years in a row now? Maybe he's superior if you assume his seasons before that weren't an anomaly and don't take into account injury.
Hartline averages less than 2 TDs/less than 700 yrds a season. That is not the resume of a top 40 WR...that's the resume of Top 20 TE.
Last year was his first year as a full starting receiver. Of course his average numbers aren't going to look great.
And in his first year when there was literally no other option on the other side of the field he just barely broke a 1000 yrds for a meh 14ish ypc and 1 lousy TD. On no planet is that a evidence of a good WR. I'm going to start begging people to open their eyes soon.
Well first he physicality. He's got about 2 inches and 20 lbs on Cruz. Dez is a true number 1 in all aspects of the position, he excels in every category. IMO Victor would not have seen the success he has the past few seasons if it wasn't for the presence of Hakeem. He can't go up and get the ball at it's highest point like Dez does, Victor's more of a slot guy and he's very good at it but I don't think he can impact the game as much as Bryant. For example you can't just toss it up to Cruz and rely on him to beat the defender one on one and make a play, he's more of a timing and space route runner. Also Victors hands can be suspect when it comes to routes across the middle.
His 14.6 YPC ranked 25 in the NFL. He was top 15 in yards. All this under a QB that wasn't very good last year. That's very good. He did it in an efficient manner, as well. YPT was north of 9. That pretty much sums up why he's a top 30-35 WR.
Rice and Austin are on that list from performances 2 seasons + ago. I'd take hartine over either one of them
dez disappears for whole games. I wouldn't say his impact is all that great. Dez also has whitten, romos favorite outlet.
Big picture, it was not as if Henne and Tannehill were tossing all manner of Td passes even with Marshall here and Bush having a career yrs. Quite frankly, our Qb play has been subpar for his entire career here. IIRC Henne never threw more Td's then int's here, and neither did Tannehill. In fact, their Td production was abysmal.
25th out 32 #1 WRs is bad. 15th out 32 #1 WRs is average. 32nd out of 32 #1 WRs is literally the worst. If you think being a top 35 WR when there's only 32 #1s is an achievement...then ok you win.
And yet he had a personal record year with Tannehill. Fine, since stats don't matter and tape doesn't matter and common sense doesn't matter and the only thing we're obviously allowed to go by is magic...then tell me...what do you predict Hartline would do with a great QB?
I agree. He's not a number one. That wasn't the argument, though. Somehow I think you knew that but I'll let you slide.
I'm fairly certain you were also using his stats as #1 to prove your point.....were you not? I don't agree he's a top 35 WR. I think he's in the 50s, which would put him about average for a #2.
I think based off what he did last year, he's a top 35 WR. It just so happens he was our #1. Now he's our number #2, but I don't expect his numbers to decrease. I expect his numbers to increase.
If thats the case then why is Reggie Wayne at 13 when hes probably the 3rd best receiver on his team? Steve Smith at 11? Smith is good, at his peak great, but if youre projecting for this year you cant put Smith above Jordy Nelson. The list has no basis for it rankings.
Obviously, the staff believes Hartline is a better WR than his stats portray and Mike Wallace is a top 20 WR. I'm pretty sure they could have gotten Jennings if Philbin thought he was worth it. Finally, it's all about QB play and I think we finally have an above average prospect. Everything about the kid screams winner.
Again, the numbers bear out that he's an average #2 WR, which put him in the 40-50 range. For argument's sake, if you're right and his numbers stay the same and Wallace/Gibson pull their averages, then that will be proof positive the problem this last year wasn't Tannehill, but was Hartline and Bess.
His numbers bear out that's he's a top 35 receiver. That's not an average number two. Your last paragraph doesn't make sense.