Dallas Cowboys veteran Jason Witten is reportedly retiring. Here’s why the former Tennessee Volunteers star is the greatest tight end in NFL history.
After 15 years, Jason Witten is reportedly calling it quits. He’s planning to retiring and join the Monday Night Football both, according to Chris Mortensen of ESPN. A Tennessee football legend, when he fell to the third round of the 2003 NFL Draft, everybody on Rocky Top knew the Dallas Cowboys got a steal. At the time, he was viewed as a lesser Jeremy Shockey.
Just saying those words out loud sounds absolutely hilarious 15 years later. Not only is Witten a much better version of Shockey. He’s actually the greatest all around tight end of all time. And in all honesty, there’s not much to debate with that either.
In most statistical receiving tight end categories, Jason Witten retires second to Tony Gonzalez. He’s fourth all-time among all players in career receptions with 1,152 and second among tight ends. On top of that, he’s 21st all time among all players in career receiving yards with 12,448 and second among tight ends.
Now, to be fair, he’s a distant fifth in career receiving touchdowns behind Gonzalez and Antonio Gates, who have 114 and111 respectively. He’s also behind Rob Gronkowski, who has 76, and Jimmy Graham, who has 69.
However, at the very worst, Witten would be called the fifth best receiving tight end of all time. Taking into account all the numbers, he’s as high as No. 2.
While being within that range, Witten also has something the others don’t. He has a reputation as an elite blocking tight end. And that’s not just a random fact we throw around. Numbers back it up.
Back in 2011, Pro Football Focus’s pass-blocking efficiency stat noted that Witten was one of the 10 best pass-blockers over a three-year span. He was on there with names like Martellus Bennett and Dallas Clark, who were slightly ahead of him, and Jeremy Shockey, who was significantly behind him.
The only person to achieve any recognition for his blocking among the elite receivers we named is Gronkowski, who did have a period as a very solid blocker. But he was not on Witten’s level.
In reality, Witten, Dallas Clark and Gronkowski are the only tight ends to be on notable lists for both their blocking efficiency and their receiving numbers. Taking that into account, who among them is the best?
Well, Witten has better overall receiving numbers than both of them by significant margins. And by the way, he had far and away the worst quarterback play of the three. Gronk and Clark had Tom Brady and Peyton Manning respectively.
In fact, let’s go back to Gates, Gonzalez and Graham, the only tight ends to have better receiving numbers than Witten in any way but who have no blocking efficiency. All three of them had better quarterback play for their career than Witten.
Sure, Witten had Tony Romo for a while. But Romo was only the starter for half of the career games Witten played. Want to know some other guys he had to play with?
Try Quincy Carter to start his career. Then let’s remember Drew Henson. Don’t forget an aging Drew Bledsoe. What about an aging Jon Kitna for half of 2010? Don’t forget Kyle Orton for a game in 2013. And who could ignore the disasters of Matt Cassel, Kellen Moore and Brandon Weeden for most of 2015?
In reality, Witten has played much of his career with bad quarterback play. Meanwhile, Gates spent his entire career with either Drew Brees or Phillip Rivers throwing him the ball. I don’t consider Rivers elite or maybe not even better than Romo. But over the course of a career, just having those two is a much better situation than what Witten had.
Graham has played his entire career with either Brees at his peak throwing him the ball in Sean Payton’s system or getting passes from Russell Wilson. Again, that’s a much better situation to be in.
Gonzalez, to be fair, can legitimately argue that he didn’t have good quarterback play for much of his career either. However, he’s the only tight end consistently ahead of him in receiving stats. And he was never a guy who made waves with his blocking.
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That brings us back to the versatility factor. Jason Witten did it all as a tight end for 15 years. He’s one of the most reliable players to ever play the position. Fans will joke that he didn’t win any rings. But such a stat is irrelevant when it comes to individual talent.