DeMarcus Ware Didn't Get Snubbed

 By John Turney 

Jason Taylor

From looking at Twitter we gleaned that some fans, many Cowboys fans, think DeMarcus Ware was "snubbed" in the Hall of Fame voting. They seemed to think he deserved first-ballot status. 

Sports Illustrated's Rick Gosselin wrote an excellent piece concerning that issue. You can read that HERE.

Gosselin noted: 

"DeMarcus Ware will get a bust in Canton. There are 10 players ahead of him on the all-time sack list eligible for the Hall of Fame and all have been enshrined. Ware was deserving a bust in the Class of 2022 – but so were the five players elected. Every year there are too many qualified candidates but too few seats at the table.

Ware’s time is coming."

We agree. 

Another point made on Twitter is that if Jason Taylor as first-ballot edge rusher then Ware had to be since, well, their numbers were comparable.

For one, Taylor was a fluke. Our view is that it was an oddity that Taylor made it into the Hall that soon and it is our view he didn't earn the kind of cachet a Deacon Jones or Lawrence Taylor did. But that's our view maybe other don't agree or don't put stock in first-ballot versus all others.

The fact is that the top four defensive ends, to football fans with some depth of knowledge, can be identified by first name—Gino, Deacon, Reggie, and Bruce. Now Jason? We don't think so. We can think of quite a few ends that had better careers that waited longer. But the deed was done and we live with it. 

DeMarcus Ware

As for Ware, it is true that Taylor and his numbers are reasonably close, it is also accurate to say that Taylor's numbers were a bit better. Not a ton, but some.

Here is a chart for comparison. 

(Click to enlarge)

*note: 12 TDs included 3 safeties, defensive scores would be a better title

Ware had the more frequent honors in terms of All-Pros and Pro Bowls and All-Conferences but he never was an NFL Defensive Player of the Year or Conference Defensive Player of the Year. Taylor also led in Player of the Week and Month awards. 

Taylor was both. Taylor has more position player of the year awards as well. He also had better stats with 409.5 "big plays" to 281 for Ware. (For us "big plays" is defined as sacks plus picks, plus fumbles forced and recovered, run stuffs, and passes deflected)

So while we can see the argument for them being basically the same, we can also see that Taylor made more big plays, played longer, and won the higher honors. Ware was more frequent in his honors. 

Just food for thought for Ware's fans. neither he nor Taylor are the stuff of Marchetti, Reggie White, Bruce Smith, Lawrence Taylor, etc., but they are still worthy Hall of Famers, and Ware, in our view, will get in next year. Taylor's first ballot inclusion? An odditiy.