Julius Peppers—Poised to be First-ballot Hall-of-Fame Inductee?

By John Turney 

Julius Peppers, the former defensive end who starred with Carolina, Chicago and Green Bay, will be a Hall-of-Famer soon, and that's not exactly news. The only question is: How soon?

When the Pro Football Hall of Fame announces its list of 15 finalists next month for the Class of 2024, guaranteed, Peppers' name will be on it. That's a certainty. Furthermore, there's a likelihood that he will also be a first-ballot selection.

But I hedge there because that part is no lock.

And here's why: Similar edge rushers recently have gotten different treatment by voters. Where Jason Taylor made it on his first try (2017), for example, DeMarcus Ware (2023) and Michael Strahan (2014) each had to wait a year.

So which will it be for Peppers? 

It shouldn't matter. What does is that Peppers had a truly great career worthy of induction and one that, statistically, few edge rushers can boast -- checking all the so-called "boxes" that voters often talk about.

Let's take a look:

-- First up is longevity and durability.  Peppers played 17 seasons and 266 games. Among defensive ends, only Hall-of-Famer Bruce Smith and Jim Marshall played more.

Also noteworthy is that Peppers missed just two games due to injury. He did miss four during his rookie season because of a league-imposed suspension after testing positive for a banned substance, one Peppers thought was allowed.

So, lesson learned for someone who played so long and missed so few games. That is rare. But so was Peppers.

-- Then there are the stats, the numbers box. His 159-1/2 sacks trail only Bruce Smith, Reggie White and Kevin Greene on the official NFL sack list. But even if you count unofficial sacks, only Deacon Jones would be ahead of Peppers among the pre-1982 guys.

Peppers had more sacks than edge rushers Chris Doleman, Michael Strahan, Lawrence Taylor Jason Taylor, Richard Dent, DeMarcus Ware, Jared Allen, Derrick Thomas, Dwight Freeney and anyone else you'd care to name, Hall-of-Fame or not.

The bottom line is that Peppers could put heat on passers like few others in the history of the game.

-- Not only that, but when Peppers reached the quarterback he was able to dislodge the ball like few others. He forced 51 fumbles. Since 1994, only Hall-of-Fame semifinalist Robert Mathis has more.

-- Peppers was also adept at pouncing on free footballs. He recovered 21 fumbles and was second among defensive ends in all-time interceptions with 11. Plus, his four pick-sixes are the most of any defensive lineman.

His interceptions were not just "freak" things like tipped balls that fell into his lap; they were often by design, with Peppers dropping into coverage on zone blitzes, making a break on the ball and picking it off. Or he'd read a screen pass and use his size to reach up and snatch the ball out of the air.

That's 32 takeaways for "Pep,"as he was called, one of only a handful of defensive ends to top 30.

-- Want more? After securing the ball, he'd take off like the running back he was in high school -- totaling 293 return yards on his interceptions and 131 yards on fumble recoveries. When you add his two scoop-and-scores to pick-sixes, you'll find that only Jason Taylor (nine) and George Martin (seven) have more defensive scores than the six Peppers had among defensive ends.

-- For good measure, throw in passes defended -- plays when a defender knocks a pass down, causing it to fall to the turf, or when he's credited with "defending" the throw.  Peppers was credited with 82. Among Hall-of-Fame edge rushers, only Jason Taylor had more with 99, though research shows Ed "Too Tall" Jones with over 100 such plays. So count Peppers third.

That's another category of huge defensive plays where Peppers is near the best-ever. Seeing a pattern?

-- But what about special teams? Did he do anything special there?

Yes. He blocked 13 placekicks, including 12 field goals and one PAT. Only one player since 1999 has more -- that was Shaun Rodgers with 17, though Tennessee's Denico Autry is close, with his 11th block Monday vs. Miami. 

"In essence," the Chicago Tribune said when Peppers signed with the Bears in 2010,  "Peppers has taken 25 points off the board (eight blocked field goal attempts, one blocked extra point attempt) in his career. 

"In terms of defensive ends, he's the best at it," said Lions' special teams coach Danny Crossman, who coached him on the Panthers' special teams. "He'll get you a couple every year. You can write it down."

The 25 points taken off the board then ended up being 37 by the end of Peppers' career.

Sacks, forced fumbles, recoveries, interceptions, defensive scores, deflected passes, blocked kicks -- you name it Peppers did it. The man was a walking "splash play" -- with 255-1/2 in his career when you add all the mentioned stats except passes defensed. Only Bruce Smith and Reggie White -- arguably the two best defensive ends in history -- had more.

"I don't know what else there is to do in a game," said Mike Rucker, Peppers' former teammate in Carolina, "except maybe take snaps under center at quarterback."

Another important box is the "Alls"-- the all-decade selections, All-Pro, Pro Bowl and All-Conference choices -- and Peppers checks that one, too. He was on both the NFL's 2000's and 2010's all-decade teams, a consensus All-Pro three times and named to nine Pro Bowls.

Nine. 

That's more than any Hall-of-Fame defensive end not named Reggie White, Bruce Smith or Gino Marchetti, all of whom were elected to the Hall in their first years of eligibility. He was also a four-time NFC Defensive Player of the Month, as well as the NFL Rookie of the Month in October 2002.

The "eye test" is another of the proverbial "boxes," and, yes, Peppers checks that, too. In short, he was a freak athlete. In a world where that term is overused, it applied to Peppers.

In volumes.

"A Bigger Deacon Jones"

When he emerged from the University of North Carolina, he stood just over 6-feet-6 and 283 pounds (eventually weighing over 295 and standing close to 6-feet-7) and had excellent quickness - with a reported sub-4.7 40 time and a vertical leap of 36-1/2 inches. Both are remarkable for someone his size.

But he had extraordinary reach, too, with arms so long that ESPN described him as having "the wingspan of a 747," and that reach helped him as much as the classic "triangle numbers" of size, speed and strength. Look at any photo or film clip of Peppers, and you see that his arms are not only expansive; they're muscular, too, what scouts called "guns" due to their size. 

Peppers used his quickness to get to passers and tremendous strength and leverage to push tackles backward. It was a combination of power and speed, and it distinguished him from finesse edge rushers. He simply made plays others could not, including chasing down running backs from behind or returning fumbles or interceptions for touchdowns.

In his second year in the NFL, Peppers was instrumental in the Panthers reaching Super Bowl XXXVIII, where they lost to New England on a last-second Adam Vinatieri field goal. But that was a Carolina team that was 1-15 the year before it made Peppers the second overall pick of the 2002 NFL draft.

He was what Hall-of-Fame coach Dick Vermeil called a "bigger Deacon Jones," and Vermeil should know: He was a Rams' assistant coach in 1969 and saw Jones up close. So he knew a physical freak when he saw one. 

But so did the Panthers. According to team officials, Peppers was the most researched and studied player in the team's history at that time. For the Carolina Panthers in 2002, there was no room for a miss. It had to be a home run.

And it was, 

"One of my favorite players to watch on film is Julius Peppers," Hall-of-Fame candidate Jared Allen told NFL Films. "The way he can move and do the things he does over his span of the years is still impressive."

As I've detailed, Peppers' body of work is impressive and Hall-worthy. The only question may be the timing of his election, i.e. if he can jump a couple of other edge rushers who've been finalists and are on Canton's doorstep, waiting to be voted in.

Among those is Jared Allen. Another is Dwight Freeney. Like Peppers, both have solid credentials. Nevertheless, it's possible that Peppers' career may be dissected so thoroughly that nitpickers will argue against first-ballot inclusion. I'm not saying it happens; simply that it's possible.

Maybe it's something like the Defensive Player-of-the-Year Award that Jason Taylor won but Peppers did not. He was fourth twice. Strahan won one, too, yet he still was bumped a year. Or it might be that Peppers didn't have a pair of NFL sack titles like Strahan and Ware or one like Jason Taylor.

Peppers never had a monster sack season of, say, 18, 20 or 22. His career high was 14-1/2, a respectable number, but not one that will win you a Deacon Jones Award (the NFL award for a given season's sack champion). Since sacks became official in 1982, 36 players have had two or more seasons with 14 or more sacks.

Peppers had the one.

But he was usually in double digits (10 of 17 seasons), and since 1982, only Bruce Smith and Reggie White had more seasons of 10-plus sacks. So, while Peppers didn't have an abundance of huge sack seasons, he was consistent year-in and year-out in getting to quarterbacks.

And that's how you get to be in the top five in sacks all-time -- with consistency.

"I was never really a stat-chaser," Peppers once told Scott Fowler of the Charlotte Observer. "I really didn't care about having this amount of sacks in a season or a career." 

Maybe. But he sure racked them up.

Yet critics contend that Peppers was not a great run defender, and that's not really fair. Was he good? Yes. Great? Probably not. But if you look at many of the top pass-rushing defensive ends, few were considered elite run defenders. And that includes some Hall-of-Famers. 

Look, few ... if any ... players have perfect resumes. Maybe Jim Brown but no one else I can think of. Almost all others will have a small flaw or two, yet they didn't damage their first-ballot chances. I mean, what do people want? Physically, Julius Peppers was a cross between Michael Jordan and Lawrence Taylor -- both Tar Heels -- but not quite as good as both. But how many people played in the NCAA basketball Final Four as well as a Super Bowl?

Has to be a short list.

Had Peppers played more of his NFL career in media centers like Chicago (Jordan) or New York (Taylor) rather than Charlotte, who knows what kind of attention he may have garnered?

"Everything you can ask from a player on the field," said Strahan, a defensive end who played his entire career in New York, "the leadership, the stats, the showing up every week .. the putting in the work and also being great citizen off the field ... he gave you every bit of that."

Yes, he did. And more.