An Example

In September 2002 Paul Zimmerman  is quoted: 

Hayes began to make his mark on the NFL as soon as he arrived: He led the league with 21.8 yards per catch in his rookie season, and he sustained that career average of 20 yards per reception, a figure few players even approach nowadays for a single season.

The zone defense had existed in the NFL before his arrival, but it was crude by today's standards, and Hayes could destroy that kind of coverage the same way he did man-to-man alignments.

So coaches came up with a double zone to try to control him. A cornerback would play him tight as he came off the line—in those days defenders could do anything they wanted to a receiver, except grab and hold—and another defensive back would pick him up deep.

Or coaches would assign the deepest defensive back, usually the free safety, to make sure he stayed behind Hayes, which opened up vast areas underneath. No other player caused that kind of strategic overhaul of the defensive game.

Zimmerman continued,

"That alone should have earned Hayes a spot in Canton, but in 1979, two years before he became eligible for enshrinement, he was sentenced to five years in prison for selling narcotics; he was paroled after serving 10 months.

His alcohol and drug problems were a shock to those who knew him. He was a decent, forthright person with...well, major problems.

But that was enough to keep him out of Canton, even though, according to the guidelines, a candidate should be judged solely on the basis of his performance on the field.

By the 1990s he was no longer a modern Hall of Fame candidate. He had been relegated to the Seniors pool, which can yield only one candidate a year and sometimes produces none.

"The situation with Bob Hayes and the Hall of Fame is one of the most tragic stories I've ever been associated with during my time in professional football," said Tex Schramm, the Cowboys' former president and general manager.

But Schramm was a one-man selection committee for the Cowboys' Ring of Honor, and he never admitted Hayes. Jerry Jones, the team's owner since 1989, didn't admit Hayes until last year."

 

The Reality

The reality of the quote is that the HOF is to select a candidate and judge a candidate solely on the basis of his performance on the field. 

So when a player delivers on the playing field, so then the HOF must deliver in accordance with the guidelines, otherwise the integrity issues arise.

For example, just as Zimmerman noted that Hayes “led the league with 21.8 yards per catch in his rookie season, the data shows that Wells was outstanding during his rookie year with Oakland, with 23.2 yards per catch. 

Furthermore, the year before Wells attained this number, he was in the military in Alaska, serving his country after being drafted into the U.S. Army.

He willingly served his country although that service caused a gap in his professional football career. 

Wells’ overall average exceeds Hayes.  In fact, his average is well above the 2009 Super Bowl wide receivers. 

 

Hayes and Wells had speed

If we compare Wells with Hayes, a conjecture would be that Hayes had speed and Wells had speed on the playing field. 

Zimmerman said that the defensive strategy had to change to control or stop Hayes, and a reasonable conjecture is that it had to change to stop Warren Wells, too.

It’s about time we exhume the records and take a good look, rather microscopic in nature, to study the DNA of the situation.  Innocent oversight is one thing; but intent to overlook excellent performance on the football field is not acceptable in the 21st century. 

The power of a critical eye, and the power of the media will have to be blended to jointly reconsider the performance on the field and come into compliance with the HOF guidelines. 

 

Career Length: An Issue or Not?

Another important point for rebuttal is career length.  The argument can be discussed in the context of the average career length of an NFL player.  According to research,  we have:  “The average career of an NFL player is 3 1/2 seasons, according to the NFLPA.”

The amazing fact about Wells’ career is that he made history during an intense five year career and his career length exceeds that of the average NFL player, and his length has qualified him for his NFL benefits, so why not give him his glory commensurate with his mark on history?

Can you imagine the depression of someone who knows that he gave his best on the football field, but was not judged for the content of his character on the field in accordance to the HOF guidelines.

Just as the Obama campaign promised change, so there must be change in how we honor those who did their best on the job, on the field, yet have been overlooked so long that some of them are finally recognized posthumously. 

Hayes passed away in 2002, and seven years later, he is being honored.  Wells is 66 years old, alive and well in his hometown, and he needs to be honored for his performance on the field in a game that gave him joy and a place to excel. 

As a child before he was eight years old, Warren Wells and his family lived on a plantation in near Franklin, La.  What great heights he attained after such an humble beginning which reminds us of the struggles for freedom, dignity, and justice for all in America. 

 

More Examples of Errors in History

In 1999 Pope John Paul honored Galileo 359 years after his death—the Catholic church failed to recognize its error in judging Galileo and it took years to correct the flawed thinking. 

Henry Flipper, the first black man to graduate West Point was overlooked and falsely accused, yet the strength and integrity of President William Jefferson Clinton addressed the errors and corrected them, thereby restoring honor to Mr. Flipper who was honored in a Presidential ceremony in the Twentieth century.  

This article sets forth a proposal to set the record straight, do the research and find all of those who have been overlooked and suppressed by selective exposure.  It is time for change.

For example, Henry Flipper suffered ill-judgment, but President William Jefferson Clinton erased the cloud around his honorable achievements.  Research indicates,

 

Clearing His Name - Examples

It was the Civil Rights movements of the 1950s and 1960s and a concerted effort by historians to tell the story of all Americans that brought attention to the circumstances surrounding Flippers dismissal.

The case was reviewed by the Army Board for Correction of Military records. In late 1976, the board changed Flipper's dismissal to an honorable discharge.

While acknowledging that Flipper had falsified reports and lied to his commanding officer, the board ruled that the sentence of the court and its approval by the president was "unduly harsh, and therefore unjust."

In the 1999 Executive Grant of Clemency, President Clinton granted "a full and unconditional pardon to Lieutenant Henry Ossian Flipper." Source:  http://www.africanamericans.com/HenryFlipper.htm

There are numerous examples of “unduly harsh and unjust” acts in world history and American history.  Similar oversights and injustices have impacted the lives of professional athletes, some of whom were from very modest sociocultural backgrounds before they achieved on the professional football field.

In many cases, the legal, political and media support systems were not in place to uphold and defend the good in their careers on the field, thereby leaving them to become overlooked and plagued by “hearsay” rather than by rigorous research to present the data to characterize their impact on the playing field.

A contemporary example of performance on the football field is Santonio Holmes, the Super Bowl XLIII MVP, who has several off the field challenges yet we must respect his data. 

During his second year in professional football his 18.1 Y/R (2007) average is outstanding, but it was exceeded by Wells in 1969.

Conclusion

Let’s us take a good look, and let us exercise an intense passion for truth, clearer perceptions, and let us recognize men and women for their performance on the field.

Appendix - A Student Project

Take a Good Look, using Mathematics --"Wells' career short, but robust"

Forty-six years ago a young man greeted me in the

hallway of the Nabrit Science Building at a Texas

university, in Houston, Texas. He was on his way

to Mrs. Corinne Newell's mathematics class and I was

taking a break, walking down the hallway. That moment

began an adventure in collaboration and I am taking a

good look at the people and experiences of the past. 

The man, an elementary education major, who spoke to

me in the hallway is Warren Wells.

He became a professional football player, a wide

receiver, while I became a mathematics professor.

After re-encountering him in February 2007, I began to

search for some way to measure the impact of his

career. 

Unfortunately, I did not archive statistics on

the NFL or on his career. 

On May 18, 2008, however, a

sports enthusiast and researcher published a

quantitative analysis of thirty-three of the NFL wide

receivers, starting with Don Hutson (January 31, 1913

-- June 24, 1997).  

Wells, a veteran who is now 65

years old, was included. I scanned the data and saw

that Wells ranked No. 1 in two categories, and it

looks like he has held that rank for about 38 years. 

I decided to compare Warren Wells with Jerry Rice by

analyzing the plot of the data for the two wide

receivers. 

Letting the leftmost, lower corner of the

chart be (0,0), I let the vertical axis represent

ranking and the horizontal axis categories (spaced at

5 point intervals). 

So, if Rice, an NFL wide receiver,

ranked 5 in the fifth subcategory, there was a point

in his data set of (5, 5). Data points were plotted

and a line graph was drawn for both Rice and Wells.

The next step was to turn the problem over to my

calculus class and ask the students to calculate the

area under each of the line graphs. 

One of my students who received his law degree from Harvard University

saw a few flaws in our approach. I encouraged him to

improve our initial approach. The students then

realized that the incrementation of the x axis was

arbitrary, and the size of the intervals of the x axis

did not matter as long as the same partitioning was

used for each player, and that the length of each

interval on the x axis was the same (uniform). 

The students got excited because they were using

calculus to analyze historic NFL data, and they were

totally surprised that the mathematics professor was

talking about great wide receivers. The students began

to take a good look at the NFL data, using

mathematics. 

What were the results of the study? Well, the students

concluded that overall Rice ranked higher than Wells,

although Wells ranked higher in two subcategories. His

rank is No. 1 in "Yards/Reception" and in Rushing

"Yards/Attempt". He has held the top rank for 38

years, which is longer than Rice's career of 20 years.

Using calculus, the total area under Rice's curve was

found to be greater than the area under Wells' curve.

The difference in the areas was not that large. Also,

although Rice's overall average rank is greater than 

Well's, Rice is ranked No. 1 in only one category,

"TDs/Game." 

In the three categories for "Rushing" Wells, Don

Hutson and Rice each rank No. 1 in one category. 

Hutson, the first NFL wide receiver, dominates

"Yards/Game" while Rice dominates "TDs/Game" and Wells

dominates "Yards/Attempt". The alumnus from Texas

Southern University has career statistics that are

shining bright in 2008. 

My students and I encourage you to take a good look at

the data on

http://www.behindthesteelcurtain.com/2008/5/18/520032/quantitative-analysis-of-t

and decide whose career statistics stands out over a

long time period. You may be surprised at your

results. Here is a short report based on student

input: 

Calculus students analyzed a quantitative analysis

comparing the career statistics of Rice and Wells.

They created a model for each player by graphing a

piecewise defined function connecting ranks and then

used integration to find the area under the piecewise

linear curves. The students asked, "Why hasn't Wells

been considered as a nominee to the Hall of Fame since

he ranks No. 1 in two of the seven categories in the

quantitative study?" They noted that the statistics

indicate that Wells has ranked No. 1 in two categories

for about 38 years. Source: WolfpackSteelersFan

Student Project for Calculus

For this project, we compared the “greatness” of two very talented football players, Jerry Rice and Warren Wells.  To do this, we examined a list on rankings for several categories. We then took this information and created a graph for each player. 

We decided that we could determine the area under the curve and that the player with the largest total area would be “the greatest.” To do this, we divided the graph into sections and determined the area of each section and then took the sum of the sections.

We took the first two ordered pairs, for Jerry Rice that was (5, 27) and (10,27).

We used these to find the slope:

m= (y₂-y₁)/(x₂-x₁) = (27-27)/(10-5)= 0/5= 0

We then plugged the slope and the first ordered pair into the slope-intercept formula:

y-y₁=m(x-x₁)

y-27= 0(x-5)

y= 27

To get the area under the curve, we next took the integral of the equation we just got:

∫₀⁵  y dy

∫₀⁵ (27)

27x ]₀⁵

((27)(5))-((27)(0))

135

 The following is a list of the sets of ordered pairs we used:

Jerry Rice:

(5,27) (10,27)

(10,27) (15,13)

(15,13) (20,29)

(20,29) (25,32)

(25,32) (30,27)

(30,27) (35,33)

(35,33) (40,28)

(40,28) (45,29)

(45,29) (50,6)

Warren Wells:

(5,6) (10,10)

(10,10) (15,33)

(15,33) (20,28)

(20,28) (25,28)

(25,28) (30,33)

(30,33) (35,29)

(35,29) (40,10)

(40,10) (45,28)

(45,28) (50,11)

The total areas we calculated were:

Jerry Rice =1177.4

Warren Wells =1047.5

Therefore, we concluded that Jerry Rice is overall the greater of these two football players.