Quote:1. Tony Boselli

2. Jimmy Smith

3. Fred Taylor

4. Keenan McCardell

5. Mark Brunell

 

There's so much to respond to here I need to do it in quote. The bottom line is that I disagree with Mark being on this list, although he certainly fits in the top 10. This is less a knock on Mark who I felt transformed as a qb going into the '98 season with super-clutch play along with dominating performances. And that's saying a lot considering how good he was in years prior. But still, as a qb overall you can truly only rank him so high, and I feel there's at least a couple defensive players I'd put over him.


 

Sorry, no love for the defense. As much as I liked Maths, Darius, Hardy and Brackens. You can't really say any of those guys had a bigger impact for the franchise than those top five players I just named on offense. Mathis was decent for maybe a two or three year stretch. He wasn't a year in, year out pro-bowl caliber cornerback.

 

I can go back and forth on Mathis. I recently ranked him #2 overall on defense because there is a bit of an argument as to who the best overall defender is between Brackens and him. That said, I'm firmly on the Brackens side and might even buy an argument that he doesn't even belong in the top 5 on defense. Toward the end of his career with the Jaguars he was a mess, although I must say it's great to see him overcome that and play so well for the Lions down the stretch. Still, Mathis has made several huge game-changing plays, although the same can be said about underrated guys like Joel Smeenge and Aaron Beasley.


 

Darius was too one dimensional as a strong safety. He had cement hands and was a liability in pass coverage at times. He was a good square for square tackler and could help in the box. That was about it.

 

Still, his run stuffing rivals the great names in league history at the position, and I'm talking about guys like Ronnie Lott, Steve Atwater and John Lynch. The guy was literally in every tackle, and down the stretch in his franchise years he improved tremendously against the pass. I agree you can't put a S in the top 5, but Darius was easily worth his franchise dollars.


 


Hardy only played five seasons in Jacksonville. And he honestly only had ONE outstanding year of football. 1999 was as good as it would get with him and after that he got quiet. He didn't live up to the selection we grabbed him at in 1996 to be honest with you.

 

Totally agree. Hardy is on my list of most overrated Jaguars in history.


 

In fact, the only linebacker Jacksonville ever had that I would consider placing in the top five overall is Daryl Smith, and even his year in, year out statistics were just "okay" for his position.

 

Hold on for a second. You're totally sleeping on Mike P, who I personally feel is far and away the best LB in team history. Daryl did his job and did it well, but Mike took the game to another level. Peterson had this way of getting up close to the line of scrimmage to repeatedly stuff RBs for less than a two-yard gain, if not no gain or a loss. Like Darius, Peterson was literally in every tackle, and you couldn't sleep on him in the passing game either. In terms of greatness as a player, I'm putting Peterson over Brunell, alhtough not in the top five especially given how he ended things with the team by getting all pissy with Del RIo.


 

Brackens gets a lot of love from the fanbase. And that's because this team has seen a drought and abyss at defensive end since his departure in 2003. But he only had 55.0 career sacks in Jacksonville. And just like Hardy, in 1999, that was his biggest and best year here. With that said. He had another decent run a year after that. I believe in 2001 he had another double digit sack season. We definitely got more out of him with a 2ND RD pick over the production we got out of Hardy with the 1ST RD pick.

 

Brackens was a breath of fresh air on defense providing a consistent pass rush. He easily transformed the entire defense to another level with his much like Von Miller currently does for the Broncos defense. He had several great years with the team including the absolutely phenomenal season you're referring to. I even remember in the '99 Championship Game when the rest of the defense was whooped and practically gave up, Brackens was doing his stuff right to the end. He showed me serious heart that day despite the loss. I have no problem saying he had even more of an impact that Brunell.


 

As far as overall impact though. Boselli was the best at what he did for a solid five years. Can't say that about the rest of these players. Taylor, Smith, McCardell and Brunell have been away from this franchise for over a decade and we're MAYBE just now getting players on this team back to their level of production and impact type abilities on offense. People thought Maurice Jones-Drew would overtake Fred's career rushing mark here. As people saw. It's not so easy after all. He was great too. Don't get me wrong. I'd place him probably at the 6th slot for this franchise as far as impact. But he ran out of gas in Oakland and it made Caldwell look like a genius for not caving into his salary demands. The fact that Fred missed 60+ potential games and STILL ran for over 11,000 yards here in Jacksonville is insane. I know people love Adrian Peterson today. But Fred Taylor was essentially Adrian Peterson during his prime when he was healthy. It was Coughlin's fault for him not getting as many rushing touchdowns as he should have here. Coughlin had a tendency to pull him out of the red-zone.

 

On McCardell, we might have to start looking at ARob as even better worthy of a top five overall spot. McCardell actually had his best days after he left the team with a couple rings to show for it. Yeah he was clutch, but so is ARob, and ARob is far and way a superior athlete..