Move over, Joe Montana

Well, not quite, but Warner's short run has a spot in history

Have a comment or question for Dr. Z? Click here.

Kurt Warner steps to center stage this week. Jason of Cleveland, a longtime Joe Montana fan, fears that Warner might be better than his idol. Not me. Let's not get into the physical blah blah at this point. I'm interested in the metaphysical. They both have great skills as passers. Montana is a better athlete. But what establishes Montana as the better QB in my book is/was his ability to lift his game to the highest point as the pressure reached its most intense level. Warner seems to play at the same level all the time, which is plenty good. But that always fascinated me about Montana, and when I spent time with him, doing a two-part series for the magazine, I kept hammering him with the same question: What happens to you when the pressure gets to the breaking point, how do you manage to make your game better? He hadn't the slightest idea. It was just a natural thing with him. "Maybe my concentration is better," he finally said, which was as close as he came to addressing the question.

Dave of Haslett, MI ... I forget, what's MI stand for? Michigan? Minnesota? Mississippi? Missouri? I still live in the days when you could understand abbreviations ... anyway, Dave wants me to compare Warner to Dan Fouts. Very close and they both ran, essentially, the Don Coryell offense. Let's see what Warner's career looks like at the end of 10 years or so. Right now he's had two good years and one injured year. Fouts was around for a long time. Based on his two good years, though, I'd give Warner a slight edge, but the real test will come (if it ever does) when we see how he operates with lesser talent around him. The question of "what did they win?" has never been a criterion of mine in evaluating quarterbacks.

Zeb of Tennessee Springs, Ark., wants to know what I think about the idea of the Rams blitzing Donovan McNabb with DBs. They haven't done it this year, so either they think it's unsound or their DBs aren't very good blitzers.

Rob of Winnipeg, Manitoba, wonders if McNabb is more dangerous, scrambling and hoofing it, or scrambling, pulling up and throwing? I'd say the former. You can be coached to fall back against his scramble-reads (although Chicago did a terrible job of it). When he takes off and goes, unless you've got a terrific athlete spying him (Adam Archuleta?), it's every man for himself.

From JT in Boston: What has turned it around for Kordell Stewart this year -- personal coaching, scheme or improved supporting cast? I'd say superior coaching in all phases of the offense, which affected Kordell and made him more confident, although the job Tommy Clements did with him was really outstanding. Stewart used to be a spray passer. Now he's accurate. Which means that they really worked on his fundamentals.

Carl of Blackshear, Ga., takes issue with my statement that the Steelers are strong in all departments, pointing out the kicking game and red-zone production as two weaknesses. Yes, I agree with you on both of those, of course I do. I didn't look at it carefully enough. Question No. 2 is, why didn't Billy Cowher fire his kicker, Kris Brown? Superstition, I'd guess. Fear of changing anything. Right now I think Brown is a mess, psychologically.

Sean of Brooklyn wonders if the Patriots will try to open up their offense against Pittsburgh, as they did in the second half against the Raiders. They didn't open it up; they threw short, safe passes. Except that in the second half Tom Brady was completing them. I think that's the way they'll attack the Steelers, for the simple reason that I doubt they feel he'll have enough time to go deep.

Gary of Philly wants my take on the Douglas hit on Jim Miller. If I were Hugh Douglas, I'd have done exactly the same thing. Down in the arena the officials felt that was football. In the ivory tower of his office, Gene Washington, the NFL's director of discipline, hoisted his skirts and hollered eeeeek .

William of Philly wonders what Mike Martz is trying to prove by running plays with his starters when the issue has long been decided. I've spent this week asking people that same question. The most logical answer, although it still doesn't make sense to me, came from tight end Ernie Conwell, who said that it simply never crossed Martz's mind not to.

Angus of San Diego wants to know if Cowher's success will cause owners to stay with their coaches longer. No. Every situation is different.

Thanks to Ron of Calgary for the compliments on my all-pro team. That now swells the number to four people who liked it, five counting my wife. Biggest difference between Bucs defense of '99 and '01? Brooks had a monster year then. This year, playing hurt, he was a disaster. Sapp used to be more aggressive against the double team. Overall tackling was better then. John Lynch looks like he's wearing down, as do some others. They missed Hardy Nickerson's smarts. The dropoff came, though, between '99 and '00, not this year.

Don of Burke, Va., has a lot of Redskins questions, but the essence is, how do I think they'll do? Depends if they can keep Snyder away from the personnel end of it. Jeff George, Deion, Bruce Smith, can we count the ways in which he's screwed up this team? Joe Mendes, his new personnel guy, is a solid football man. Spurrier is unproven. His Florida teams always seemed kind of soft to me. None of these guys will be able to do their jobs if Snyder keeps meddling. I'd be shocked, incidentally, if Tony Banks were Spurrier's quarterback.

Jason of Hoboken, N.J., asks the question all Jets fans are asking. Who will it be in '02, Vinny Testaverde or Chad Pennington? I don't think it matters unless they get someone to coach them. Testaverde's only good year with the Jets came when Dan Henning was the man. Pennington remains a question mark, but I don't think this staff will get much out of him, if he beats Vinny out.

Tom of Baltimore wants to know how I'll vote when Art Modell's name comes up for the Hall of Fame. I'll vote no. Right now I can think of about 50 people I'd push for ahead of Art, guys who aren't even on the ballot: Cliff Harris, Dave Robinson, Bob Hayes, Chuck Howley, Archie Manning, Lee Roy Jordan, Benny Friedman, Tommy Davis, and if you want to go back a ways, Clark Shaughnessy. Make that about 100 guys. Hell, Shaughnessy did more for the game in his few years than Modell did in his umpteen million years on all those committees.

Have a comment or question for Dr. Z? Click here.

 

Related information
Multimedia
Visit Video Plus for the latest audio and video
Search our site	Watch CNN/SI 24 hours a day
	Sports Illustrated and CNN have combined to form a 24 hour sports news and information channel. To receive CNN/SI at your home call your cable operator or DirecTV.