We conclude our countdown with the final 10, highlighted by some star QBs and championship-winning players.
It’s time.
Time for the final installment of a list I began last July counting down the best 101 football players in LSU history. If we’re getting technical, it’s 102, because we had a tie at No. 99.
We’ve looked at players from nearly every decade, from the early days of the program to what current players could be joining the list soon. Putting this together, I learned a lot about LSU’s history by looking at the individuals that have defined it.
[autotag]Eric Reid[/autotag] kicked us off at No. 101, and today we’ll see who came out on top, though I think you might already have a good idea who that is.
So, for one final time, let’s begin our countdown.
Over the next few weeks, LSU Wire will be releasing our list of the top 101 players in program history. It begins here with a few running backs and national title-winning defensive tackles.
LSU football has been around for a long time. Since 1893, to be exact.
In that span, plenty of great football players have come through the program. Before we begin the journey of the 2022 season, I thought I’d take a stab at ranking the 101 best players in LSU history.
I want to say a few things before we get started to take you behind the curtain on how this list was put together and throw some disclaimers in there, too.
I have tried to avoid recency bias as much as possible. It can be hard to get enough information about older players, but I did my best to get them about in the ballpark of where they should be.
Anytime there’s a list this big, people will disagree. There’s so little that separates the 50th player from the 70th, and so on.
I tried to balance consistency over multiple seasons with some players that had one great year. Both have been rewarded here. With that in mind, let’s jump right in and begin the countdown.
While it’s true Boston didn’t have a great 2020 season, we’re not huge fans of cutting him at this point. For one thing, it didn’t save a whole lot of salary cap room for 2021 – only $3.55 million according to Over the Cap. If that sounds familiar, it’s because the Panthers made a similar decision last March when they cut Eric Reid despite little cap savings and a sizable dead money penalty.
Clearly the safeties that the Panthers are signing are not meeting their standards, which makes picking up another veteran to replace Boston a wary proposition.
However, there are some excellent pending free agents at the position who deserve some serious consideration. Justin Simmons of the Broncos is just 27 and poised to cash in next month. Anthony Harris of the Vikings is two years older but in a similar situation.
The gem of course is Earl Thomas, formerly of the Seahawks and the Ravens. He’s still an otherworldly defensive talent based on what we saw from him in 2019. Thomas’ ugly exits from both Seattle and Baltimore are a concern, though. While his behavior might drive his price down, it’s also a big yellow flag. That said, if general manger Scott Fitterer believes Thomas wouldn’t be an issue off the field, then he has to at least kick the tires.
Internally, the DBs on the roster are all not ideal as far moving them to Boston’s former spot. Jeremy Chinn was going to be playing more safety anyway but he’s not the kind of defender you want playing the center field role, at least not until he improves dramatically in coverage. Juston Burris is a quality backup but also not someone you’d want starting at that spot.
Unless the Panthers are convinced somebody like Sam Franklin or Myles Hartsfield can make a dramatic second-year leap and take over for Boston, odds are they’ll have to acquire a new safety to meet this need.
Not every position can be filled via the NFL draft. This is one that likely should be added to an already-long list, though.
Ron Rivera is still open to bringing in FA safety Eric Reid to help in Washington after injuries to Deshazor Everett and Landon Collins.
Washington has had a lot of tough luck at the safety position this season, with both Landon Collins and now Deshazor Everett succumbing to injury in the past month or so.
With both players down — Collins for the season with an Achilles injury, and Everett for an unknown amount of time with a high ankle sprain — coach Ron Rivera said on Thursday that the team might still be open to bringing in free agent safety Eric Reid to help out. The team offered Reid a spot on the practice squad earlier this season after Collins went down with his injury, but Reid turned it down, claiming that he felt he deserved a spot on the active roster instead.
With Deshazor Everett batting a high ankle sprain, I asked Ron Rivera if the team might reconsider bringing in Eric Reid. Rivera said “that ship hasn’t sailed” but Washington wants to see some young players on the field first
There are still some young players on the roster that Rivera wishes to give a chance, but it’s good to know that the team is still willing to look to Reid as a potential replacement, someone who has a history with Rivera and still is good enough to play in the NFL.
Rivera said that his decision to go with Reaves and Curl over Eric Reid at safety was due to the respect they earned during training camp.
When it was announced last week that free agent safety Eric Reid would be turning down a spot on the Washington practice squad following the season-ending injury to Landon Collins, a bunch of us were left scratching our heads. It almost made too much sense for Reid to join his former coach Ron Rivera in Washington and start his NFL career back up in a defensive system that he is familiar with, so why did he turn the opportunity down.
Well, he turned it down because the offer was to join the practice squad and work his way up to the active roster, when Reid felt he was already in shape to join the active roster. For Rivera, who explained the situation on Monday, his decision to hold the starting spot at a distance from Reid is due to the respect that he gained for both Kamren Curl and Jeremy Reaves in training camp, and something that he feels he owes to them.
Ron Rivera on his discussion with @E_Reid35 and why he offered him a spot on the practice squad, which Reid declined: pic.twitter.com/uNlxwbxNZ3
“I’m one of those guys that if you come to training camp, you work your butt off, you do everything that you’re supposed to do, you deserve that opportunity before anybody else,” Rivera said. “And that kind of what I was doing with Jeremy [Reaves]. I think he earned that right here and my respect, as far as going through camp, not complaining and doing things the right way. So I wanted to give him a chance to be part of the 53 and see where he is.”
Going forward, it will be on Curl and Reaves to shore up the safety position, with the belief that Deshazor Everett can continue to hold things down at free safety. No matter how badly you wanted Reid to come in and improve the secondary, you have to respect Rivera’s reasoning for why he’s choosing to go with the young guys.
Reid turned down a spot on Washington’s practice squad, but a report shows that he likely would have accepted a place on the active roster.
Rather surprising news came out on Tuesday afternoon when it was reported that free-agent safety Eric Reid declined to accept a spot on the Washington Football Team practice squad after being offered.
Washington, who is looking to replace Pro-Bowl safety Landon Collins, who was sent to the injured reserve with an Achilles injury, offered the practice squad spot to Reid hoping that he would be able to come in and help out the team, eventually playing his way up to the active roster.
According to a report from ESPN’s John Keim, Reid says that he is above a role on the practice squad, and his decision likely would have been different had Washington offered him a role on the active roster.
“I just don’t think playing on the practice squad is reflective or indicative of my career,” Reid said, via ESPN. “I’m just not in a place to play on the practice squad right now. If they go a different direction, I’ll be ready.”
According to Keim, Washington made it clear to Reid that they are hoping to give rookie S Kamren Curl a chance to start at the position after he has had a solid start to his career playing sparingly in the secondary. With Collins now out, it will be Curl’s role going forward, assuming that they don’t sign anyone else.
Reid is a 28-year-old safety who played for two years with Ron Rivera in Carolina with the Panthers, and he set two defensive franchise records with the team last season.
After reportedly being offered a spot on Washington’s practice squad, S Eric Reid declined the invitation to reunite with Ron RIvera.
The Washington Football Team offered free-agent safety Eric Reid a spot on its practice squad and he declined, a person with knowledge of the situation confirmed. (1st by @RobMaaddi)
According to a new report, free-agent safety Eric Reid was offered a spot on Washington’s practice squad in the wake of the season-ending injury to S Landon Collins, but Reid declined the invitation.
With Collins out for the remainder of the 2020 season and moved to the injured reserve on Tuesday, it seemed likely that Washington was going to try and add Reid to the roster, as someone who head coach Ron Rivera has a bulk of experience with during their time together with the Carolina Panthers.
Now, with Reid declining to accept a position on the practice squad and potentially be activated to the roster, it appears that Washington will have to look elsewhere for their free agent needs.
With the fear that Landon Collins is out for the year with an Achilles tear, signing Eric Reid is a logical next step for Washington.
[jwplayer 9q8uU4Cl-ThvAeFxT]
It was reported on Sunday afternoon that the Washington Football Team fears that safety Landon Collins suffered a torn Achilles in the first half of Sunday’s game against the Dallas Cowboys, which would end his 2020 season.
Though Collins has not yet received an MRI on the injury, the report shows that the team is not expecting good news on Monday, and the belief is that the team will need a new starting strong safety once they come out of their bye week in Week 9.
[lawrence-related id=43246]
Though there may be players on the roster that they could turn towards, the logical step for Washington to take is signing free-agent safety Eric Reid, who has a long relationship with coach Ron Rivera after their time together in Carolina with the Panthers. Reid started 29 of 32 games for the Panthers over the past two years, and had 130 tackles in 2019 alone.
Washington has struggled at the safety position all year long, and though Collins had a great start to the day on Sunday with a strip-sack that led to a safety, they will obviously need to look elsewhere now going forward. Bringing in a trusted veteran that the coaching staff knows well should be an obvious choice for Washington, and one that we will keep our eye on going forward.
Former Panthers safety Eric Reid called out Commissioner Roger Goodell on Twitter today.
The NFL is great at pretending to care about problems without actually doing anything meaningful to address them. That’s what they did for years when it came to concussions and CTE and it’s what they’re doing now on the subject of the social justice issues that are so important to the communities of over two thirds of its players.
Despite all the feel-good-come-together videos and end racism slogans in the end zones, some critics are not impressed by what they perceive as a hypocritcal public relations campaign. Former Panthers safety Eric Reid called out Commissioner Roger Goodell on Twitter today, calling the NFL’s actions half-hearted at best. Reid continued with a second message, calling Goodell’s using video of Colin Kaepernick kneeling while continuing to rob him of his career “diabolical.”
2/2 business climate. As such, Roger Goodell uses video of Colin courageously kneeling to legitimize their disingenuous PR while simultaneously perpetuating systemic oppression, that the video he’s using fights against, by continuing to rob Colin of his career. It’s diabolical.
It was a mystery as to why Tre Boston, one of the NFL’s best safeties, couldn’t find a long-term contract. That mystery has been solved.
In today’s NFL, it is exceedingly difficult to field a great defense without a prominent free safety who can patrol the deep third of the field and take away all manner of vertical passing concepts. It’s why guys like Eddie Jackson, Kevin Byard, Devin Mccourty, Earl Thomas, and Anthony Harris make all kinds of money.
This is also why it’s highly curious that current Panthers safety Tre Boston was unable to find a long-term contract for his services from 2016 through 2018. Selected in the fourth round of the 2014 draft out of North Carolina, Boston quickly turned himself into one of the best deep safeties in the NFL for Carolina until the Panthers mysteriously waived him in May of 2017. There was a salary escalator that bumped Boston’s pay from $791,000 to $1.9 million for the 2017 season, and the Panthers saved $1.8 million in cap room by releasing him, but that’s a relative pittance for a player who had two sacks, two interceptions, 38 solo tackles, five tackles for loss, and just 12 receptions allowed on 27 targets for 178 yards, no touchdowns, and an opponent passer rating of 35.7 the year before.
Even more mysterious was the inability of the NFL to realize Boston’s value. The Chargers signed him to a one-year, $690,000 deal in 2017, and in that season, per Pro Football Focus, he allowed just three receptions on 12 targets for 19 yards, two touchdowns, five interceptions, and an opponent passer rating of 39.6.
Then, the Chargers selected Florida State safety Derwin James with the 17th overall pick in the 2018 draft, and Boston was once again a free agent. He signed a one-year, $1.5 million deal with the Cardinals for the 2018 season, and once again excelled, allowing 18 receptions on 30 targets for 189 yards, two touchdowns, three interceptions, and an opponent passer rating of 61.0 for one of the league’s worst-coached defenses.
The Cardinals weren’t interested in a reunion — instead, the Panthers, who had transferred ownership of the team from Jerry Richardson to David Tepper, game Boston a one-year, $2.125 million contract. Yet another “prove it” deal for a player who had consistently proved it for multiple teams and in multiple schemes. And in 2019 for his first NFL team, Boston allowed eight receptions on 16 targets for 125 yards, two touchdowns, three interceptions, and an opponent passer rating of 76.3.
It wasn’t until the Panthers finally coughed up a three-year, $18 million contract last March that Boston got any level of professional security, though he’s still radically underpaid for both his position, and for the excellence with which he’s played it over the last half-decade. You can count the number of deep-third safeties with this kind of consistency on one hand and still have a few fingers left.
As I watched Boston play for all these teams, I kept wondering what I was missing (here, here, and here):
Somebody explain to me why no team has signed Tre Boston to a multi-year deal in the last few years. Explain it to me like I'm five.
How can a guy this good somehow miss out on the kind of contract he clearly deserves?
As it turns out, there may have been another reason for not only Boston’s release from the Panthers but also the inexplicably soft market he’s found over the last few years.
In 2016, as Colin Kaepernick was ramping up his own protests against police brutality, Boston and some of his then-Panthers teammates wanted to make their own thoughts public, but it was discouraged by then-owner Jerry Richardson, as Boston recently told Ian Rapoport of the NFL Network on the “RapSheet + Friends” podcast.
“In 2016, we saw a world that… even with peaceful protesting with Kap, we saw a world that didn’t understand, and was not willing to listen or hear what we were trying to say,” Boston said. “It was hard times. We were screaming back then, ‘Help.’ We need help. How can we help out our community so that we’re one? And it’s tough when you hear from the top down that the people who watch football come here to get away from that stuff, even though we had protesting going on the day of the game. So, to hear open-ended promises — them telling us to do nothing, we’ll get you in the community. Then, the next week comes around, the week after that comes around, and nothing’s been said to you. Nothing’s been brought up to put you in the community. They did what they wanted.”
“You know, it’s not like that anymore. I’ve been assured, when I first came back, that it wasn’t like that anymore. I’ve had phone calls with owners and our coaches now, who have called me and told me how much they appreciate what I’m doing, and that they would love to help. Tepper calling me and telling me how much he appreciates that I was out there with the guys. It’s a 180 from what we used to be. When I was thinking about coming back, I wanted to know — did I have the stability in my job to be who I am as a man, as a black man, as a very intelligent University of North Carolina alum? They assured me that they believed in everything I believed in, I was allowed to be myself, and I was allowed to stand up for things that were right.”
Dec 17, 2017; Charlotte, NC, USA; Panthers owner Jerry Richardson watches his team during the first quarter at Bank of America Stadium. (Jim Dedmon-USA TODAY Sports)
It’s great that Boston is now with a team, and with a team owner, who believes in the rights of his players to free expression — in fact, Tepper has been quite vocal about that.
“These are some of the most patriotic people and best people. These are great young men,” Tepper told CNBC’s Scott Wapner in 2018. “So to say that [they aren’t patriotic] makes me so aggravated and angry. It’s just wrong, it’s dead wrong.”
The Panthers didn’t just sign Boston to a multi-year deal under Tepper; they also signed safety Eric Reid, who experienced his own “soft market” after he knelt with Kaepernick when both men played for the 49ers.
Oct 28, 2018; Charlotte, NC, USA; Carolina Panthers owner David Tepper with Chancellor Lee Adams, son of Rae Carruth and Saundra Adams before the game at Bank of America Stadium. Mandatory Credit: (USA TODAY Sports)
It will take more owners like Tepper, and fewer like Richardson (whose time as the steward of the Panthers ended in disgrace), for the kind of paradigm shift that has long been overdue in the NFL. Tre Boston should have been paid far more than he was for a long time, and while he’s still underpaid for the quality of his work commensurate with the market, it’s good to see that he at least has the environment, and the rights, he should have been given all along.
