Here at TakeThis, we believe that rings are a reflection of a player’s greatness. That generally speaking, great players tend to win rings, and players that don’t win rings usually weren’t great enough.
And as always, the key word is usually. There are always exceptions, which we outlined before:
This is because any good theory or trend will usually have some exceptions. It is our belief that there is always some nuance. Things aren’t always 100% or 0%. But there are still trends or rules. And naturally… there are exceptions to rules.
Here are the Exceptions:
Drew Brees
Brees is perhaps the best exception to this theory.
The reason why he is here? Brees actually did what the greats who win championships typically do: in the playoffs, he often led his team on late-game scoring drives to take the lead in the final minutes – sometimes, final seconds. Or played reall well in general. He did this multiple times.
Guess what happened afterwards each time? His defense gave up literally last second scores.
It happened in 2017 against the Vikings… this doesn’t even need explanation, or the full game highlights posted. Brees went out of his way to make sure the Vikings had very little time left. Yet the Saints defense still gave up this touchdown with under 20 seconds left.
And lastly, in 2018… the worst missed PI call ever happened after Brees drove them downfield for what should have been the game-winning score to send them back to another Super Bowl.
This matters. After all, we don’t roast Brady too much for his New York Giants Super Bowl losses since his defense also gave up late-game drives. And you can’t say “well Brees should have played better in the first half of those games”, because that can apply to a lot of QBs who have comebacks (such as Mahomes, Brady, Elway, etc.). Especially since, in the playoffs, you are going to go up against playoff caliber defenses and coaching that won’t allow you to just go lights out all 4 quarters, every single game. You will run into a good defense that will provide some resistance, and Brees showed that he could actually adjust to them and come back.
The fact is, Brees showed that he can do what you want your franchise QB to do: be clutch in the playoffs, and still put our team in position to win, even if his defense is not playing that well.
What makes Brees earn his spot on this list is that this happened multiple times. If it happened only once, we’d say “tough break, what about the other years?”. If it happened 2x, we could still say it. 3x? It gets tougher.
And what makes it worse is how many horrible defenses he had in the mid-2010s. Some of those Saints teams lacked talent on both defense and offense. Reggie Bush left. Colston left. They didn’t draft Alvin Kamara until 2017. Thomas was good, but a rookie in 2016. So it means that some of his years were wasted, and the few years he did have saw his team fail him in the final moments several times.
Lastly, Brees is the only QB of his contemporaries that actually had good QBs in his division. He had two MVPs in their primes in Matt Ryan and Cam Newton in his division. That’s, crazy. Oh yeah, and then in his final season, Tom Brady – the GOAT – went ahead and joined his division. Most other QBs don’t even have another good QB in their division that actually lasts long, let alone 1 capable of winning an MVP. But Brees had 2 of them, in their primes, and saw almost all of their careers.
Would Brees be the GOAT if this moments didn’t happen? We don’t know. His arm strength was not the best in the league. But he definitely showed the ability to win in spite of it many times, and had surreal bad luck.
Drew Brees is one of the few QBs who can actually blame his defenses for not winning multiple rings. He is one of the few players whose ring count does not accurately reflect his greatness.
Kevin Garnett
Garnett is also, probably the best exception to this theory.
Garnett had a skillset very easy to build around. He was a 7-foot power forward that had a good post-game, but could also shoot long jumpshots (which helps with floor spacing), and he even had a good handle.
Additionally, his defense was all-time great – he could even go out on the perimeter and help trap guards, while also holding his own against big men. In short, Garnett had a very versatile skillset that you could put a variety of players around. You could give him a really good scoring guard to play a two-man game. You could actually even give him another big like David Robinson for some twin-towers action. And his floor spacing could allow him to play with many small forwards as well.
So what happened? Why didn’t this happen?
Well, one big thing that happened: during the late 90s, the Minnesota Timberwolves were trying to sign Joe Smith (who wasn’t a great player but still considered a hot commodity) to multiple short-term deals so they could save money temporarily to sign other players, and then have him be eligible for a Larry Bird exception. Because of this, however, they were forced to forfeit 5 first-round picks from 2001-2005. 5 first-round picks. (They would later have their 2003 and 2005 picks returned). Losing multiple first round picks is devastating when trying to build a team – this goes without saying. Some players that were available in the later part of the first round that they could have gotten included Gilbert Arenas, Tony Parker, Gerald Wallace, and Tashaun Prince. Even just hitting on one these picks could have made a difference.
Additionally, they did not resign Chauncey Billups after the 2002 season, choosing to instead stick with the injury riddled Terrell Brandon – who ended up not even playing after that season due to his career-ending injuries!
All in all, Garnett’s best team was in 2004… with Sam Cassell (who finally made his first all-star appearance that season) and Latrell Sprewell, who was out of the league shortly after that year. And Garnett took this team to the WCF… where Cassell got hurt and missed the rest of the series after game 1… and yet KG still pushed the 2004 Lakers to 6 games. (The 2004 Lakers that had Shaq, Kobe, Gary Payton, and Karl Malone.)
KG is one of the few stars whose front office really dropped the ball. And again, his team lost multiple first-round picks – that is not something most players in the league ever dealt with.
People can point out “oh KG wasn’t a great scorer in the playoffs”, but this is not a great argument, as Duncan was able to win playoff series without having to score amazingly well. The Spurs did not always give Duncan stacked teams, but they at least did the bare minimum (and were able to!)
KG won with Boston in 08. People will say “oh, it’s a stacked team”, but ignore that plenty of great players have their opportunities to play with other all-stars and still don’t win. Fact of the matter is, KG was huge for the Celtics when he arrived, winning DPOY and even getting MVP votes. When he hurt his knee, the team wasn’t the same without him (losing in the WCSF to Orlando). So this proves that KG can get the job done with help.
Dan Marino
In fact… many football fans would say Dan Marino is the best exception! Marino is why many people like to swear off using rings to judge players as a whole (and they bring up Trent Dilfer). Obviously, we won’t go that far – and it doesn’t make sense to, because of a lot of QBs that have won rings, did play a very important part – even the QBs that some people like to say were “carried” by their “stacked” teams like Bradshaw, Aikman, etc. They all played an integral part, especially in the postseason, and their teams do not win a dynasty without them. Anyway…
Dan Marino is why you still need some nuance. Marino had a notable number of playoff games where he not only played well, but he actually put his team in position to win or tie, before special teams miscues messed it up.
1983 Wild Card game against Seattle
Marino literally didn’t get a chance to be clutch a the end, with two special teams turnovers occurring at the end of the game.
1990 against Buffalo
1994 Divisional against San Diego
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UQjQnzESs68
Seriously, watch this game. Especially past the 3:44 minute mark. It’s absolutely ridiculous what happens. Bad calls, bad defense, and yet Marino gets his team downfield… only for the kicker to miss wide right on what was not a far kick.
And this isn’t included the roster construction issues. Although Marino can be critiqued in some ways (for instance, Marino was too aggressive, and often forced passes even when teams switched to nickel dime defenses – this hurt him in the AFC title game in 1985, when his team actually helped him get back in the game…), it is also true that the Miami Dolphins really didn’t supply Marino with a really good team. He had some good receivers in Mark Duper and Mark Clayton, but he didn’t really have a strong running game after his first few years in the league, and his defenses were never often that great either – with some bad years in the late 80s and early 90s. And his receiving corps fell off in the mid 90s (with only a few good years from Irving Fryar), and so did his o-line after his center retired…
Was Marino perfect? No. Was he more than good enough to win a Super Bowl? Obviously. Would he have been the undisputed GOAT if he had better teams? Eh, technically, you could still argue that he wouldn’t be for the reasons listed earlier (aggressiveness against zone coverages), so likely not. And he still had some underwhelming playoff performances – he had opportunities to come back against the Patriots in the 1985 AFC title game, for instance. But literally everyone can agree that he would have gotten at least a couple rings. Him having zero rings is not due to him not being great enough to win any. Given his crazy statistics for his time, winning just 1-2 would put him in most people’s top 3 (and effectively the GOAT debate), instead of hanging around 4-10 for most people’s list.
David Robinson
David Robinson is on this list. For all the talk of “Robinson’s post game wasn’t that great” or “he got killed by Hakeem in 95”, the fact of the matter is, Robinson, in his prime, never got to play with an elite running mate like many other bigs did:
Russell still had Sam Jones, KC Jones (and Heinsohn at PF)
Kareem had Oscar/Magic
Shaq had Penny/Kobe/Wade
Duncan at least had both Ginobili and Parker.
Anthony Davis got to play with LeBron.
And right now, Jokic has Jamal Murray who is widely recognized as being one of the best playoff performers in the league.
Robinson had only 1 all-star teammate between 89 and 97 – Sean Elliot – who only made the all-star game twice.
Many will argue that Hakeem won in 94 without an elite teammate, and in 95 he won with an older Clyde Drexler, therefore there is no excuse for Robinson.
Well? No one is saying Robinson is better than Hakeem. I am not saying Robinson is the GOAT center. The point is simply that if Robinson just had the same level of support as his contemporaries, his resume would end up being on par with some of these other bigs. And instead of him being a top 20 to top 25 player on most people’s lists, he’d be as a high as a top 10-top 15 player. And unlike many players, Robinson’s skillset is not one that is difficult to build around.
Robinson, similar to KG, still did win eventually albeit not as a clear #1 option. And like KG, they still deserve credit because : a) they anchored the defense in those runs, and b) other players we have seen who slid into a #2 role, still didn’t perform well enough to win a ring (Barkley, Harden, etc.).
Lastly, all those other bigs had their flaws masked by their teammates. Shaq had some of his perimeter defensive flaws masked by Kobe. Kareem did not have to playmake since he had Magic and Oscar by his side. Neither did Davis.
So there you have it. Our exceptions to the ring greatness theory.
This is an article that can always be updated. Let us know what you think. Should a player here be taken off? Or is there a player you think should be added? Comment below.
