Throwing the “best of all time” phrase around over a young player is not always a good idea. The first issue that comes to mind with it is health. In order to become on of the greatest players of all time at your position, you have to stay on the field. Calvin Johnson is only 25 years old, so it would be way too early to speculate on whether or not he can join the likes of Jerry Rice and Cris Carter when all is said and done. Not for Todd Haley.
Mlive.com passed along a piece of Haley’s conference call with the Detroit media on Wednesday, during which he praised Calvin Johnson for being an extremely dangerous weapon.
“This 81, Calvin Johnson, was one of my favorite players as a receivers coach when he was coming out,” Haley said. “I thought he had a chance to be one of the best ever, and I think he’s kind of pushing toward that. You’ve got to handle him. If you just put the blindfold on, and hope a guy like that doesn’t hurt you, you’re probably going to have problems.”
Cris Carter and Al Davis would certainly disagree with Haley’s assessment. Trending he may be, but Johnson has been in the league only four years now and had two very good seasons and two very mediocre ones. He has yet to catch more than 80 passes and cracked the 1,000-yard mark only twice. The difference now is he has a quarterback who looks like he can play in Matthew Stafford, so we can truly see what Megatron is capable of. In any event, receiving a compliment from an angry man like Haley is something Calvin can take to the bank.
