"Gritty" or "pretty"

Don’t matter. I’ll take either as long as they are a winner. Brady, Ben, Favre, Young, Montana, Aikman, Bradshaw etc…don’t matter. I’ll build a team around any of these gritty or pretty QBs.

stylistically, coaches love the prototype. that is, the tom brady, the joe montana, the guy who stands in the pocket, who recognizes every coverage, every stunt, every mask or disguise… and who always knows where to go with the ball before everyone else does. but has pittsburgh ever been that type of city? when has it ever been pretty, or prototype for that matter, for the steelers? personally, i don’t care much about style so long as my QB can play. but for this team, in this town, give me the gritty guy with balls over the guy who dates supermodels. give me the warrior over the general. give me heart and instinct over precision and calculation.

this is pittsburgh, after all…

Hate to steal an Al Davis line….

Pretty is fine, but all the numbers in the world don’t get you the trophy by themselves.

Look at the last few SB winners, where the Northeast weather in December/January was a key factor in the games. Most of those games were not pretty, but grind-them-out deals.

I go for gritty because not every game is picture perfect. In the end, just get the win any way possible….Big Ben’s 1st SB win was not pretty. But he does have the “W.”

if he had Brady’s O-Line? I know we’ve been ragging on the line all offseason but If Roethlisberger had all day to throw he would look more like a Manning type, he’s got the talent. But the fact that he doesn’t have that luxury speaks volumes for him as a football player. If Brady or Manning had Bens situation I doubt they could do nearly as much. Ben is John “F***ing” Wayne when it comes to gritty QB play and I wouldn’t have it any other way!

Also my favorite non-Steeler gritty quarterback would have to be Y.A. Tittle. Though I am way to young to have ever seen him play, the highlights and accounts of him are the stuff of legend. One of my favorite football pics is of him kneeling on the field after a horrible loss and he’s bleeding from his head and he reminds me of an old warrior. That picture is football, and that’s why I can’t take diva’s and show boaters in this sport.

I can think of plenty of winners (and losers) categorized as gritty and or pretty. It mainly depends on team chemistry and how that QB fits into the scheme, the “personality” of the team.
There are also “hybrids” which can posess both qualities of pretty and gritty……hence another good category!

When I think of pretty, I think of refined, well spoken, more of a gentleman, textbook, cerebral, analytical, gets the good TV commercials, and just looks good when they drop back to pass, clean throwing motion, and great stats.

Gritty I envision, blood/guts, unrefined, ad-lib, on the fly, throw a lead block on a reverse, gets the ball where it needs to be but not stylish, sacrifices their body, spontaneous-type QB, and good but not great stats as it relates to team wins.

Given my above criteria and throwing names off the top of my head…….
GRITTY: YA Title, Sonny Jurgerson, Big Ben, Jim Plunkett, Johnny U, Kenny Anderson, Fran Tarkenton, Kenny Stabler, Archie Manning, Phil Simms, Dan Pastorini, Jim McMahon,

PRETTY: Troy Aikman, Drew Bledsoe, Dan Fouts, Dan Marino, Boomer Esiason, Otto Graham, Joe Nameth, Payton Manning, Matt Ryan, Tom Brady, Mark Rypien, Bert Jones, Kerry Collins, Richard Todd,

HYBRIDS: Bart Starr, Bob Griese, John Elway, Steve Young, Roger Stauback, Len Dawson, Terry Bradshaw, Jake Delhomme,

Cold time winter in the city footballs here and it can’t be pretty
Big Ben’s slippin and a slidin’ tossin’ that pigskin lookin’ kinda gritty
Turfs hard like fallin’ on concrete shonuff sir tisn’t it a pity
Ben wins when it gets down to the nitty gritty

I’ll stick to my day job!!!!!!!!

But I just want a QB that wins football games, don’t care about the label.

i dont want my QB going down after one hit he has to keep getting up and show the opposing defense that you may hit me but you won’t knock me out of the game

with all the time in the world ben would never be able to throw like manning. ben is nowhere near as accurate as manning. ben wins by will, scrambling and short dump offs (occasional hail mary). give manning bens defense and the colts never leave Tampa. give ben mannings defense and he’s battling detroit for bragging rights.