On Friday, Kurt Warner retired from the NFL, leaving the league with one less great quarterback. In a league that is starving for great quarterback play and where there are too many teams without a solution at the position, one of the league's all-time greats decided to hang up his cleats. When any great player retires, inevitably the next question people ask is, "Is he a hall of famer?" Kurt Warner, the former Arena League/NFL Europe star, as well as a former grocery store employee, is without a doubt a hall of famer.
In his 12 seasons in the NFL, from 1998-2010, Kurt has amassed over 32,000 yards, 208 TDs and a QB rating of 93.7. He has won 2 league MVPs, led his team to three Super Bowls, winning one. He has the THREE highest passing games in Super Bowl history in terms of yardage. He is a 4-time Pro Bowler and holds countless NFL records, which can be found here.
Kurt is responsible for resurrecting two dead franchises, the St. Louis Rams and the Arizona Cardinals, leading both franchises to the Super Bowl.
He is without a doubt, the biggest Cinderella story in the history of sports. After being cut from numerous teams and practice squads after college, Kurt found himself in the Arena Football League as well as a stint in NFL Europe. After playing in those leagues Kurt found himself bagging groceries in Iowa, not knowing if he would ever get another chance to make it in the NFL. Eventually he was signed by the St. Louis Rams in the 1998 season only making an appearance in one game. However, in the 1999 preseason when Trent Green was injured, Kurt got his chance to run the show and he never looked back. He posted an MVP season and led the "Greatest Show on Turf" to the Super Bowl. That was the first chapter in his Hall of Fame career.
After being benched for Mark Bulger, the Rams never saw the same success they saw when Warner was operating. The team has yet to finish a season over .500 since Warner was benched for Bulger. Warner then got a chance to be the starter in New York while the Giants were grooming Eli Manning. Warner never re-captured the magic he had in St. Louis and had a disastrous 2004 season with New York. He then signed with the Cardinals in 2005 to be the quarterback and eventually groom Matt Leinart who was drafted the following season. Leinart got his shot and never took control, forcing the team to go back to Warner who didn't disappoint. Warner turned the Cardinals into a high-flying offense much like his old Rams teams. The Cardinals reached their pinnacle last year, making it one Santonio Holmes catch away from being Super Bowl champs.
Warner amassed all those great stats in 12 seasons, only in 8 of those seasons did he start at least 10 games. Warner has been one of the greatest QBs of the decade and deserves more praise than he receives, relative to some of the other QBs in the NFL with similar or less credentials. He retires with a higher QB rating than Joe Montana, Tom Brady, Troy Aikman, and other Hall Of Fame QBs.
If you speak to anyone in the NFL they will tell you that Kurt is an even better man than he was a player, and that is saying something. He is a man who will sorely be missed in the NFL and particularly by the Arizona Cardinals who now have to turn to unproven Matt Leinart to lead them.
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