A Tribute to Hines

I could see the handwriting on the wall last year. If you are a Pittsburgh Steeler fan and you could not see it, you're fooling yourself. He was in his 14th season,he started the season starting the first five game as usual, but then that starter status was gone. He would start one more time in his last season as a Steeler player. The questions started. Why isn't Hines playing? The coaches responses were cryptic as usual. Bruce Arians would say that the starters for each game are dependent on the situation. That is coachspeak for I need to give a reason for not starting one of the most popular players in Steeler history and this is what I'm going to say.

That is where it became obvious that Hines would probably not return for another season with the Steelers. As he himself said when someone would try to suggest that he had lost a step, he never did have that step. He just knew exactly how to get open and still does. The problem now is that the Steelers have 3 young guys that are fast and seem to know how to get open, mostly by running by the opponents players. Hines knew more than most receivers how to find an open spot in the defense and when he was thrown to, he caught it. He caught 85 touchdowns in his 14 years with the Steelers, and coincidentally the longest TD catch in his career was 85 yards in the 2005 season.

What else could he have been done?
Hines was drafted in 1998 in the 3rd round with the 92nd pick. Bill Cowher was the coach at the time and another future Hall of Famer was the first pick of the draft. Another coincidence is that player was just released by his team, Peyton Manning. Wouldn't that be a surprise if both of those players ended up on the same team. The next year the Steelers picked another record setting wide receiver out of Louisiana Tech in the first round, Troy Edwards. That pick was made probably due to the fact that the Steelers had no idea what they had in Ward. Cowher gave him little playing time in his rookie year and he ended up with 15 receptions that year. The next year Edwards and Ward battled for a starting spot. Edwards had that first round draft pick status on his side and Ward had, well, the desire to show that he was a starting receiver. Ward lobbied for playing time and was rebuffed by Cowher in favor of the first rounder. Edwards had a promising rookie season and it looked like Ward would be just another mediocre receiver with a short career.

Along came Plax
So, the next year in 2000 the Steelers used yet another first round pick and drafted Plaxico Burress. Apparently the Steelers still thought that Hines' 61 catches in his second year were not good enough to merit a starting role and Edwards with his 61 catch rookie year was the complement they needed to the tall Burress. Nope, Edwards slumped badly in his next 2 years, with only reception totals in the teens and by his 4th year Ward hit 94 receptions and 112 the next year. He became a great complement to Burress and Edwards became a journeyman receiver. How many more receptions would Ward have had if the Steelers had seen his true potential in those first 2 years. It's almost guaranteed he wouldn't have had to rely on Arians and Ben targeting him every play in his last regular season game to reach that 1,000 reception mark.

What made Hines Hines?
As mentioned previously Hines has that desire to win and achieve greatness. Looking through the drafts after the 1998 draft there were many players taken in the 1st, 2nd, and 3rd rounds that did not have this same desire. You need only to look at the 2nd quarterback taken in that same 1998 draft that many thought was as good as Peyton Manning or even another Wide Receiver that was taken in the first round of that draft. Ryan Leaf had neither the desire or the mentality to became a successful player in the league. If success in the NFL was based on talent alone Leaf may have been a star, but it is not and Leaf crashed and burned. Randy Moss was the other receiver I'm talking about. Moss had so much talent that he was even able to get by without the desire to succeed. He'd take plays off and would still get playing time because when he did give it his all he was unbelievable. Ward did not have that luxury. As a 3rd rounder competing against 2 first rounders he had to overcome the Steelers need to play the guys who they had signed to that first round money. He not only had to play as well as them he had to play better than them to show he should be the one getting the playing time. He obviously did just that.

The intangibles
I've already mentioned his desire to win. What else did Hines have that other receivers lack? What makes him a future Hall of Famer? You need to go no farther than youtube to see that. Until the last few years of his Steelers career the NFL allowed it's players to knock the snot out of their opponents. Hines was easily the best blocking wide receiver in his era. He knocked countless players out of the game and had a rule created specifically for the hits he dished out on kicks and punts. Fans of other teams would call them dirty hits, Steelers fans knew they were legal up until the rule change. I am sure there have been numerous bounties put on him by other teams trying to exact revenge for the punishment he exacted to other players. You could take a poll of fans and players and I'm convinced that if they could have Hines on their team in his prime they'd take him in a second.

What else?
I think what made the players on those other teams madder than anything is that no matter how hard they'd smack Hines around he would get right back up with that patented smile. Whenever you saw him he'd have that smilehttp://www.blogger.com/img/blank.gifhttp://www.blogger.com/img/blank.gif on his face and it was a signature for him.

A role model
Despite his offseason arrest, Hines has been a positive role model for many, many kids throughout his career. He has helped multicultural kids such as himself and has been a positive force for many charities throughout his career. There is no doubt that he will end up in Canton at some point in the future. Steeler fans have been priveleged to witness the play of many unbelievable athletes. Hines is one of those and will always be remembered as one of, if not the greatest Steeler Wide Receiver, quite a compliment for a team with 2 players named Swann and Stalworth in its history.