Friday Flicks: Footballs of Fury
I’m almost ashamed for using this low-brow comedy as the basis of this week’s Friday Flicks post, but Balls of Fury is the biggest release of the week. What’s a brother to do?
As for the film, don’t go see it. Please! Just because Christopher Walken stars in it, that doesn’t mean anything. That guy is a role whore. His acting addiction rivals Courtney Love’s drug habit — he’ll take any part in any film to stay working. If you need more convincing, Rotten Tomatoes has the film rated as a 27% on its “Critics Tomatometer”. For all of you R.T. rooks, that’s somewhere in between The Fantastic Four: Rise of the Silver Surfer and Daddy Day Camp. Not good.
Enough about the film already — let’s get to it.
Which current NFL starting quarterback has the strongest arm out there?
This wasn’t an easy one, so, even though I had pretty strong opinions of my own already, I surfed the Web and looked for answers.
There seemed to be a consensus on which former NFL gunslingers had the strongest weapons: Bert Jones, Doug Williams, Drew Bledsoe, Jeff George, John Elway, Randall Cunningham, Terry Bradshaw, Vinnie Testerverde, etc.
There were even quite a few back-ups and out-of-the-league QBs who I saw mentioned repeatedly, i.e. former New England Patriots hailmary specialist Michael Bishop.
Things weren’t as cut and dry with today’s rocket-armed quarterbacks, though. Especially now that Michael Vick is about to start slinging the pigskin for the Virginia Penal League. Here’s my top five:
- The Top Five Strongest Arms in the NFL
- JaMarcus Russell -The only thing I haven’t heard about Russell’s throwing power is that he can hit the moon with his non-throwing arm. He’s a genetic freak of a quarterback. And, yes, he is for all intents and purposes the Oakland Raiders starting QB. Daush McCulpepper is just a temporary quick fix, and maybe even a negotiating ploy by Al Davis to lowball J-Russ contract wise.
- Carson Palmer - Palmer can straight sling it. Last season, Palmer had only five games where he didn’t complete at least a 40-yard pass. Four of those outings occurred during the first six games off the season, while he was still recovering from about as major of a knee operation as one can undergo. If he’s not the one, then he’s the prototype.
- Brett Favre - The old school cannon arm — call him Megatron. I can’t tell you how many time’s my brother and I used to debate whether Elway or Favre had the better rifle. I still can’t decide. He’s a forty-something-year-old man with graying hair who’s still out-throwing most of the young punks playing QB in the NFL today.
- Jay Cutler - Cutler’s arm is straight ridiculous. I had always heard about it since his days at Vandy, but never really experienced his true throwing power until last season when he hit Javon Walker with a perfect 54-yard touchdown strike (the pass went about 65 yards in the air, probably) against the Arizona Cardinals. He might not have Elway’s rocket launcher, but he’s about as close as anybody can get to having that kind of arm strength.
- Donovan McNabb – Maybe Aaron Rodgers, Chris Simms, Jason Campbell, Kyle Boeller or Tarvaris Jackson will bump McNabb out of this spot soon, but, as of right now, No. 5’s mighty right is way more proven.
