PRO FOOTBALL : Quality of Quarterbacks Hasn’t Slipped

Is the NFL running out of good quarterbacks? Are there fewer than there used to be?

Former coaches Bill Walsh and Bill Parcells keep saying so, but evidence indicates otherwise.

This season there are as many potentially great young ones as ever: Troy Aikman of the Dallas Cowboys, Jeff George of the Indianapolis Colts, and, among others, Jim Harbaugh of the Chicago Bears.

There are also about as many exceptional, established NFL quarterbacks as ever, from Warren Moon of the Houston Oilers to Bernie Kosar of the Cleveland Browns, plus, among others, Jim Kelly of the Buffalo Bills and Dan Marino of the Miami Dolphins--not to mention two who are injured: Joe Montana of the San Francisco 49ers and Randall Cunningham of the Philadelphia Eagles.

The percentages have remained fairly constant for 50 years: At any time, about one-third of the quarterbacks can be called superior, one-third not bad, one-third average or a shade below.

Of the superior quarterbacks, 19 have made it to the Hall of Fame in the NFL’s 72 years, an average of one every 3.8 years.

The average was one every 3.3 years from 1930, rookie season of the first Hall of Fame quarterback, Arnie Herber, to 1985, when Terry Bradshaw retired.

Walsh is forgetting his NFL youth. So is Parcells.

Leisure time: If the NFL has an artistic problem, the cause isn’t mediocre quarterbacking but the 45-second clock, which slows the game, giving the coaches nearly a minute between plays for situation substituting.

The Buffalo Bills’ fast break was designed to beat the clock and knock out changing defenses. But most coaches don’t embrace no-huddle football. They want the leisure to select the right offensive signal or the right defensive alignment.

And they persuaded the rules committee that they have to have it, thus crafting a game in which NFL players spend considerably less time playing football than standing around between plays.

The committee should ignore the coaches and go for a 37- or 35-second clock next year.

Too much tee: On the opening kickoff at Kansas City Sunday, Alton Montgomery of the Denver Broncos returned the ball 54 yards, getting the NFL weekend off to an exciting start, and leading to a question:

Why are so few kickoffs returned?

It is because the league authorizes kicking off from a tee. That enables kickers to put more balls into the end zone.

NFL figures show that touchbacks have more than doubled since 1978--from 122 to 281.

And the coaches like it that way. They can control the situation more readily when any given possession begins at the receivers’ 20-yard line.

What’s more, they are unmoved when told that football crowds much prefer the drama of long kickoff returns and midfield series starts, where the future is less predictable.

NFL club owners should bypass the coaches and simply abolish the tee.

Player of the year: As NFC clubs won three of four interconference games Sunday, the unbeaten Washington Redskins, running the string to 11, routed the Pittsburgh Steelers, 41-14.

Even so, when wide receiver Art Monk fought his way through the Pittsburgh defense to get two early passes from quarterback Mark Rypien, the game was still on the line.

On plays of 53 and 11 yards, the 6-foot-3, 209-pound receiver set up a field goal and scored a touchdown, and for the Redskins, the rest was downhill.

At 33, Monk is probably the best player today. “He (almost) never drops the ball,” Redskin Coach Joe Gibbs said.

Said linebacker Matt Millen: “If all of us had Art’s attitude, we’d be undefeated every year.”

Last season, San Francisco 49er receiver Jerry Rice was probably the player of the year. In 1989, it could have been Montana. Before that, it could have been Chicago Bear linebacker Mike Singletary.

Earlier, when he was with the Green Bay Packers, it was wide receiver James Lofton--and Lofton isn’t far away today. But this is Monk’s year.

A warning only: The next time Dallas Cowboy Coach Jimmy Johnson criticizes NFL officiating, it will cost him $7,500, Commissioner Paul Tagliabue warned Monday.

Johnson’s long, loud protest, a feature of the Giants Stadium game won by the home team, 22-9, tied an NFL record that is renewed each season.

Said NFL Vice President Joe Browne: “Every year for 70 years, at least one NFL coach or club official has called at least one game the worst-officiated game ever.”

NFL apology: The officials did lose control in a few stadiums this week, and in Monday’s statement Tagliabue apologized for one of the NFL’s best referees. He is Bob McElwee, who, Tagliabue said, cost the Kansas City Chiefs a critical 10 seconds near the end of a 24-20 game they could have won from the Denver Broncos.

After the scoreboard operator let the clock run from 35 seconds to 25 during an injury timeout, McElwee “mistakenly ordered” it wound down to 16, the commissioner said.

Although Tagliabue didn’t mention it, there was also an instant-replay problem at Kansas City. The upstairs official, Norm Kragsmeth, apparently let Denver quarterback John Elway get away with one--a touchdown pass thrown after the ball had crossed the scrimmage line while still in Elway’s hand.

From some angles, the passer himself seemed over the line. But according to a new rule, it’s an infraction as soon as the ball is beyond.

The goofs couldn’t have hurt the Chiefs at a worse time, putting the Broncos one game ahead in the AFC West with five games left against teams they can beat: Seattle, New England, Cleveland, Phoenix and San Diego. The Broncos, 8-3, got their easy schedule, the so-called fifth-place schedule, by finishing last a year ago.

Buffalo coming: The remaining Raider schedule, by contrast, is one of the league’s most difficult. After their next two at Cincinnati and San Diego, the Raiders will close against Buffalo here, New Orleans there, and Kansas City here.

Coach Art Shell is 17-3 at home, but his club will play only two more before friendly fans.

Quote Department:

Mike Ditka, Chicago coach: “Talent doesn’t go very far in ( the NFL ) . You’ve got to have other things.”

Leonard Russell, New England rookie, the AFC’s fourth-leading rusher who was held to eight yards in five carries by the Jets: “I’m realizing how hard it is in the NFL to get 100 yards ( in one game ) .”

Dan Fouts, CBS commentator, former quarterback, on intentional grounding: “I don’t understand why they call it, or why they don’t.”