Consummate Pro Monk Should Get Hall Nod

Every year, usually beginning in the spring, literature arrives at my office trumpeting the virtues of candidates for the Pro Football Hall of Fame. I don’t recall getting a single leaflet or fax or handout lobbying for Art Monk, who is up for election Saturday morning. And it’s perfectly appropriate that there’s no campaign for Monk, considering he never lobbied for himself and spoke only when it was necessary -- and sometimes not even then.

There was nothing slick about Monk’s 16-year career at wide receiver, the meaningful 14 years all coming with the Washington Redskins. The men voting on his worthiness will have to find Hall of Fame value in the subtleties of great route running, study, preparation. His candidacy, like his understated career, has none of the sizzle of Bill Parcells’s or Lynn Swann’s. And in considering Monk, we voters will have to eschew the highlight-reel mentality that seems to have all but taken over our perceptions of what constitutes all-time greatness.

“To fully appreciate Art Monk, you have to realize his game wasn’t speed, and his game wasn’t power, it was brains,” said Matt Millen, the former linebacker, former TV analyst and newly hired boss of the Detroit Lions. “He had enough speed, and he had enough power. But most of all he had a cerebral game. He had it all figured out, if you go that way, I’ll get open over here. To be able to do that you’ve got to know your quarterback, your scheme, and their scheme. He was the Cris Carter of his day without the show.”

It’s a recurring theme when you mention Monk’s name to current or former players. “Consummate pro” is what you get back in a game of word association. No one can recall him dramatically signaling first down, dancing or posing or so much as spiking the ball. Monk’s retirement seems to have signaled the beginning of excess.

To deal with Monk’s statistics (224 games, 940 receptions, 12,721 yards, 68 touchdowns) in the discussion of his candidacy almost leads you to miss the point. Within five years, almost all of his numbers will be dwarfed by a half-dozen or more receivers. Robert Bailey, the Baltimore Ravens’ veteran cornerback who played against Monk, said, “I don’t associate Art Monk with numbers. He was a very, very intelligent guy. He played the game with intelligence. And he worked. When he retired, he stayed in shape, was still running hills. He was the consummate pro.

“He was a real quiet guy. Everybody on both teams loved him. And no trash talking. He was a quiet man who just did his job. Is there anybody playing today who reminds me of Art? Yeah, Irving Fryar. Art was a real nice guy who ran great routes, who everybody loved. He was one of those guys you wished well and hoped he stayed healthy. Everybody hopes guys like that last a long time in the league.”

If anything about Monk amazed us, it’s how he did what he did. “You wind up asking yourself, ‘How did he get so open?’ ” Millen said. “In putting together the game plan, you said, ‘We’ve got to take away Art Monk. He might have only four catches, but three of them were on critical third downs. That’s why his numbers don’t tell the story, it’s when you make the catches.”

Tom Jackson, the former Broncos linebacker and ESPN analyst, takes it one step further. “Joe Gibbs was a firm believer in max protect. He always protected the quarterback first. That often meant an extra tight end or a second back staying back to block. So much of what Art Monk did came on one- or two-receiver routes. You send four guys out, it’s easier to get open. One guy, two guys, it’s very difficult. But still, Art always got open. . . . And he played on teams that ran as much if not more than they passed.”

So is he a lock for immediate enshrinement? Nope. The 2001 class isn’t going to be star-studded like the 2000 class with Joe Montana and Ronnie Lott. There’s no lightning-rod case, like that of Lawrence Taylor the year before. But there are plenty of worthy candidates, including Jackie Slater and his 20 seasons with the Rams; his teammate, defensive end Jack Youngblood, who was all-pro five times and played two postseason games in 1979 with a broken leg; Coach Bill Parcells, who led teams to three Super Bowls and won two; and again Swann, the receiver many NFL players think is in the Hall of Fame already but is not.

And it’s not like Harry Carson, Dave Casper, Dan Hampton, Mike Munchak, John Stallworth, Ron Yary, Ralph Wilson Jr., Marv Levy, Nick Buoniconti, Lester Hayes don’t have credentials. Personally, there’s not a receiver eligible today that I would vote ahead of Swann, who in seven fewer seasons was all-pro more times (three to Monk’s two), went to as many Pro Bowls (three each) and was a contributing member to more championship teams (four to Monk’s three). In 109 fewer games, (224 for Monk to 115 for Swann), Swann caught 15 fewer touchdown passes (53).

But there I go again, using numbers to build cases. It’s something Hall of Fame selectors have to resist because players of different eras played with slightly different rules, at times that featured different styles of play. Soon, men such as Andre Rison will retire with more catches, more yards, and more touchdowns. But they will have played in four-receiver sets with quarterbacks who threw the ball 50 times per game instead of 20, in specialized roles that didn’t call for the kind of completeness that marked Monk’s distinguished career and will sooner or later land him in the Pro Football Hall of Fame.