Could This Be The Year We See A Wide Reciever Win MVP?

No wide receiver has ever won the MVP in the NFL's existence. This year, two are making strong cases to be the first ever.

The NFL has been around since 1920. Though the MVP started in 1957 which stands for “Most Valuable Player”. It is given every season to the best player that season. It has been given 67 different times, and not one has ever gone to a wide receiver. Obviously, to no one’s surprise, the position with the most is the quarterback with 46. Then it's running back with 18. The other three positions are a linebacker, a defensive lineman, and even a kicker who won it in 1982. That was a weird season but thats a different story for another day.

There have been some crazy seasons by WRs and they still didn’t win the award. The two most notable ones that come to mind are Calvin Johnson in 2012 and Cooper Kupp in 2021. Johnson broke the record in 2012 for most receiving yards in a single season with 1964 yards but only five touchdowns and still wasn’t able to win the award. The award that year went to another player who happened to run for over 2000 yards in Adrian Peterson. Hard to be mad at that decision when it is also very rare to run for that many yards as an RB, so well deserved for AP. Now the 2021 MVP I truly feel was robbed of Cooper Kupp. The winner that season was Aaron Rodgers. His stats were very good throwing for 4115 yards, 37 touchdowns, and just 4 interceptions. They don’t jump out at you because all the great QBs just about average those numbers. Cooper Kupp had an insane season that year, getting the Triple Crown. That means he led the league in all three major categories catches, yards, and touchdowns. His stats were 145 catches, 1947 yards and 16 touchdowns. it is absolutely criminal that he only received one measly vote for MVP, but I digress. Now let’s get to the two WRs I believe have a chance to at least make it interesting.

Tyreek Hill

This is the most obvious one because he is considered the top receiver by a lot of people. Through the first nine weeks, he has 1076 yards and eight touchdowns on 69 catches. To put it into perspective, through the first nine games of Kupp’s Triple Crown season he had 1019. So that means Hill is on pace to beat that and tie his touchdowns as well on fewer catches. There is also no denying how valuable Hill is to Miami and QB Tua Tagovailoa. The only thing that could really hinder Hill’s chances is team success. The award always goes to a player on one of the top teams. The Dolphins are currently 6-3 and they have yet to beat a team with a record over .500 which doesn’t help Hills’ chances. Though there is no denying that Hill should at least be in the top five.

A.J Brown

The second one I have is another one on pace for another ridiculous season and thats Eagles WR A.J Brown. He is currently right behind Hill for yards at 1005 and 6 touchdowns on 67 catches. He has also broken a record already passing Johnson for most consecutive games of 125+ receiving yards with six. He has been on a mission this year and has made his team better and it shows as the Eagles have the best record right now at 8-1 as they head to their bye week. There is no doubt in my mind that both these teams would be worse without Hill and Brown. Just using the eye test, there are a handful of games this season that the Dolphins and Eagles would’ve lost had they not had their two top wideouts.

Only time will tell if they can keep up their great performances for the remainder of the season. It’s already hard enough to compete with an award that is known as “the QB award”. It feels like if either of these players wants to win the award, they will have to get over 2000 yards and over 15 touchdowns. To add to it, your team also has to be a top team at the end of the year. There are a lot of hurdles they have to jump to make it possible. Though if you ask me, I think they should be ahead of their respective QBs who are both currently in the top four spots for the award this season. Nonetheless, I can’t wait to see how the season plays out and I hope one of them can break 2000 yards for the first time in NFL history

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