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NFL Network's top 100 countdown for 2014 came to a close last week with Detroit Lions wide receiver Calvin Johnson being revealed as the No. 2 player on the list. He was ranked behind only Peyton Manning, which says a lot about Johnson's talent and how highly regarded he is in NFL circles.
In all, the Lions finished with five players in NFL Network's countdown. How does this compare to other top 100 lists that have come out this offseason? Let's take a look:
NFL Network | Pro Football Focus | CBS Sports (Pete Prisco) | CBS Sports (Pat Kirwan) |
100. Matthew Stafford 85. Reggie Bush 59. DeAndre Levy 40. Ndamukong Suh 2. Calvin Johnson |
67. Larry Warford 62. Stephen Tulloch 35. Calvin Johnson 17. Ndamukong Suh |
91. Larry Warford 21. Ndamukong Suh 6. Calvin Johnson |
79. Matthew Stafford 26. Ndamukong Suh 10. Calvin Johnson |
Pro Football Focus' list -- which was actually a top 101 -- stands out to me the most. For starters, they've got Suh all the way up at No. 17. He didn't even crack the top 20 in any of the other rankings. What's more, they've got Johnson all the way down at No. 35. He was in the top 10 in all of the other rankings. Also, PFF's list is the only one that features Tulloch, and they are much higher on Warford than any of the other sources.
If I could take all of the Lions' different rankings and combine them to form a single top 100 list, I'd go with something like this:
85. Reggie Bush
79. Matthew Stafford
67. Larry Warford
62. Stephen Tulloch
59. DeAndre Levy
21. Ndamukong Suh
6. Calvin Johnson
The homer in me wanted to just take each player's best ranking and go with that, but I took a slightly different approach. I do think Johnson should be in the top 10, for example, but the second best player in the entire NFL? I'm still surprised he was ranked that high. I went with Prisco's ranking for him, and I also went with Prisco's ranking for Suh.
For the other players, I went with Kirwan's ranking for Stafford and PFF's ranking for Warford. As for Levy, Tulloch and Bush, each of them was only in one set of rankings, so I simply went with NFL Network for Levy and Bush and PFF for Tulloch.
Where would you rank these Lions players in a top 100 of your own?