In praising Jason Fisk @SLS90 had the fun idea of a thread on under-appreciated Stanford greats. Some nominations from the last two decades (as a kid I always thought my favorites like Bookman and Mitchell were the bee’s knees but I didn’t follow Stanford obsessively/analytically until the 2000s):
Richard Sherman (far and away my number one....a small number of us saw his greatness but most didn’t appreciate him like they should)
Kevin Hogan (I’ll always think so)
Anthony Kimble (huge over-achiever with the misfortune of quickly being overshadowed by a golden age)
Leigh Torrence/Stanley Wilson/TJ Rushing (fans gave a pass to the front seven and never appreciated how good we had it with that trio)
Trent Edwards (we all intellectually understood that a QB who could have been great under different circumstances was screwed by coaching/protection but emotionally it was never possible to have much affection for a QB who never had any success at Stanford)
Mark Bradford/Brandon Harrison (less extreme examples of that dynamic)
Will Svitek (at least by his coaches!)
Chris Marinelli/Ben Muth (so crucial to bridging the dark ages with the glory years and quickly overshadowed by Stanford legends DeCastro and Marinelli)
Austin Hooper (fan opinions of him never seemed to match the acclaim he received in the conference)
AJ Tarpley (we loved him but the comparison with Skov probably made it less fervent than it would have been otherwise)
Richard Sherman (far and away my number one....a small number of us saw his greatness but most didn’t appreciate him like they should)
Kevin Hogan (I’ll always think so)
Anthony Kimble (huge over-achiever with the misfortune of quickly being overshadowed by a golden age)
Leigh Torrence/Stanley Wilson/TJ Rushing (fans gave a pass to the front seven and never appreciated how good we had it with that trio)
Trent Edwards (we all intellectually understood that a QB who could have been great under different circumstances was screwed by coaching/protection but emotionally it was never possible to have much affection for a QB who never had any success at Stanford)
Mark Bradford/Brandon Harrison (less extreme examples of that dynamic)
Will Svitek (at least by his coaches!)
Chris Marinelli/Ben Muth (so crucial to bridging the dark ages with the glory years and quickly overshadowed by Stanford legends DeCastro and Marinelli)
Austin Hooper (fan opinions of him never seemed to match the acclaim he received in the conference)
AJ Tarpley (we loved him but the comparison with Skov probably made it less fervent than it would have been otherwise)
