Do We Currently Have the Best Group of WRs in Steelers History?

[flippy]

1. Wallace
2. Brown
3. Cotchery
4. Sanders
5. Rainey/Maze/Clemons/whoever is #5

I know we've had some great WRs and many of these guys are early in their careers. But this corp has the makings of the best ever in Steelers history.

I'm interested in who you like best out of this group? My vote goes to Manny who's gonna emerge this season.

And who's gonna get the #5 spot? I could see Rainey or Maze making a Wes Welker type impact. Clemons might be the most intriguing of the bunch with his size/speed.

It's gonna be a fun year with all these guys likely playing for contracts or for their NFL life.

[Crash]

Boy that 1995 group was pretty good from #1-#4. I would give 1995 the nod until Manny can prove he can stay healthy.

[Slapstick]

Yancey, CJ, Hastings and Mills...

They were really good...

[Crash]

Not even CJ...Mills/Yancey/Hastings/Kordell

[phillyesq]

Boy that 1995 group was pretty good from #1-#4. I would give 1995 the nod until Manny can prove he can stay healthy.

I think I have to agree with you here. Even if Sanders stays healthy, I'm pretty sure I would take Yancey over Wallace.

[hawaiiansteel]

I'll go with the 1974 group of WRs as being the best ever:

1) John Stallworth
2) Lynn Swann
3) Ron Shanklin
4) Frank Lewis

[flippy]

Not even CJ...Mills/Yancey/Hastings/Kordell

I'd say that group was the best to date and the current group is a work in progress. But I'm thinking we're gonna look back at the end of this year and be able to say this current group is better.

The current group has so much more speed. I think Wallace, Brown, and Sanders are capable of being better than any WR from 95. Cotchery's as good as anyone in that group except for Thigpen. And the #5 guy this year is the big question mark.

How good this group can be is probably riding on Sanders' health. But I've seen glimpses that he's capable of being the best of them all if he can get past his foot injury.

[phillyesq]

The 2002 group - Ward, Plaxico, ARE and Terrance Mathis was also pretty good. I'm not a Plaxico fan, but Ward/Plaxico > Wallace/Brown. I would take Sanders/Cothery over ARE/Mathis, but that was a solid group.

[feltdizz]

The 2002 group - Ward, Plaxico, ARE and Terrance Mathis was also pretty good. I'm not a Plaxico fan, but Ward/Plaxico > Wallace/Brown. I would take Sanders/Cothery over ARE/Mathis, but that was a solid group.

I agree... the difference was the red zone. Ward was a beast and all you had to do was throw it around Plax and he would snatch it out of the air. The only problem with Plax was the easy passes... he dropped a few easy ones but he usually caught those passes that I thought were sure in-completions. He was a monster in the Atlanta overtime game.

[DukieBoy]

I'll go with the 1974 group of WRs as being the best ever:

1) John Stallworth
2) Lynn Swann
3) Ron Shanklin
4) Frank Lewis

+1
I still think Stallworth was the best of all.

[Slapstick]

The '74 group was better 1-2, though IIRC, Swann and Stallworth weren't the 1-2 WRs in '74...

The '79 group was awesomeas well, though Cunningham and Grossman were listed as TEs...

But, 1-4 that '95 group was pretty good...

[BradshawsHairdresser]

I'll go with the 1974 group of WRs as being the best ever:

1) John Stallworth
2) Lynn Swann
3) Ron Shanklin
4) Frank Lewis

+2
Maybe this current group will get there, but they ain't there yet, IMO.

[Gus]

We are looking pretty darn strong at wr, but it's too hard to compare because of the different supporting casts. Take qb alone. What if Ben was throwing to stallworth/lipps/Sweeney/Thompson instead of Malone/Woodley/Campbell in 85 or substituting a rookie bubby for Woodley in 86?

[steelz09]

I can't rank this set of WR as the best until they perform clutch in big moments. Ward had clutch moments as did Stallworth and obviously Swann. The biggest clutch play that the current WR set has had is Antonio Brown catching that bomb when it was 3rd and 19 against the Ravens. The "best" in anything make big plays in big time moments. I need to see more from this group.

On a positive note, our WRs are loaded with talent.

[RuthlessBurgher]

Our WR group was pretty impressive in 2009 when Santonio had 79-1248-15.8-5, Hines had 95-1167-12.3-6, and a rookie named Mike Wallace had 39-756-19.4-6 (not to mention that it was Heath's most productive year from a pass catching perspective with 76-789-10.4-6). Of course, there really was no #4 wideout that year (Tyler Grisham, Limas Sweed, and Stefan Logan had 1 catch each), it is difficult to compare against other WR foursomes.