Despite Hall of Fame numbers, Terrell Owens won't be headed to Canton in 2016, and there appears to be one very simple reason: He was a terrible teammate. Hall of Fame voter Gary Myers of the New York Daily News put it in simple terms this week: "The bottom line on T.O. is he was so disruptive."
But Owens found an unlikely ally in former Eagles teammate Donovan McNabb, who had his share of run-ins with the mercurial wide receiver.
"The thing about Terrell is, on the field, outstanding talent," McNabb told CBS Sports Radio's Tiki and Tierney Show, via The 700 Level. "Probably one of the best receivers that I played with in the pro ranks. He’s one of the best to have ever done it, and will he be a Hall of Famer? Absolutely."
During the 2004 season with the Eagles, McNabb completed 64 percent of his passes and threw for 3,875 yards with 31 touchdowns and eight interceptions. Owens caught 77 of those passes for 1,200 yards and 14 touchdowns. The team finished 13-3 and made it all the way to the Super Bowl, where they lost to the Patriots.
During that offseason, Owens made several controversial remarks, including that the Eagles would be better off with Brett Favre at quarterback.
"It was definitely a slap in the face to me," McNabb told ESPN in February 2006. "Because as deep as people won't go into it, it was [a] black-on-black crime."
A decade later, McNabb touched on the disruptiveness Myers described earlier this week.
"Andy (Reid) was a very disciplined guy," McNabb told Tiki and Tierney. "He wanted things structured ... but people (began) to follow Terrell, and Terrell knew that. Terrell had these guys (thinking) this is the way to do it, when, no, that's not how we did it in Philly. We're going to do it the way it's supposed to be done. People felt some type of way on Terrell's side, just like (some) people (were) on my side."
This certainly doesn't mesh with Owens' version of events. In 2010, he talked about the perception that he was a locker room cancer.
"That's all hearsay," Owens told KESN-FM at the time. "If you ask a bunch of my teammates, a lot of it is basically blown out of proportion, the media making me into a fall guy. Overall, will I ever admit that I was a bad teammate? Never. I wasn't a bad teammate. Was I disruptive. No, I wasn't disruptive."
That seems like revisionist history at best, delusional at worst. Either way, what remains undeniable was Owens' otherworldly on-field talents.
"T.O. gave us that extra oomph that we needed on offense to become that passing attack that would be more of a problem for defensive coordinators to try to stop," McNabb said.
Now it's up to the voters to determine when Owens will get into Canton.
