Shortly before NFL training camps opened, ESPN released the results of a poll that ranked the league's top players across 11 different position groups.
Each position ranking included comments from NFL executives, coaches and scouts, all of them anonymous. Buffalo Bills quarterback Josh Allen was listed as the third-best player at his position. While Allen’s ranking could certainly be argued, one quote about the Bills star’s standing among his peers seemed to stir some controversy.
One of the unnamed executives described Allen as “one of the most overrated players in the NFL,” a statement Fox Sports NFL reporter Erin Andrews disagreed with. Fox Sports is a unit of FOX Corp., the parent company of Fox News and FOX Business.
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Josh Allen (Timothy T. Ludwig)
Andrews addressed the executive's comments on her podcast “Calm Down with Erin and Charissa,” which she co-hosts with Fox Sports' Charissa Thompson. Andrews challenged the anonymous person to “take responsibility” for her opinion.
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“Come on, if you're going to say something like that, say it from the chest. Take responsibility,” Andrews said. “'I'm scared, so I'm going to say something bad.' It's like Twitter. Shut up.”
Fox Sports NFL reporter Erin Andrews took issue with an anonymous NFL executive's opinion of Buffalo Bills quarterback Josh Allen. (Erick W. Rasco/Sports Illustrated via Getty Images)
The anonymous executive also suggested that Allen was mistake-prone and struggled with different aspects that are critical for any player hoping to excel as a quarterback.
“He has immense talent, but he makes a lot of mistakes,” the executive said. “He is not very developed to win at the line of scrimmage, he tends to focus on targets, he is more of a thrower than a precision passer, he forces passes into traffic.”
Andrews stopped short of sharing her full thoughts on the criticism. “Sources are fun, aren't they?” Thompson added. “I'll leave it at that, since I get in trouble for being too honest.”
Fox Sports NFL reporter Erin Andrews took issue with an anonymous NFL executive's opinion of Buffalo Bills quarterback Josh Allen. (Andy Lewis/Icon Sportswire via Getty Images)
Nearly 80 ballots were submitted, and all of them ranked at least one position group, ESPN reported. While most respondents ranked all position groups, follow-up calls and additional votes were conducted to avoid publishing data that included ties.
Meanwhile, an anonymous “AFC executive” said Allen “leaves you wanting more, just a little bit more.”
Bills general manager Brandon Beane said the anonymous comments left him frustrated.
“I don't know where to start. It's frustrating,” Beane said in July. “You try to ignore these things, but Josh is going into his seventh year and there are still detractors. I don't understand it. If I had to say 'rated,' I would say 'underrated' before I would say 'overrated.' And I know I'm biased. He's our guy, we love him every day.”
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Beane also questioned the validity of the comments.
“I know people love whoever's label, but when you don't put your name on it and you make comments like that, like, who is this executive? Executive is a vague term. I was probably referred to as an executive way before I should have been. I'm just saying, if you're not going to put your name on something, we really shouldn't validate it.”
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