LOS ANGELES — Former NFL MVP Shaun Alexander was training in Fort Lauderdale with some of his Seahawks teammates when a group of high school kids approached them.
“We could tell this little one with the braids was a little bit faster than everybody else,” Alexander told NBC Sports Chicago. “I said, ‘Hey, young gun, you wanna come work out with us?’ He worked out, he did drills, and I could say, man, super talented, super hungry, super humble.”
When the workout was over, Alexander asked the kid his name.
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“Devin Hester.”
Fast forward a few years, and Alexander found himself facing Hester and the Chicago Bears in the divisional round of the playoffs. That was Hester’s rookie season, when he exploded onto the scene with seven return touchdowns, including the opening kickoff of Super Bowl XLII.
And Alexander saw it coming.
“He was so hungry to be great. Was he going to be like Terrell Owens as a receiver? Nope. But he was going to find out what he was good at and go be great at it,” Alexander said. “And so, yeah, I was really happy for him and I'm hoping that he does get the nod.”
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The nod would be to the Pro Football Hall of Fame. A deserving finalist in his first eligible season, Hester will find out Thursday if he will be a first-ballot Hall-of-Famer.
From this reporter’s view, he’s the most exciting player I’ve ever seen. Whenever the Bears played, you knew you couldn’t miss a kickoff or a punt because Hester might do something amazing.
“You had to hold your breath,” Alexander said.
With 21 career return touchdowns (including the playoffs), Hester set a new bar in the return game and gave the Bears a weapon no one else had in the NFL.
“We all know when he was here, when he touched the ball, people weren't getting up to go to the concession stand when it was time for him to receive the football. He changed games,” former Bears special teams coordinator Chris Tabor said.
Ask any football coach about field position and they’ll tell you how important it is. A return is the first offensive play of any drive and it’s not hard to understand how a shorter field increases your chance of scoring points. Every team runs their own scoring probability numbers (usually over a three-year average), but in general, even starting at your own 40-yard-line gives teams about a 50 percent chance to score.
That’s where the criticism of Hester not being a Hall of Fame worthy wide receiver falls short. His impact on the offense and the Bears’ ability to score points was tremendous, even if he only finished his career with 255 receptions for 3,311 yards and 16 touchdowns.
“Wasn’t Rex Grossman the quarterback that went to the Super Bowl? I mean, we love Rex, but come on,” Alexander said. “It’s plays that Devin would make that set up the field.”
Debunking the offensive side of it isn’t hard, and once you do that, Hester’s impact from the special teams side of it makes him a slam dunk Hall of Famer. He’s quite simply the best returner ever with the most return touchdowns in NFL history. He’s the only player in the game to return the opening kickoff of a Super Bowl for a touchdown. And with the way the kickoff rules have changed since Hester retired, his numbers will probably never be matched.
“Obviously NFL games come down to the end and special teams have a hand in that,” Tabor said. “And obviously you always want to be on the better side of it. We would all love to see a special teamer go into the Hall. That would be great.”
From Alexander’s view, the criteria is quite simple: “If you change your organization, you have stats that break it up, and you doing your job shifts the game, then all the rest of it now goes down the numbers. I think Devin did all those things, you know?”
Thursday evening in Los Angeles, will find out if the Pro Football Hall of Famer voters agree.