On Wednesday, EA Sports released the full player ratings for the entire Madden NFL 16 roster, and that includes our San Francisco. Your benevolent overlord, Fooch, posted on the top rankings within the division but as someone who is a fan of the games, I thought I'd take a look at the ratings and give my thoughts.
I'm more than a little obsessed with ratings, or at least I used to be. At one point, I was one of the folks who took community input on ratings and relayed them to EA Sports so they could get feedback post-release. It was a terrible, awful job because nothing gets annoying Internet people angry like being dissatisfied about Nate Davis' short-range throwing accuracy.
They didn't just release the overall ratings, but the full ratings including every stat for each player. I'm not going to list all of those out, but you can find the full thing here (h/t: Pasta Padre). If you're just interested in overall ratings, I've listed them below by position. Keep in mind that the game still has guys like Aldon Smith and Chris Cook on the roster for the Day 1 roster, but I have not included them as they will be removed in the first roster update.
QB: Colin Kaepernick (81), Blaine Gabbert (72), Dylan Thompson (64)
HB: Carlos Hyde (77), Reggie Bush (80), Kendall Hunter (74), Mike Davis (71)
FB: Bruce Miller (88), Trey Milliard (65)
WR: Anquan Boldin (88), Torrey Smith (86), Jerome Simpson (74), Quinton Patton (71), Bruce Ellington (68), DeAndre Smelter (67), DeAndrew White (66), Dres Anderson (65)
TE: Vernon Davis (84), Vance McDonald (78), Garrett Celek (72), Derek Carrier (69), Asante Cleveland (68), Blake Bell (65), Busta Anderson (64), Kyle Nelson (50)
LT: Joe Staley (94)
LG: Brandon Thomas (73), Trent Brown (60)
C: Daniel Kilgore (79), Marcus Martin (72), Dillon Farrell (65)
RG: Alex Boone (88), Joe Looney (68), Andrew Tiller (63)
RT: Erik Pears (72), Ian Silberman (64)
RE: Darnell Dockett (82), Lawrence Okoye (50)
DT: Ian Williams (80), Glenn Dorsey (78), Quinton Dial (76)
LE: Tank Carradine (77), Tony Jerod-Eddie (76), Arik Armstead (72), Kaleb Ramsey (64)
ROLB: Corey Lemonier (71), Eli Harold (66)
MLB: NaVorro Bowman (93), Philip Wheeler (76), Desmond Bishop (76), Michael Wilhoite (75), Nick Moody (68), Nick Bellore (67)
LOLB: Ahmad Brooks (80), Aaron Lynch (79)
CB: Tramaine Brock (80), Shareece Wright (74), Dontae Johnson (74), Leon McFadden (71), Keith Reaser (65), Kenneth Acker (64), Marcus Cromartie (61)
FS: Eric Reid (81), Jimmie Ward (73), L.J. McCray (63)
SS: Antonie Bethea (91), Craig Dahl (74), Jaquiski Tartt (69)
K: Phil Dawson (91)
P: Bradley Pinion (51)
Overall, I don't think there's a whole lot to really be upset about as far as the 49ers are concerned. There are some guys that went down for seemingly no reason, but other guys I actually feel are somewhat overrated. The team as a whole has a low rating, which is troubling when you consider online play against higher-rated teams, but we'll actually have more thoughts on that going forward.
For now, I'm going to run down the list with some of my thoughts about individual players and ratings. Happily tell me while I'm wrong!
- Kaepernick is obviously the big one, and I think he's rated fairly. I do have an issue with his speed rating (85), and the notion that there are more than 20 players on this roster faster than him. I'm just not buying that one.
- That said, I don't feel like the 49ers were screwed overall when it comes to speed ratings. It's one of the most important ratings in Madden, but there is some decent speed on the roster. Not enough, mind you (Torrey Smith being 89 speed is lunacy) but it's not particularly egregious overall.
- I'm pleased with the receiver ratings -- Boldin is getting the respect he deserves, and Smith didn't take a hit for a down year. As far as the tight ends go, Davis took a big hit and that's understandable.
- Guys like Kilgore and Bowman are both being punished for getting injured and that's disappointing. There's no reason Bowman should drop until they observe him playing worse, and the same goes for Kilgore, who looked like a Pro Bowl center before sustaining his injury last season.
- Good to see Lynch getting some respect early, and also the fact that Johnson was not overlooked, at least.
- This is the big one for me: Reid is way too low. There's no way Reid deserves to be an 81 overall, he should be an 86 at the lowest and I'm not even hearing arguments otherwise. He's a top-flight safety and that rating is puzzling.
- Oh jeez, Pinion. That is rough. His kick power and accuracy are also pretty low, but that rating is mostly due to stats that don't matter, fortunately.
- One thing that's worth noting about some potential contributors who are rated low -- like Acker and Reaser -- is that they seem to be at least up to snuff when it comes to the stats that matter. Acker is decent in both man and zone coverage, as is Reaser. White has a lot of speed and agility, etc.