NFL Network has been announcing their Top 100 players over the last few weeks, and San Francisco 49ers linebacker NaVorro Bowman came in at No. 61. And apparently he thinks the whole thing is nonsense. Bowman spoke with media after Wednesday's practice, and in discussing his recovery from knee surgery, he talked about his status around the league. He feels his knee is in much better shape, and he feels he is the top linebacker in the league.
That all led to his comments about the NFL Network top 100:
“It’s totally bogus,” Bowman said Wednesday after the 49ers’ minicamp practice. “I’m sure I’ll be (better) than 61 if the players really vote on it. The NFL 100, they can keep doing what they’re doing, but it’s not accurate at all.”
An NFL spokesman told 49ers media that only 18 players on the roster voted last December. Apparently the players list out their top 20 players, and that is where the top 100 come from. That would seem to make it very easy for high quality players to end up further down the list than others.
It only adds further motivation as Bowman is back for his second season of football since tearing up his knee. And he said the difference this year is fairly significant:
“I feel great. Adding on days on top of days,” Bowman said. “I feel it sometimes, but it’s nowhere near what I went through last year with the constant attention I had to put on it. This year, I’m able to wake up and ride. That’s definitely a better thing that it was last year.”
There was a report last year in MMQB talking about how much time it took Bowman to get ready each day. There was some uproar about it, and Bowman said it was exaggerated. Whatever his thoughts at that point, he seems pretty excited about where he's at heading into the 2016 season. There was clearly some rust at the start of last season, but we saw improvement as the season moved along. With another offseason slowly wrapping up, it makes sense that he would be in even better shape heading into 2016.