Jim Jeffcoat Madden Career 1993-1998 - Peak 69 OVR

Jim Jeffcoat was a first-round pick out of Arizona State in 1983 and a fixture on the Dallas defensive line for twelve seasons, bridging the lean years before the dynasty and the championship run that followed. In his prime in the mid-1980s he was a genuine double-digit-sack pass rusher; by the time the titles came he had settled into a rotational veteran role, still getting after the quarterback on obvious passing downs.

Madden only caught the tail end of his career, and the grades are modest and noisy because of it. His cards run from the 40s to a peak of 69 in Madden NFL 96 for the 1995 season with Buffalo, with an obvious glitch, a 25, mixed in, the low numbers of an aging situational rusher rather than the disruptive force he had been a decade earlier.

Jeffcoat finished with 102.5 career sacks, one of the higher totals of his era, and won two Super Bowls with Dallas before closing out with the Bills. He later became a defensive line coach, passing on what he knew for years after his playing days. Madden's grades never saw his prime, which came before the ratings tables began, and rated only the veteran. The sack total is the better record of what Jim Jeffcoat was.