Ja'Marr Chase didn't crack the top 5 fantasy football outings. Here's who did

The Thursday Night Football matchup between the Cincinnati Bengals and Baltimore Ravens was electric, thrilling — all the adjectives – and Ja’Marr Chase logged a truly legendary fantasy football performance. Chase scored 55.4 points per reception (PPR) points and became the first player in the league to score over 50 fantasy points in a game on three separate occasions. But where does the star pass catcher’s Thursday performance rank on the all-time list?

Surprisingly, Chase’s point total does not rank among the Top 5, 10 or even Top 15 highest-scoring fantasy performances of all time. Chase’s 55.4 points ranks as the 20th-highest PPR total ever, just behind a 55.6-point showing from Jan. 1, 2022 … also by Ja’Marr Chase.

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If you turn back the clock, you will uncover even more eye-popping stat lines when you apply the principles of PPR scoring. Although fantasy football has risen in popularity in the modern era with the propagation of online platforms like ESPN or Yahoo!, its roots go back to 1962, when Bill Winkenbach – a minority owner of the Oakland Raiders at the time — and an Oakland sports reporter dreamed up the idea in a Manhattan hotel. Winkenbach and his friends held the first-ever fantasy football draft in August 1963, and since that time, there have been some truly epic fantasy scoring performances. But even way back then, Winkenbach & Co. would have missed out on the best-ever fantasy showing, which took place less than two years earlier.

Here’s a look at the top 5 fantasy performances in the game’s history, according to Stathead, and what sports scribes were writing in the wake of their excellence.

5. Jerry Rice, San Francisco 49ers, Dec. 18, 1995

59.9 points vs. Minnesota Vikings

A Los Angeles Times article titled “Rice Too Much as 49ers Win Sixth in a Row” begins, “Jerry Rice outdid himself and did in the Minnesota Vikings.” Did he ever. Then, at 33 years old and in his 11th season, Rice finished the game with 289 receiving yards on 14 receptions and grabbed three touchdown passes from Niners legend Steve Young, who threw for 425 total yards.

After the game, Rice said, “I feel I’m in great shape, and I haven’t lost a step,” adding that he was focused on keeping his team on track for the playoffs.

The win over the Vikings secured a 1995 first-round playoff bye, and Rice took the NFL record for most career receiving yards from Herman Moore in the contest. He still holds the NFL’s top spot for career yards with 22,895. In a distant second is Larry Fitzgerald, with 17,492.

Interestingly, Rice could have landed one spot higher on this list if he hadn’t lost a fumble – the only blemish on an otherwise sterling showing.

4. Jerry Butler, Buffalo Bills, Sept. 23, 1979

60.7 points vs. New York Jets

In 1979, Jerry Butler, a rookie wide receiver out of Clemson, racked up 255 receiving yards and four touchdowns on 10 receptions from Bills QB Joe Ferguson in front of 68,731 fans in a home victory over the rival New York Jets. Daily News writer Larry Fox summarized the matchup in an article titled “5 Ferguson TD passes bombard Jets, 46-31.”

The Jets had a 24-12 lead when Butler snared a tipped 75-yard “Hail Mary” pass for a touchdown to end the first half. Mike Dodd of the Buffalo Evening News detailed the play the Bills had practiced. “Three wide receivers on one side of the field, send all of them down the sideline, and Ferguson throws a loop pass. Frank Lewis in the middle, is supposed to try to tip the ball to one of the other two receivers in the flanks.”

Coach Knox told Dodd, “It’s a tip play, we have one receiver on each side of him to grab it if it comes out.” Ferguson added, “You might hit it one out of 50 times. Today it hit.” Well, kind of.

Lewis never touched the ball. It bounced off the hands of Burgess Owens (now a Republican member of the U.S. House of Representatives) and into the hands of Butler.

According to Dodd, that play changed the momentum of the game. Butler would go on to haul in a failed screen at the Jets’ 45-yard line and scamper down the sideline to the endzone. Then Butler capped a 10-play, 55-yard drive with his fourth touchdown of the game. “Fergy rolled right, stopped, and hit Butler going backdoor behind Owens and Bobby Jackson,” reported Todd.

The Bills drafted Butler fifth overall in 1979, and he spent his entire career (1979-1986) with the Bills. The four receiving touchdowns against the Jets were the only TDs he recorded in his rookie season. He was named to the Pro Bowl in 1980 before sustaining a career-ending injury in 1986.

3. Jimmy Smith, Jacksonville Jaguars, Sept. 10, 2000

62.1 points vs. Baltimore Ravens

Smith notched a whopping 15 receptions for 291 yards and three touchdowns in a deflating loss to the Baltimore Ravens. Speaking to reporters after the game, he said, “The stats are good, but it doesn’t matter when you don’t win.”

Jacksonville led 23-6 at halftime but let the game slip away. In the second half, the Ravens stormed back, as rookie Travis Taylor and Obegemi Ayanbadejo each caught touchdown passes, quickly bringing the score to 26-22.

Up 36-32, after Jags’ former QB Mark Brunell hit Smith for a 41-yard touchdown, the game seemed in the bag. But Ravens QB Tony Banks found Shannon Sharpe on a 29-yard touchdown pass with 41 seconds left in the game to steal the 39-36 win.

Jacksonville was down to third-string running back Chris Howard after losing Fred Taylor and Stacey Mack to injury. Howard’s inefficiency and inability to secure the ball meant that Brunell had to pass — a lot. He finished with 386 yards and three touchdowns on a robust 50 attempts.

During his career, Smith had nine 1,000-yard receiving seasons and made the Pro Bowl five times. He also has two Super Bowl rings from his short time in Dallas. The first ring came during his rookie season in 1992 when he played primarily on special teams. He earned his second ring the following season, which he missed entirely due to a near-fatal infection following an appendectomy.

After being incredibly close to death, the Cowboys placed him on the non-football illness list and did not pay his salary, insurance, pension, or free agent credits. They offered him only $100,000 and nothing else, which he declined. In 1994, he was waived.

Smith’s true reign began in 1995 when the expansion Jaguars signed him. The Jags’ legend still holds the franchise record in career receiving yards, career receiving touchdowns, career receptions, season receiving yards, season receptions, and most receiving yards in a game — this one, Sept. 10, 2000 — and more.

2. Jerry Rice, San Francisco 49ers, Oct. 14, 1990

65.5 points vs. Atlanta Falcons

The consensus best receiver of all time, Rice makes the list again with an incredible performance from 1990, five years before his impressive 1995 statline against the Vikings.

This time quarterback Joe Montana led the Niners against the Atlanta Falcons. In an article headlined, “Montana has 6 touchdown passes; Rice catches 5,” from the Los Angeles Times archive, Rice and Montana played it cool when talking about the historic game.

Montana said, “At times I played pretty well, but I didn’t feel like I played up to the standard of the Super Bowl. I was up and down.”

Rice shared a similar sentiment, telling reporters, “I had a decent game today . . . but I don’t compare games. I don’t think I made two mistakes in the Super Bowl. Today I made four or five.”

Humility from the all-timers.

Rice had 13 receptions, 225 yards and five touchdowns, tying Rice for the most receiving TDs in a single game alongside the Chicago Cardinals’ Bob Shaw (1950) and the San Diego Chargers’ Kellen Winslow (1981).

Mike Holmgren, 49ers offensive coordinator at the time, said about Rice, “Rating his best games is like trying to say which paintings are the nicest.”

Rice’s 20-year career is almost unanimously considered the best of any wide receiver to ever play the game. When he retired in 2005, he held 38 NFL records, including receiving yards, touchdown receptions and career receptions — three he still holds today.

1. Billy Cannon, Houston Oilers, Dec. 10, 1961

68 points vs. New York Titans

Billy Cannon was one of the greatest football players in the long and storied history of Louisiana State University. In fact, his number, 20, is one of just three LSU has ever retired.

That athletic excellence was on display against the New York Titans in 1961, his second pro season. He ran for 216 yards on 25 carries and scored five touchdowns in a 48-21 Houston victory. Cannon caught two touchdown passes from QB George Blanda and ran 61, 53, and two yards from scrimmage for the other three scores.

The five TDs tied Abner Haynes’ single-game scoring record, while Cannon blew past Haynes’ single-game rushing mark of 158 yards. (It’s also fun to note that Haynes posted the 13th all-time single-game PPR scoring mark.) After the game, the Brownsville Herald noted that Cannon took the lead among AFL rushers with 803 yards in 13 games, ahead of Bill Mathis (775 yards) and Paul Low (746 yards).

Remarkably, logging the single best stat line for fantasy scoring in history is far from the most interesting thing in Cannon’s life, chronicled by The New York Times and ESPN.

The No. 1 draft pick in both the NFL and AFL drafts in 1960, Cannon made additional stops with the Oakland Raiders and Kansas City Chiefs, during which he transitioned from running back to fullback and tight end; Cannon retired following the 1970 season. In 1983, he was arrested for his involvement in a more than $5 million counterfeiting scheme after FBI agents found fake money stuffed in ice coolers buried on one of his properties. Sentenced to five years and fined $10,000, Cannon served four years in prison and a halfway house before being released.

“Billy’s gone through life figuring he could do anything and get away with it, that he was above the law,” Cannon’s friend Paul Manasseh said to The New York Times. “Billy’s basically a good guy, but he does some dumb things. He’s a very complex person. I’m no shrink. Go figure it.”

Cannon was also a dentist, specializing in orthodontics and provided dental care for inmates at Angola State Prison for 22 years, according to The Advocate. He died at the age of 80 at his St. Francisville farm, where he trained thoroughbred horses – yet another dimension to Cannon’s storied life. He was survived by his wife Dorothy, five children, eight grandchildren and eight great-grandchildren.

(Photo of Ja’Marr Chase: Patrick Smith / Getty Images)