I'm sure that had nothing to do with Mitchell throwing the ball 583 times in that best season, compared to Aikman's 473. You also overlook (omit) the fact that Mitchell in Detroit the year prior was poor, and the two years after was also poor. He had one huge year, and that's it.
You might as well try to sell us on the idea of Don Majkowski's one big year meaning something.
You also ignore (omit) the fact that Moore had more opportunities to come up with catches due to the fact that the Lions threw the ball a ton. In his three best seasons (in terms of receptions), he had 123 catches out of 605 passes, 106 of 541, and 104 out of 540. Irvin had 93/500, 111/494, and 88/475.
In addition, you overlook (omit) the yards/catch, as well as the overall yards/attempt. Irvin never averaged below 14.3 yards/catch in any season of his career. Moore exceeded that level just four times, and his career average is below Irvin's worst mark. Yards/attempt...for Dallas, starting in 1991 and ending in 1998, goes 7.3, 7.3, 7.6, 7.7, 7.6, 6.7, 6.2, 7.5. For Detroit, going from 1992 to 1998, it goes 7.8, 6.8, 6.7, 7.5, 6.4, 6.7, 6.9.
Why's that important? What happens is that a poor team will tend to get down early and be unable to come back, so they start throwing the ball all over the place. The defense, now refusing to let the game change in one play, starts playing cover-7 or cover-8, ceding the short- and intermediate-range passes while also letting the clock run down. You know who had a lot of average receivers put up huge numbers? Guys like Drew Bledsoe, who threw the ball all over the place for that very reason. Very rarely do you see a high yards/attempt number with a poor record, but the 1992 Lions were one of those teams (7.8 y/a average, 5-11 record).
