Using my custom position-by-position Field Impact Counter (FIC) we can safely and accurately rank quarterbacks, running backs, wide receivers, and tight ends by an objective statistical measurement. The importance placed on specific positions is far different in football than it is in basketball, baseball, and hockey. Because of this, we have separated salaries by position instead of having a single common pool. Quarterbacks are compared to quarterbacks. Running backs are compared to running backs. Wide receivers are compared to wide receivers. There are only four positions on the football field where we can truly use statistics to rank a player?s performance in the same ways we can for the other three major sports. Intangibles such as how a running back picks up the blitz or how well a wide receiver blocks for his downfield runners do not appear on stat sheets and in order to get a truly objective statistical ranking, these elements are unfortunately overlooked. Players are ranked from highest to lowest by the total FIC for the season, not per game because players only give contribute to a team when they are playing. * More information about the FIC at the bottom of this article. Beside each player?s actual salary, we slide in raw cap value figures of the position, ranked top to bottom, which determines their ?deserved? salary. The player who has the highest FIC receives the highest ?deserved? salary. The player with the second highest FIC receives the second highest salary. The player with the hundredth highest FIC receives the hundredth highest salary. We then calculate the percentage increase or decrease from the actual and deserved and that figure becomes their Reina Value. The Reina Value is a valuation system that quickly determines how players perform in relation to their contracts or in the case of the NFL, their cap value. - Jay Cutler, Aaron Rodgers, Philip Rivers, and Tony Romo comprise 4/5's of the FIC top-five, and we are a few weeks away from having a true changing of the guard at the quarterback position. Because of the horrible weather in Cleveland and a blowout in Week 1, Roethlisberger doesn't have the attempts to be among the leaders in the FIC category, but he is the current leader in QB rating with 136.3 and 51.5% of his passes having been for first downs. All five of these quarterbacks are under 30 and have QB ratings over 100. Peyton Manning has a rating of 77.5, while Carson Palmer is at a panic button low of 37.1. Cutler leads the NFL in passing yards with 325 and tied with his buddy Rivers in touchdown passes with six. - Donovan McNabb is currently 3rd, and he's a DeSean Jackson blunder away from being 2nd on this list. The mobility he has shown within the pocket and eluding potential sacks against the Cowboys has been vintage McNabb that was getting the Eagles to the NFC Championship on a seemingly annual basis. - J.T. O'Sullivan has completed more passes over 25 yards (7) than any other quarterback in the NFL. - I'm not sure if we're all there yet on how to properly evaluate Reggie Bush, but I think we're getting close and this statistic does not even factor in his impact as a punt returner. The 3.3 yards per carry is a drop from his already problematic career mark of 3.6, but he is 14th in the entire NFL in receiving yards (175). - Adrian Peterson scored his first touchdown of his rookie season on a 60-yard touchdown pass out of the backfield. Over the first two weeks he caught five balls for 112 yards, but this season he has caught five balls for just 31 yards. He is being identified and shadowed by opposing defenses on every play no matter if he gets a carry or not. - The Eagles limited Marion Barber to just 63 yards on 18 carries (3.5 YPC), but he caught four balls for 51 yards. Barber very rarely caught balls out of the backfield in his first two and a half seasons, but since Week 14 last season when he caught 10 against the Lions, he has been looked at more and more by Romo. - Brian Westbrook leads all rushers with 13 first downs on the ground. - Willie Parker currently leads all backs with carries and is on pace for 424 this season which is almost 100 more than his previous highs in 2007 and 2006. - Jonathan Stewart has been the much better back in Carolina through the first two weeks of the season and was used primarily in the second half against Chicago. - FIC leader Anquan Boldin leads the NFL with yards after catch with 134. - The era of a dominant Calvin Johnson appears to be upon us already in Week 2 of his second season. He has over 100 yards in each of his first two games this season- last year he didn't reach the plateau until Week 15 in San Diego. - Greg Jennings leads the NFL in receiving yards with 258 (23.5 yards per reception) but still has not found the end zone. - Eagles' rookie DeSean Jackson is a *cough* fumble away from being several slots higher on this list. The fact that he and Eddie Royal are 6th and 8th, ahead of Terrell Owens, Randy Moss, Marvin Harrison, and Torry Holt is an improbability nobody saw coming on April 26th. - Brandon Marshall has played in just one game but leads the NFL in receptions with 18. Not surprisingly with that kind of haul of passes, Marshall is averaging 9.2 yards per reception- his career average is 12.9. - Is there really much doubt that Jason Witten is the best tight end in the game? He is a true tight end in that he actually is a useful blocker, and he has 70 more yards than Tony Scheffler, who is second in yards. Nine of his 13 catches are for first downs as Romo is constantly looking for 82. - It always looked like Jeff Samardzija would catching passes on Sundays, but while he may end up pitching in the World Series, former Notre Dame teammate John Carlson has caught 10 balls for 130 yards through his first two games to become Matt Hasselbeck's most reliable healthy target. - Antonio Gates, Kellen Winslow, and Tony Gonzalez are bunched together at four, five and six, but while Winslow and Gonzalez are averaging 8.5 yards per reception, Gates is at 15.3. Gonzalez has been in double-digits every year of the 11 seasons he has on the books while Winslow led all tight ends who had at least 300 yards in the category with 13.5 in 2007.