Rice has every right.
While I certainly loathe the Niners, when it comes to receivers there just wasn't any better. Any of us that were football aware in the 80s know this.
No.. Sherman could not shut him down, nobody could. Rice was simply the best combination of speed, size, hands, brains and work ethic that the NFL had to offer. He wasn't big, but he was tall enough. He could make the circus catch, the leaping grab, the slant. He was doing the WR screen before it was popular.
Like Harvin you just had to get the ball in his hands. He was elusive after the catch and dangerous as they come down field, even like Megatron. He was a lot tougher than people give him credit for and consistent as Largent with the ball in the vicinity of being caught.
There is one thing to consider with Rice though, having Taylor, Jones and a RB who frequently caught passes made it easy to get open. That said, it was amazing that he produced at the level he did with the amount of balls going elsewhere. In the 80s you could have any of the SF offensive skill players on your Fantasy team (yes, we did it on paper even back then) and you were assured production.
I don't think Rice is the same guy without the Niners offense, but on a team of experts at their position, Rice stood out as the feature guy and made it look easy. Sherman might have been able to slow him down a little, but Rice just didn't get shut down. There were few games that he wasn't a factor.
Nope.. not Sherman, Revis or Sanders could stop him for an entire game. If they did, they were likely to get torched by Taylor anyway.