Are you kidding me???
Speed might be the ONLY rating that has a tangible and "real" effect on the field every single play.
Just going from 95 SPD for a HB to 99 SPD can be the difference between 5 YPC and 9 YPC. That's against users or CPU.
I'm more curious to know if anyone has seen the SPD ratings on draft classes to see if they finally matched them up with the rosters that ship with the game. EA is known for having 2+ 99 SPD guys in every draft class that break the game engine because their OVR becomes meaningless in comparison to their dominance on the field. Based on the above numbers, there should only be a 99 SPD guy every few draft classes and rarely should we ever see a 98 SPD player in the classes. I'm willing to bet that issue hasn't been fixed, but one can always hold out hope.