Jim Brown

Jim Brown didn’t just want to run over would-be tacklers – he wanted to run through them.

The former Cleveland Browns star is often viewed as the toughest running back ever to play the game of football. At 6-foot-2 and 230 pounds, Jim Brown was an absolute beast to bring down. And if that wasn’t enough for defenders to deal with, he also had explosive speed, too.

Amazingly, Jim Brown only played nine seasons for the Cleveland Browns. But in those nine seasons, he led the NFL in rushing eight times. For his career, Jim Brown finished with 12,312 rushing yards and averaged an eye-popping 5.2 yards per carry. Jim Brown also had 126 touchdowns and was selected to nine Pro Bowls.

On two separate occasions, Jim Brown rushed for 237 yards in a single game. He also scored five touchdowns in one contest and four touchdowns in four other games. Jim Brown never missed a game in his nine-year career and went on to run for at least 100 yards in 58 of his 118 regular-season games.

The three-time NFL MVP rushed for more than 1,000 yards in seven seasons, and once finished with 1,527 yards in one 12-game season. Imagine how many yards Jim Brown could have accumulated if he played in a 16-game season like current NFL running backs do.

When he left the game at age 30 to pursue an acting career, Jim Brown had more yards (12,312), touchdowns (126) and rushing touchdowns (106) than any other player in the game. It’s hard to fathom what he could have done if he played a couple more seasons.

Unbelievably, football might not have been Jim Brown’s best sport, either. Jim Brown was also a basketball player and a second-team All-American lacrosse star at the University of Syracuse.

Jim Brown was inducted into the Pro Football Hall of Fame in 1971. He was also inducted into the College Football Hall of Fame, as well as the Lacrosse Hall of Fame, making Jim Brown one of the few athletes to ever make it into multiple Hall of Fames.

Jim Brown was simply an incredible athlete and is arguably the best running back the NFL has ever seen.

Barry Sanders

Many used to say Barry Sanders had moves on moves. The former Detroit Lions running back certainly had a knack for the highlight reel play.

Sanders attended Oklahoma State University from 1986 to 1988. There, he set college football season records with 2,628 rushing yards, 3,249 total yards, 234 points, 39 touchdowns, five consecutive 200 yard games and also scored at least two touchdowns in 11 consecutive games. His highlight game came in the 1988 Holiday Bowl in which he ran for 222 yards and scored five touchdowns in only three quarters of play. He went on to win the Heisman Trophy that year and joins Thurman Thomas as arguably the best OSU Cowboys running back ever.

Sanders left OSU after his junior year and the Lions selected him with their first round (3rd overall) pick in the 1989 draft. He quickly became one of the greatest sports figures in Detroit history and went on to have an amazing career.

In his 10 seasons with the Lions, Sanders went to 10 Pro Bowls and was a 10-time All-Pro Selection. He also won the 1989 NFL Offensive Rookie of the Year Award and was a two-time NFL Offensive Player of the Year for years 1994 and 1997.

His abrupt retirement prior to the 1999 NFL Season sent shockwaves through Detroit and the rest of the league. Unhappy with the direction of the Lions franchise, Sanders chose to retire and leave football forever. Some fans in Detroit still can’t bear to talk about how Barry left the game, but they always respected the way he played the game and his professionalism.

Sanders will always be known as one of the most electrifying players in NFL history. It would often appear that he was stopped for little to no gain, only for him to bounce away from would-be tacklers and break off an amazing run. His quite demeanor will always be respected as well, and if he hadn’t cut his career short, he would have probably gone on to break numerous NFL records.

Jerry Rice

As the story goes, rookies and fellow teammates would try to work out with Jerry Rice in the offseason. Rice used take them on this jog up this large hill in the middle of the woods and at first, his teammates would be able to keep pace without a problem.

Then the real workout began.

Rice, one of the greatest wide receivers to have ever played in the NFL, would break into almost a full sprint up the hill, leaving his teammate behind gasping for air. Nobody worked as hard as Rice in the offseason.

Before Rice made a name for himself in the NFL, he was a standout football player at Mississippi Valley State University. As a sophomore in 1982, he hauled in 66 passes for 1,133 yards and seven touchdowns. As a senior, he broke his own Division 1-AA records for receptions with 112, and yardage with 1,845. Rice’s 27 touchdown receptions in 1984 set a NCAA record and on August 12, 2006, he was inducted into the College Football Hall of Fame.

Even though his college stats were marvelous, many NFL teams stayed away from the wide receiver because he only ran a 4.7 40-yard dash. The 49ers weren’t scared, however, and traded up to the No. 16 spot in the 1985 draft to get him.

The rest is history.

For his career, Rice was nominated to 13 Pro Bowls and was a 12-time All-Pro selection. He was named MVP of Super Bowl XXIII, as well as named NFL Offensive Player of the Year in both 1987 and 1993. The NFL also named him onto their All-Decade Team for the 1980s and 1990s.

By the time Rice finally retired in 2005, he finished as the leader in numerous NFL statistics. Below is just a small sampling of how many NFL records he holds.

Receptions (1,549)
Receiving yards (22,895)
Touchdown receptions (197)
Yards from Scrimmage (23,540)
All-purpose yards (23,546)
Rushing/Receiving Touchdowns (207)

He also holds countless NFL season and single game records, including most seasons with at least 1,500 receiving yards (4) and games with at least 100 yards receiving (76).

On top of all his accomplishments, Rice was also in fantastic shape. He only missed 17 regular season games in his career, with most coming in 1997 when he missed 14 games with torn knee ligaments.

There might not be a better wide receiver to ever play the game of football.

Brett Favre

UPDATE: Brett Favre signs with NY Jets!
http://www.sportsline.com/nfl/story/10922372

The date of February 10, 1992 will be a day the Green Bay Packers organization will cherish forever and a day the Atlanta Falcons would love to forget.

That was the day then-Packers general manager Ron Wolf pulled off one of the most lopsided trades in sports history.

At the time, the Falcons were coming off a playoff appearance the season prior, thanks in large part to the stellar play of their quarterback Chris Miller. About 950 miles north, the Packers were in utter disarray and needed a face for the franchise – preferably at quarterback.

So Wolf made a call.

The Falcons must have thought Wolf’s phone call was a joke, because what he was offering was Green Bay’s first round pick in 1992 for quarterback Brett Favre – the same Brett Favre that had rotted on the Falcons’ bench as a rookie by day and hit the nightlight in Atlanta hard by night. In fact one time, Favre was late for a team photo shoot because he had been out drinking the night before.

He wasn’t a savoir – he was a screw up. And the Falcons were more than happy to take a first round pick (which they eventually used to select Favre’s college teammate, running back Tony Smith) for their third-string quarterback that wasn’t going to see the field anyway.

Whoops.

The rest was history.

Favre cleaned up his act and found a new life in Green Bay. He concentrated on football and almost immediately transformed into the player that caught Wolf’s eye at Southern Mississippi University.

Favre would eventually take the Packers to two Super Bowls – winning one in 1997 – and earned the Associated Press’s Most Valuable Player Award three times (1995, 1996, 1997). He was also selected to nine Pro Bowls, was a seven-time All-Pro selection and was named to the NFL 1990s All-Decade Team.

He also currently has the most wins by a starting quarterback in the NFL with 160, and has the most consecutive starts by a quarterback with 253. For his career, he has thrown for 61,655 yards and 442 touchdowns. He also has a career QB rating of 85.7.

On March 4, 2008, Favre officially walked away from the game. Even though fellow signal callers like Peyton Manning and Tom Brady received more accolades later in his career, Favre always competed at the highest level and is considered one of the best quarterbacks to ever play the game.

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