Our favorite college football players of the 80s

In the 1980s, television made stars – and money – throughout the college football landscape.

Jackie Sherrill won the first million dollar contract with Texas A&M in 1982. There was even more bombing, from teams from Barry Switzer in Oklahoma to the Miami Hurricanes camouflaged under Jimmy Johnson. And at SMU, these factors combined in the form of a slush fund – which included payments by the governor of Texas – for the Mustangs to be sentenced to death in 1987.

Bo Schembechler may still have focused on “The team. The team. The team.” until his retirement in 1989, but let’s go back to the decade when television transformed regional heroes into national celebrities and where individuals began to shine more. When the kids asked for haircuts like Brian Bosworth from Oklahoma. When the power of Deion Sanders turned it into Prime Time. When Bo Jackson and Herschel Walker became mythical characters with one name.

Here are our favorite players from the 80s:

Mark Schlabach: Herschel Walker
Walker should have won the Heisman Trophy in the first year in 1980 (when he ran for 1616 yards and led the Bulldogs to a national title) and in the second year (1891 yards) before finally winning it in 1982 (1752 yards). If he had stayed for his senior season, he would have won a second. With all due respect to Eric Dickerson, he was not half as good or strong as Walker. During his junior season in December 1982, while Walker was on his morning run, he encountered a car accident in which the driver was trapped in an overturned car. Walker burst out of a crowd, grabbed the door, and pulled it with a “powerful key,” according to a report by United Press International. “It shocked me to see how it went wild,” said a spectator at the UPI. “He grabbed something because he just ripped this thing. I had pulled it before and I couldn’t move it. He just opened the door, the glass broke everywhere and then we got it exit.” The man told the IPU that he did not recognize Walker at first. “It’s like looking up and John Wayne is helping you,” said the man. This is what pushups and situps can do for you, boys and girls.

Adam Rittenberg: Brian Bosworth
The Boz. I didn’t really get into college football until the early 1990s, but I knew Brian Bosworth from Oklahoma. He was one of the first national brand players, especially as a non-quarterback. He had appearance, hair, mouth and fearlessness, both in the way he played and what he said. Le Boz was one of the university footballers first stars of reality TV. The double winner of the Butkus Award and the unanimous double selection of the All-America have done a lot of great things on the field, but the image he created – both good and bad – is what sticks to most of between us who remember him.

In 1987, the NCAA imposed the “death penalty” on a college football program for the first and only time in its history. Watch on ESPN +

Dave Wilson: Eric Dickerson
Dickerson of SMU symbolized the excess of neon of the 1980s and the bravado in Texas of the days of the Far West of the Southwest Conference. He was arrogant and fast, attended a preppy private school and drove a car that someone else had bought for him. (He’ll forever say – with an ironic smile – that his grandmother bought this Trans Am.) Dickerson has lived up to all the hype after a legendary career in Texas, rushing for 3,045 yards and 36 TDs combined for the Mustangs in 1981 and 1982 despite the alternation of each series with Craig James in the backfield “Pony Express”. He never lacked confidence. Although he finished third in Heisman’s 1982 vote against Herschel Walker and John Elway (averaging 7.0 yards per carry for Walker’s 5.2), Dickerson was not disturbed. “I think I’m as good or better than Herschel,” he told the Washington Post.

Ryan McGee: Barry Sanders
With all due respect to Herschel and Bo, no other player made us leave our Saturday night dates to jump in our cars and run to the TV we could find to watch the SportsCenter highlights from anywhere. what Barry Sanders did that day at Stillwater. The way Herschel and Bo managed the ball was classic. What Sanders did was straight out of a video game. No one has run like this before or since.

Sam Khan Jr .: Andre Ware
As a person born in the early 1980s, I didn’t get to see many of these players live, but the first one I remember very well was Andre Ware. My father took me to the Astrodome to see the Houston Cougars play, and it was my first experience in person with college football. Seeing Ware launch beautiful parables all over the field and the Cougars’ high-power run-n-shoot attack illuminating the dashboard was a good introduction to the sport. Ware was a marvel, and he and the Cougars were at the forefront of what was to become an offensive revolution in the sport. Later, when I became a teenager, the first college jersey I owned was that of Andre Ware.

Long before hip hop culture filled our airwaves, the Miami Hurricanes brought street values ​​and the bravery of hoods into the American living room and a serene campus was transformed into “The U”. Watch on ESPN +

Andrea Adelson: Michael Irvin
I consider myself one of the luckiest people in the country because I grew up in Miami in the 1980s during the height of the hurricane dynasty. I could probably list so many obscure 1980s Miami hurricanes to fit this category (Melvin Bratton signed my shoe when it came to my elementary school and I never wore it again), but my favorite player from this era is Michael Irvin. I loved his swagger, I loved the way he played the game and I loved the way the white towel he wore to hang his uniform flapped wildly every time he ran on the field . Watching these Miami teams made me want to write about sport, so a big thank you to the Hurricanes and Michael Irvin for helping this little girl achieve her dream.

David Hale: Deion Sanders
My memory of the university football world of the 1980s is not really alive, but there is no doubt about the first name that comes to mind: Neon Deion. The decade was going to produce legitimate crossover superstars from The Boz to Bo, but no one has done it with as much pomp and gravity as Deion Sanders. Not only did Sanders put the state of Florida on college football, kicking off a quarter of a century of excellence, but he was a legitimate name, a star of both sports and a national celebrity before even that he only earns a salary. Fair watch “Seminole Rap” for proof of his 1980s, greatness filled with cheese. The only regret is that social media wasn’t there to really archive how incredible Deion was – on and off the pitch.

Chris Low: Herschel Walker
Come on, it’s obvious. Herschel Walker was not only my favorite player of the 80s, but he is the best college football player I have ever seen playing. At the time, you simply hadn’t seen a racing back weighing between 225 and 230 pounds with track speed. Herschel passed the linebackers and passed the defensive backs. Go back and watch the top 15 game with South Carolina and George Rogers in 1980, when Herschel was a freshman. Safety was cornered, and Herschel turned on the jets, hit the sidelines, and made the DB believe he was running in quicksand en route to a 76-yard touchdown run. “Oh you Herschel Walker!”

Bill Connelly: Keith Jackson
The end of Oklahoma, not the announcer. I was 7 when Oklahoma won the national title in 1985, so I didn’t really understand what a unicorn was until years later. It was just unfair. The OU restored its true wish that year when Jamelle Holieway took over for an injured Troy Aikman at QB, and once they hypnotized you and stepped back against the option, they stabbed you with Jackson. During his career, he has accumulated only 86 catches and carries combined, but these 86 touches produced 1,859 yards and 19 touchdowns. He has an average of 24 yards per catch and 14 yards per CARRY, an average certainly reinforced by an 88-yard end against Nebraska in 1985.

To repeat: A tight end listed at 6-2 and almost 260 pounds took an 88-yard backhand against black shirts and a Nebraska team ranked second in the country at the time. Complitly normal.

Harry Lyles Jr .: Tim Brown
I was not there to watch someone play college football in the 1980s, but when I grew up in Atlanta, the legend of Herschel Walker was as spoken as any other player. While Walker would be my easy answer, I’m going to go with Tim Brown. I’m a contender for a good wide catcher game, and during his season at Heisman in 1987, he only caught 39 passes but an average of 21.7 yards per catch. When he took the soccer ball in his hands, he made it happen.

Tom Van Haaren: Barry Sanders
I grew up in a Detroit suburb, so Barry Sanders was my favorite player growing up, period. Once he was drafted by the Lions, we were able to learn more about his stay in Oklahoma State and see some highlights of his college career, which were incredible to watch when I was a child. We were all trying to replicate his movements in the backyard, but the things he could do in the field were breathtaking. He was a complete wizard – to think he would be tackled for a loss, then watching him slide out of a tackle and run for a 20 yard gain was always a sight. All things considered, Barry is the best ball carrier to ever play. He had 2,628 yards in his last college season with 37 touchdowns. If you include the bowl game this season, it has had 2,850 yards and 44 touchdowns, which is incredible in itself. He has established 34 NCAA records this season and has continued to be an incredible player in the NFL. You cannot convince me otherwise that he is not the goat.

Ivan Maisel: Don McPherson
In 1987, I left Manhattan, where I had worked for five years and where my girlfriend lived, and I covered national college football for The Dallas Morning News. It has been 20 years since Syracuse had won up to eight games. No one expected the Orangemen (as they were then called) to escape mediocrity. But they won their first five games. I believed in Syracuse. Did I mention that my girlfriend lived in New York? Did I mention that she grew up opposite the Syracuse campus? Here came the No. 11 from Penn State, who had beaten Syracuse 16 years in a row. In the first sold-out scrum game in a sold-out Carrier Dome, quarterback Donac McPherson of Syracuse backed off and threw an 80-yard touchdown pass to first-year student Rob Moore. You could hear the roar light up to Watertown. Syracuse won 48-21. McPherson became my guy. He led Syracuse to an 11-0 regular season and the Sugar Bowl. He finished second in the Heisman vote against the off of Our Lady Tim Brown – a travesty. McPherson made me look like a black horse. By the way, I married the girl.