Even the most hardcore of NFL fans probably haven’t heard of former Giants running back Eddie Price. His career totals — 3,292 rushing yards, 24 touchdowns, 672 receiving yards — are unimpressive; his football career was anything but.

In 1942, Price was considered perhaps the best high school football prospect in the country, but World War II prevented him from being part of the next great super team at Notre Dame. Instead of going to play for Frank Leahy and the Fighting Irish, Price reported to New Orleans for his service. After the war, he stayed in New Orleans and attended Tulane, and helped power one of the best teams in school history. Price played at Tulane in the late ’40s and was a superstar:

He became the first Green Wave player to rush for more than 200 yards in a game, the first to top 1,000 yards in a season and the first in NCAA history to surpass 3,000 yards for his career.

He was named an All-American in 1949 and was twice named All-SEC. He also set the SEC rushing record with 1,178 in 1949. Price nearly beat his record in 1950 with 1,137 yards and his 1949 mark stood unbroken for 27 years.

Price’s career at Tulane was legendary. In his first collegiate game, he had a 103-yard kickoff return against Alabama for a touchdown that led to a 21-20 upset. He later helped Tulane beat the Crimson Tide in ’48 and ’49, too. In fact, Price was so dominant in his three years with the Green Wave that he retired as the NCAA’s all-time leading rusher with 3,095 yards.  He helped Tulane beat LSU by the score of 46-0 in 1948 by rushing for 116 yards and two scores; the Louisiana schools used to face off every year, but the Green Wave didn’t beat the Tigers again until 1973.  As a senior, Price led the NCAA in yards per carry.

In 1950, Price was the 20th player selected, going in the second round to the Giants. And that’s when he really took off.  As a rookie, he led the NFL in rushing yards per game at 70.3. Price missed two games, but otherwise had a magnificent rookie season: he finished the season with 145 yards, 156 yards, and 103 yards rushing in three of the Giants final four games.

In 1951 Price was even better.  The Giants had one of the most concentrated rushing games in NFL history that year, as New York’s offense revolved around the second-year star.  Price led the league with 971 yards, setting a franchise record for the Giants in the process.  Price also set the record for carries with 271, which stood until Jim Brown broke it in 1959.  In an era of committee attacks, the 9-2-1 Giants built their team around the man known as Superman.

Price opened the ’52 season with 130 and 119 yards games, and through 9 games, he was again leading the league in rushing.  But in that 9th game against the Redskins, he severely bruised his left hip bone. He rushed for just 14 yards and 14 carries the rest of the year, and sat out the Giants season finale.  He still was named a 1st-team All-Pro by the by the AP, the UPI, and the NY Daily News.

From the half-way point of the 1950 season through 9 games of 1952, Price was the best running back in the NFL. Price rushed for 2,222 yards in that 27-game stretch, an average of 82.3 yards per game. The only other players to gain even 1,000 rushing yards during that period were Joe Perry (62.8 rushing yards per game), Dan Towler (60.7), Bob Hoernschemeyer (56.5), Marion Motley (51.0), and Rob Goode (68.9). Putting it into even starker perspective, from game 7 of 1950 through game 9 of 1952, Price had 517 carries… over 200 more than any other player in the NFL (Perry was second with 312 in one fewer game).

With that sort of workload, injuries took a toll. In 1953, he was plagued with injuries and produced an anemic stat line of 206 rushing yards on 101 carries.  The Giants brought in Jim Lee Howell and Vince Lombardi to run the offense in 1954, and that resulted in Pro Bowl season for Price. Price totaled less than 100 receiving yards in his first three seasons in the league, but in ’54, he rushed for 555 yards and added 352 yards through the air, finishing third in yards from scrimmage among running backs. On a Giants team with Kyle Rote, Bob Schnelker, and Frank Gifford, it was Price who Howell and Lombardi built the offense around.

But that was it for Price, as injured ruined his 1955 season and caused him to retire. But from 1950 to 1954, Price was third in both rushing yards and yards from scrimmage, behind Perry and Towler on both counts. He was the engine of the Giants offense, and a workhorse in an era where that didn’t existed. At his peak, he was a superman in an era of committee backfields, paving the way for Brown’s dominance a few years later.