There is no doubt that in modern times, passing is king. But until pretty recently, we were at the peak level in NFL history with respect to individual rushing performance. On the team level, rushing production ebbed and flows, with high points in the late ’40s, mid-’50s, and mid-’70s, but on the individual level, the 2006 season may have been the high point.

That year, Pittsburgh’s Willie Parker rushed 337 times for 1,494 yards and scored 13 touchdowns, but Parker ranked just sixth in rushing yards. He also caught 31 passes for 222 yards, but Parker ranked only 7th in yards from scrimmage. That season, the average leading rusher on the 32 teams gained 1,124 rushing yards. Again, that was average. Last year, the average leading rusher gained 912 yards. Consider that in 1991, after Emmitt Smith, Barry Sanders, and Thurman Thomas, the fourth-leading rusher was New York’s Rodney Hampton, and he gained 1,059 yards. In other words, 2006 and its surrounding seasons — even if it might not feel like it — really was a different era of football for running back statistics.

The graph below shows the average rushing yards gained by the leading rushing for each team in every season since 1932. All team seasons of fewer than 16 games were pro-rated to 16 games ^[1]But this does not pro-rate for injury.; the NFL line is in blue, while the AFL/AAFC line is in red.

What if we only look at individual seasons but only give credit for rushing yards above league average? For example, in 1973, O.J. Simpson rushed for 2003 yards. That was in a 14-game season, so his production gets pro-rated to 2,289 yards. The (pro-rated) league-average that season was just 989 yards, which means Simpson rushed for 1300 yards over average. That’s the most ever, just narrowly edging Jim Brown’s best year. In 1963, Brown rushed for 1,863 yards, or 2,129 pro-rated yards. The (pro-rated) league average was 830, giving Brown 1,299 rushing yards over average. The table below shows the top 200 rushing season according to this formula. By default, only the top 25 are displayed, but the table is fully sortable and searchable, and you can change the number of plays displayed by using the dropdown box on the left.

• Walter Payton and Sanders lead the way with nine top-200 seasons. After them comes Brown, who has 8 top-200 seasons despite playing for only nine years.

• Eric Dickerson and Smith have six top-200 seasons, while Simpson is the only player with exactly five top-200 performances.

• Six players have exactly four top-200 seasons: Jim Taylor, Steve Van Buren, LaDainian Tomlinson, Curtis Martin, Edgerrin James, and Thurman Thomas.

• Seven more have exactly three top-200 seasons: Earl Campbell, Terrell Davis, Tiki Barber, Gerald Riggs, Jerome Bettis, Leroy Kelly, and Clinton Portis. Incredibly, Adrian Peterson has just two such seasons, although they are two top thirty years. And Peterson does have five top 235 seasons.

What if we calculate the number of rushing yards over league average produced by each player over the course of his career? By ignoring all below-average seasons, this is a good way to avoid giving undue credit to compilers while also adjusting for era. Take a look:

Using this method, Smith, the career rushing leader, drops to 5th on the list. And Simpson, who ranks 18th in career rushing yards, vaults to sixth. Campbell is 33rd in career rushing yards, but tenth here.

Among running backs eligible but not yet in the Hall of Fame, it’s not Jerome Bettis who ranks highest on the list. Bettis, who ranks 6th in career rushing yards, finishes two spots behind Terrell Davis using this methodology. Should Davis be a Hall of Famer? That’s outside the scope of this post. This analysis tends to support his case, though, and it even ignores his touchdowns and his postseason play (it also ignores his lack of receiving and the value he gained from playing in Denver).

Let me know your thoughts on the process in general, and some of the individual results, in the comments.