Bo Jackson

Checkdowns: Some Bo Jackson stats

by Chase Stuart on December 9, 2012

in History, Rushing

The Bills get to know Bo.

Tonight ESPN aired You Don’t Know Bo, another excellent documentary in its 30 for 30 series. It’s often said that Bo Jackson’s greatness can’t be captured by statistics. While that’s undoubtedly true, there are still some ways to use Jackson’s numbers to give a glimpse into the type of player he was. A few years ago, Jason Lisk talked about Bo in this podcast and noted that Bo had the longest rush in the NFL in three of the four seasons he played. Jackson and O.J. Simpson remain the only two players to record the league’s longest rush in three different NFL seasons.

There are other ways to capture what Bo did in his brief career. Because he was busy being a baseball player, Bo missed the first third of the season each year. If we look at the data starting in week 7, from 1988 to 1990, Bo compares pretty favorably to the elite running backs of his day. Over that span he ranked third in rushing yards while averaging over five yards per carry:

Rank	Player	From	To	Tm	G	Att	Yds	Y/A	TD
1	Eric Dickerson*	1988	1990	CLT	30	606	2536	4.18	19
2	Thurman Thomas*	1988	1990	BUF	30	519	2221	4.28	16
3	Bo Jackson	1988	1990	RAI	30	423	2143	5.07	11
4	James Brooks	1988	1990	CIN	30	383	2082	5.44	16
5	John Stephens	1988	1990	NWE	31	523	1989	3.80	10
6	Herschel Walker	1988	1990	TOT	30	494	1985	4.02	13
7	Barry Sanders*	1989	1990	DET	20	370	1968	5.32	19
8	Neal Anderson	1988	1990	CHI	29	455	1951	4.29	14
9	Roger Craig	1988	1990	SFO	27	445	1874	4.21	12
10	Earnest Byner	1988	1990	TOT	31	438	1697	3.87	14

Provided by Pro-Football-Reference.com: View Original Table

[continue reading…]

Tagged as: Bo Jackson

{ 9 comments }