Rupert Patrick wrote:I've always felt that Walker's joining the USFL cost him a spot in the Pro Football Hall of Fame. I think had he entered the NFL in 1984, he would have been one of those guys that, barring injury, would have been hugely successful regardless of where he had wound up. New England would have had the top pick in the 1984 Draft and there was enough talent on that team that would have allowed him to flourish, to reach his full potential. He would have been handed the torch that went from Jim Brown to Simpson to Campbell, as a once in a generation type runner, the likes of which pro football had never seen before. I've watched a lot of college running backs, and still think Walker is the best total package I've ever seen, and probably the closest thing we'll ever see to another Jim Brown. But the USFL messed it all up, where he was successful there, and he went to Dallas where he was put with Dorsett instead of being put with a team where he should have been the feature back, and his talent was squandered.
ChrisBabcock wrote:I agree with this statement completely and I think I've said it before here somewhere. (that old "your unpopular opinions" thread?) If you look at his entire career output and remove the "team" and "league" column from the table and just look at it as a whole, you have slam dunk HOF numbers. The unknown though is would his USFL performance be similar if he were in the NFL? Possibly not due to the obviously higher level of competition.
I don't think Walker makes the PFHOF. He was big and fast enough to be productive in the NFL, he had great balance, but he wasn't elusive. Walker was a great RB in college because he could run over people and then outrun the rest to the endzone (like Ron Dayne), and he kind of did the same thing in the USFL. I remember one play where Walker had his momentum stopped after running over a pile of Michigan Panther defenders, it looks like safety David Greenwood will tackle Walker from behind, but somehow Walker immediately accelerates away from Greenwood and in a space of 20 yards Walker is already 10 yards ahead of Greenwood. It was very OJ Simpson-like, but it also was the USFL. Guys like Kevin Long and Tim Spencer were 1000-yard RBs. Kelvin Bryant was one of the best players in league history. David Greenwood was an all-USFL safety who didn't have the athleticism to produce in the NFL.
Walker had one big season in the NFL (1988), and even that was a grind-it-out year with a decent 4.2 average on 361 carries and only 5 TDs. It seemed like Walker was most effective catching short passes, where he could then use his straight-line speed and size to get extra yardage. I just don't see how the USFL 'robbed' Walker of a PFHOF spot when he entered the NFL at age 24, unless the argument is that Walker was too beat up from carrying the ball so much in the USFL...but Walker was such a unique athlete that he lasted 13 years in the NFL. I'm not sure if 'durability' is what prevented Walker from achieving the same level of NFL success that he had in the USFL. To me, it just seemed like he wasn't that devastating of a RB in the NFL. In 187 games, Walker had 18 100-yard performances, or one less than Joe Morris.