Herschel Walker has not played in an NFL game since 1997, but the former running back believes he could still play a few downs.
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“I don’t think I can. I know I can,” the 54-year-old told Omnisport this week in a phone interview. “In a third-down situation, I could help a team out today. I could do a few things and do it well.”
Even at 54, Walker, who is training for a yet-to-be-announced Bellator MMA fight, is still a superb athlete. Walker, who won the Heisman Trophy in 1982 while at Georgia, said he’s taken care of his body and would listen on the off chance an NFL team were to call him.
“I’d tell them I probably could do it,” he said of hypothetically continuing his playing career.
Long gone are the ground-and-pound days of Walker’s 12-year NFL career. While running backs today are asked to do more in the league’s pass-heavy offenses in terms of catching footballs and pass protection, Walker said their bodies still probably take the same amount of abuse.
“They don’t take as many hits as we were taking,” said Walker, who played three seasons in the USFL before his NFL career. “But at the same time, you’ve got to be able to block and protect that quarterback. They don’t take as many hits, but the guys have gotten bigger and faster, so it might be irrelevant. There might be a little more impact when they do get hit.
“The game has changed so much because of the passing game and many times they’ve tried to get rid of the running back position by throwing the ball all the time, but if you want to win the Super Bowl, you’d better be able to run the ball. I don’t care who you are, you’ve got to be able to control the clock when it comes down to it.”
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One of today’s players whom Walker loves to watch is Los Angeles Rams running back Todd Gurley, who also hails from the University of Georgia. Gurley was the Offensive Rookie of the Year last season after rushing for 1,106 yards and 10 touchdowns.
“This guy can really play,” Walker said of Gurley. “And he can catch the ball. That’s what you want your running back to be able to do. You want him to be able to be more than just a running back. “People should be excited about what Todd Gurley’s going to do.”
Walker was the centerpiece in one of the NFL’s most infamous trades in 1989 when the Dallas Cowboys sent Walker and four draft picks to Minnesota for five players and six draft selections. The Cowboys then used those picks to build their Super Bowl-winning teams of the 1990s by taking Emmitt Smith, Alvin Harper and Darren Woodson.
Walker said he doesn’t think much about the trade, which has only been rivaled since by the New Orleans Saints trading all of their draft picks in 1999 for Texas running back Ricky Williams, and the Rams as part of two recent trades.
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The Rams fleeced the Washington Redskins in 2012 by getting three first-round picks and a second-rounder so Washington could select Baylor quarterback Robert Griffin III with the No. 2 pick. The Rams made a similar trade this year, giving up six picks to the Tennessee Titans in order to move up to No. 1 to take California quarterback Jared Goff.
“I think owners are trying to pick up a little of what (Cowboys owner) Jerry (Jones) and (former Cowboys coach) Jimmy (Johnson) did,” Walker said. “The trade they did brought them a couple of Super Bowls. So I suspect general managers and owners of those teams are expecting the same thing to happen to their team by doing trades like that.”
Walker isn’t bitter about missing out on a Super Bowl. Instead he’s grateful for being able to play in Dallas, Minnesota and Philadelphia, from 1992-94, and for the New York Giants in 1995.
“I got to be in a lot of great cities. If I ever run for office, I believe I could carry the state of Minnesota,” Walker said, but added political office is not in his future.
“Oh no,” he said. “I’ve been asked a few times, but I don’t think that’s cut out for me.”
Instead he’ll wait for his next Bellator fight, and that call from an NFL team.