Barry Sanders
He wasn't a big guy and was quiet to the point of nearly being introverted. Didn't play RB until the 4th game of his Sr yr in HS but then ripped off 188ypg for the rest of the season and earned All State.
All State or not he didn't get much attention from the big names and ended up at OK St where he backed up AA Thurman Thomas for two years. He did lead the nation in KOR in '87. As a starter in '88 he averaged 7.6ypc and 200+ypg, including 4 games over 300 and benchmarked a slew of single season records while winning the Heisman.
Listing Sanders NFL stats would be silly so there's no point in belaboring the issue. The only thing worth pointing out is that he had all that success with a pretty lousy team and with every defense knowing "If you stop Sanders you stop the Lions". They all tried, and often succeeded, in stopping the Lions. But like beating Jordan and the Bulls you knew Sanders would almost always get his yards, you're just trying to beat the rest of the team.
The only gripe I could begin to raise is his style didn't lend itself to any individual play. In other words if you absolutely had to have 3yds on this particular play he wasn't necessarily your guy. Having said that I don't think there's ever been anybody that was a bigger threat to leave defenders grabbing air and ripping off a big run on any given play than Sanders. He was simply wondrous to watch. As another poster said, with all due respect to Emmitt Smith if Sanders had been behind that Cowboys line of that time period I believe any and all RB conversations would begin with "Other than Barry Sanders...".
Dickerson probably deserves more credit than he's usually given.
