Bo Jackson refused the teams that originally tried to draft him in both baseball and football.
One of the best athletes in American sports history, Bo Jackson is remembered by most in the uniforms of the Auburn Tigers, Los Angeles Raiders and Kansas City Royals. But what about the NFL team that actually drafted him first? In 1986, the Tampa Bay Buccaneers selected Jackson with the first...
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Modern players[edit]
Bo Jackson in 2004
In 1987,
Heisman Trophy winner
Bo Jackson played for both the
Los Angeles Raiders and the
Kansas City Royals, becoming the first player to play in both MLB and the NFL since the 1960s.
[20] Jackson played eight years in Major League Baseball and four years in the NFL.
[21][22] Jackson was also the first athlete to be named an
All-Star in both sports.
[23] His versatility led
Nike, Inc. to develop its "
Bo Knows" ad campaign in which Jackson was envisioned attempting to take up a litany of other sports, including tennis, golf, hockey, luge, auto racing, and even playing blues music with
Bo Diddley, who scolded Jackson by telling him, "You don't know diddley!"
[24]
In 1989, two years after Jackson's accomplishment,
Deion Sanders played baseball for the
New York Yankees and football for the
Atlanta Falcons. Sanders had greater longevity playing in both sports than any other athlete in history, competing in Major League Baseball from 1989 to 2001 and in the NFL from 1989 to 2005. He led the
National League with 14 triples in 1992 and finished second in the league in stolen bases twice: 1994 (38) and 1997 (56). Sanders also played in the
1992 World Series with the
Atlanta Braves, hitting .533 in the series with five stolen bases in five attempts. He had a career batting average of .263, with 186 stolen bases and 43 triples in a nine-year career. In the NFL he was selected to play in eight
Pro Bowls as a defensive back, and won two
Super Bowls with the
San Francisco 49ers and the
Dallas Cowboys. Sanders had 53 career interceptions, returning 9 for touchdowns, and caught 60 passes for 784 yards and three touchdowns as a wide receiver. He was later inducted into the
Pro Football Hall of Fame.
[25][26]
Brian Jordan is another notable two-sport athlete who played in both professional leagues. Jordan began his professional career in the NFL, playing three seasons as a safety for the
Atlanta Falcons from 1989 to 1991. In his last two seasons in the NFL Jordan started 30 of 32 games and had 5 interceptions and 4 sacks and appeared in the 1991 playoffs with the Falcons.
[27] In 1992, Jordan switched to baseball and played 15 years as an outfielder from 1992 to 2006, mostly for the
St. Louis Cardinals and
Atlanta Braves. He had a career batting average of .282 with 1454 hits and 184 home runs. He was selected as an All-Star in 1999 and played in the World Series that same year. He appeared in post-season a total of five times, hitting six home runs in 38 games.
[28]
The last player to accomplish the feat was
Drew Henson, who was a
third baseman for the
New York Yankees from 2002 to 2003 and a
quarterback for the
Dallas Cowboys and
Detroit Lions in 2004 and 2008.
[29][30]
In total, only seven players have accomplished the feat since 1970. They are Jackson, Sanders, Jordan, Henson,
Chad Hutchinson,
D.J. Dozier, and
Matt Kinzer.
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