Worst Betrayal? Bo Jackson and the Bucs

On April twenty ninth, nineteen eighty six, the Buccaneers made a historic bad decision, drafting Vincent Edward bo Jackson as the number one pick. Now, we all know Bo, right, how could that be a bad pick? He just won the Heisman the year before, and he's one of the most legendary athletes of all time. The problem was Bo refused to play for the Buccaneers due to actions they took prior to the draft that would limit his baseball's career in college. And he held a grudge. And he was one who knew how held a grudge. And this moment changed the trajectory of Bo Jackson and made him one of the greatest athletes of all time. Today, we're going to dive into Bo Jackson and his decision not to join the Tampa Bay Buccaneers and what that meant for the greatest what if story of all time. Welcome to Daily Sports History, a Ethan Reese, your guide as you daily learn more about sports history, increasing your sports knowledge. Bo Jackson grew up in Alabama, and he was the eighth of ten children, and he grew up in poverty, getting hymny downs not only from his brothers, but from his sisters he would get teas for wearing girl clothes because that's all he had. He would be a troublemaker, breaking windows, stealing bikes, picking fights, and grew the nickname wild Boar from his siblings, which later would be shortened to bo because of his wild energy and relentless spirit. And the age of thirteen was the turning point for bo taking away that wild energy and focusing it. Him and some of his friends would kill several hogs from a minister by throwing rocks at them, and he was forced to repay the loss of the hogs, so he took on odd jobs to pay the restitution, and it really instilled in him responsibility and the value of hard work and let him know to leave that wild side behind and focus on the gift that he was given, which was athletics. He would excel at three sports in high school, in football, baseball, and track and field. Senior year, he would rush for eleven hundred yards on the football field. In baseball in twenty five games, he would hit twenty home runs, and track he would win the state title in the decathlon two times, and often during the season he would have such a large lead he wouldn't even run the final fifteen hundred meters event and still win the contest. He would also set records in the indoor high jump and triple jump, doing all this without really stepping in the weight room. He was known for his power, but he got his physique from playing the sports, not from the gym room. So after high school he would go on to get drafted by the New York Yankees, but he chose instead to go to Auburn to take the football scholarship because he would also be able to pursue baseball while at Auburn because he equally loved both sports, and he had immediate impact on the football field. His freshman year, he had over eight hundred yards and nine touchdowns, and he would top that his sophomore year with over twelve hundred yards twelve touchdowns with nearly eight yards of carry, helping lead Auburn to an eleven to one record, finishing third in the national polls. Now, his junior year, he would be injured, but he would rebound his senior year with the best season he would have in his entire football career, rushing for seventeen hundred yards and averaging six point four yards to carry and this would lead him to win the Heisman Trophy over Iowa was Chuck Long by the closest vote in Heisman history. And after this, he was excited looking forward to his final baseball season because his junior year was great. He had a batting average of over four hundred and was looking forward to one of his greatest seasons on the baseball diamond as well. But something happened before that. See, the NCAA had a lot of rules back then that they don't have today. Their sanctions have become a little more relaxed. Amateurism was huge back then and the slightest thing could derail your entire college career. As coming up that season, the Tampa Bay Buccaneers had the number one overall pick, and unlike normal seasons, Bo Jackson was the clear number one pick for that draft. No one else was better. Just to put this in perspective, there was only one Hall of Famer in that entire draft, including Bo Jackson, and that would be the eventive nd Charles Haley, who'd be taken in the fourth round. So it wasn't a stacked draft, but there were future Pro bowlers and Jim Everett Leslie O'Neill, Keith Bayers, John L. Williams, Ronnie Harmon, will Walford, and Neil Anderson, who were all taken in the first round. But Jackson was a clear number one favorite, and running backs were valued even more back in the eighties. But with Bo being the clear favorite, he also had interest in baseball. Everyone knew Bo played baseball as well as football in college and had already been drafted previously by the Yankees, and they didn't want this situation to happen That happened with John Elway a few years earlier, where he used baseball to get his way to another team, But Bo didn't go the same route, and neither did the Tampa Bay Buccaneers as the owner of the Buccaneers, Hugh Culverhouse, aggressively pursued Jackson and arranged for a private jet to fly him to Tampa Bay for a physical in meetings now now Culverhouse assured bow In Auburn officials this trip was cleared by the NCUBA it would not jeopardize his baseball eligibility for that season, but he did not get approval from the NCUBA, and the NCAA ruled that Bo was ineligible for receiving benefits from the Tampa Bay Buccaneers, so his baseball career was over alvert now hearing this, Bow was beyond mad. He loved baseball just as much as he loved football, and he didn't view this as an honest mistake. No. He thinks that they purposely did this so he would not play baseball and would have to come play for them. And I think I tend to agree with him. It may have been a miss, but a mistake that went in their favor, and so Bo told them, do not draft me. I will not sign with you. But that didn't matter to the Buccaneers. They still thought nobody would not play for us, and at worse, we could trade him away. But the problem is that's not what happened. On April twenty ninth, nineteen eighty six, with Pete Rosell came up and announced with the number one pick with the nineteen eighty six NFL Draft, the Tampa Bay Buccaneers select Vincent bo Jackson, who was actually backstage and came out to shake Bell's hands, but he would not go on to sign the contract, which would be a record setting contract. They gave him a deal five years for seven million dollars. I know that doesn't seem like much now, that would be the most rookie has ever gotten. But in June nineteen eighty six, in the fourth round of the Major League Baseball Draft, the Kansas City Royals selected him and gave him a three year, one million dollar contract. So for Bo, this was not about the money. This was about principal the disrespect that the Buccaneers did to him, and he would go on to play for the Kansas City Royals that year and be so good that he would get called up that same year to the Royals and Bo Jackson would be the first Heisman Trophy winner not to play for the team that drafted him since nineteen fifty eight, and the Bucks would lose his rights and he would go on to be drafted on the following year by the Raiders in the seventh round, who gave him a half a million dollar signing bonus and told him in his contract he could play baseball and after the baseball season was over, he could come play football, which really showed him that they wanted him to be able to do both sports. And this is at where the bouns sports came along with the Big Nake campaign, which made him more money than he could have made with the Buccaneers and made him a star. But you know what's interesting, and he would go on to play in both baseball and football for about four years. His rookie year, he would rush for over five hundred yards it's six touchdowns in only seven games for the Raiders, and in baseball that year he had twenty two home runs and had ten stolen bases in his first full time season, and in nineteen eighty nine, he would rush for nine hundred and fifty yards in eleven games as well as hit thirty two home runs and have one hundred and five RBIs being selected to an All Star for the Kansas City and he would become an All Star in both the NFL and Major League Baseball, being the first person to do so. But unfortunately, on January thirteenth, nineteen ninety one, in a playoff game versus the Bengals, he suffered a dislocated hip injury in a routine tackle. Because of how powerful his legs were, this is the injury that many say that only he could have gotten because of how powerful he was. Now he was able to come back from the surgery, but his football career was over after just four seasons and he would never make the Hall of Fame and just be remembered as a blip as he never rushed for over one thousand yards. But he would go on to return to baseball and play a few more seasons with the Chicago White Sox in the California Angels, but wasn't the same as before and finished his career with only eight seasons. He would have over one hundred and forty home runs hit and score over sixteen touchdowns in his career and is often known as one of the greatest two sport athletes to ever live. Even though it's a short four year window, it was a fun time while it lasted. The question is what do experts think would have happened if you focused on just one sport or if he got picked by another team. Now, if you got picked by another team, most likely something similar would have happened. It's a lot of wear and tear to be playing a sport basically year round. There would be a couple months off after the football season before baseball started, and baseball isles taxing on your body, but it still is a difficult thing to do, but his football skills was way off the charts. It said that he ran a forty yard dash with four point one seconds, something that has been unmatched by many. Even though it wasn't a computerized timer, it's still a crazy feat and many think that he would have been a Hall of Famer for sure if he only focused on football, and it's hard to doubt that in his four seasons he really did a lot in part time play, and maybe he would have even surpassed the likes of Walter Payton and Barry Sanders, as he averaged five point four yards to carry in just thirty eight games. Now, if he only focused on baseball, he was a lot raw of a talent. In baseball, he was still good enough to be an All Star, but he only had a career batting average of two fifty, not the greatest. He was a power hitter, so he would have been great in the nineties era where power hitters were great, with the likes of Sammy Sosa and Mark maguire, but it's hard to see how far he would have gotten. He definitely would have been maybe a perennial All Star, maybe borderline Hall of Famer, but many think that his true greatest sport was football, and if he would have focused on that, he would have had a chance to be one of the greatest all time. Instead, we just get one of the greatest two sport athletes of all time. Now, he wasn't the only first round picked not to play for the team that drafted him. It actually started in the very first NFL draft where Jay Burwagner was selected by the Philadelphia Eagles, which we covered on a previous episode, and he demanded a salary of one thousand dollars a game, which the Eagles could not do, and they traded his rights to the Chicago Bears and the Bears couldn't even come to a contract. He never played in the NFL. Then, a few years before Bo Jackson, another two sport athlete, John Elway, was drafted by the Baltimore Colts and he threatened to play baseball instead of football, a similar story, but instead he got traded to the Denver Broncos, where he played his entire career and only played a spring with the New York Yankees and did not pursue the two sports. And more recently, Eli Manning was picked number one by the San Diego Chargers in the two thousand and four draft, and Manning and his family made it clear that they did not want to play for the Chargers, so he would go on to get traded to the New York Giants on Draft Day and went two Super Bowls for them. But don't feel bad for the Chargers. They got Hall of Famer the Dating Toalentson in the deal. So was this the greatest? So this is not something that happens very often, as these great generational athletes do have some leverage and can use it to get exactly where they want to be. And if you want more NFL Draft content, check out the NFL Draft Big Boards. I know the draft happened last week, but there's still a lot to uncover about what happened, as there were still crazy moments in this year's draft as well as the host, Brandon takes you through the NFL Draft, fantasy football, and college football analysis to beat so you can be up to date on the future of the NFL. There'll be a description in the link below for you to check them out. And if you enjoy today's episode, please make sure you give us a rating or review wherever you're listening to it. Doesn't matter what the review says. Just being there puts a big smile on my face, and I enjoy smiling so that I will be internally grateful. Tell me a topic that you would like me to cover, and I'll give you a shout out at the end of that episode. Come back tomorrow for more Daily Sports history.