Being stuck in a hotel in a south Texas crap-hole, I found myself thirsting for an OU football fix. I wandered on to YouTube, and decided to watch some Marcus Dupree highlights. After doing so, I felt it necessary to compare them to AD's highlights, and found the two remarkably and possibly inexorably equal. So.. what say you, Sooner fans that witnessed both. If you could put one of them on a random Sooner squad of the future, which freak of nature would you choose. Please base your choice on tangibles only.
Dupree vs. AD
- Thread starter Bigred91
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Man, that's right down the middle.
If I needed to come from behind, I'd hand off to Dupree over and over until he needed to suck pure oxygen.
On the other hand, if I needed a clutch third and long, that would be Mr. ADs forte. Or, a red zone situation, AD.
Man, so many variables to consider, and they were both so damn good...it's a conundrum.
One was a hard working guy who is maybe still the NFL's best running back. The other is an overrated never was with talent physically, but without the will to be great. One will be in the PF hall of fame if he never plays another down. The other, uh, won't.
Two players who were arguably the two best running backs in OU history....yet their time at OU was limited.
Dupree was not really unleashed until 4 games into his freshman season...against Texas, where his long TD run was the margin of victory in OU's 28-22 win. Dupree played in only 13 games at OU as he left the team after the 28-16 loss to Texas in 1983. Clearly, he represented one of Switzer's biggest mistakes.
Peterson in three years at OU played in only 31 games. After playing 13 games as a freshman, Peterson appeared in 11 games in 2005, but was injured and had only 16 carries in three weeks against K-State, Texas and Kansas and played only 7 games in 2006 after scoring a touchdown against Iowa State in the sixth game of the season with 6-1/2 minutes left in the game, a play that resulted in a regular season-ending injury.
Both were great players, but the issues of Peterson's injuries in 2005-2006 and Dupree's entitlement mentality (and perhaps the way Switzer, by his own admission, handled him) really put a dent in the Sooner careers of both.
If all things were equal, I would have to go with Dupree as having superior talent. Simply because they were both so dominant on the field, yet only one of them was a hard worker, while the other was lazy and put as little effort in as possibly. So that alone, I would say Dupree was the better of the two, since his capability likely could have been even higher if he had the work ethic of AD.
But then again, all things were not equal. And to answer the OPs question, I would have to pick AD for a Sooner squad to win games. You won't have to worry about AD quitting or giving up on you half way through the season. And ADs work ethic is much more of a motivator for the rest of the team than a star player that is lazy and doesn't want to practice. Dupree would have a toxic and demoralizing effect on a team being the star and getting "special treatment" in not having to work like the rest of the team.
But then again, all things were not equal. And to answer the OPs question, I would have to pick AD for a Sooner squad to win games. You won't have to worry about AD quitting or giving up on you half way through the season. And ADs work ethic is much more of a motivator for the rest of the team than a star player that is lazy and doesn't want to practice. Dupree would have a toxic and demoralizing effect on a team being the star and getting "special treatment" in not having to work like the rest of the team.
Marcus Dupree, hands down. Electrifying every time time he touched the ball. Tremendous waste of talent that could have been the best ever in college football. AD had to work a lot harder to be great.
AD. Work ethic... Marcus was a primadonna. He is a great guy now but AD was willing to put the work in.
Yeah, AD had a dream, Dupree was just a dreamer.
Agreed. AD was a better blocker and better hands out of the back field. I liked Dupree's size and the speed and strength betweent the two seemed comparable, but I would go with AD as the better RB who could get through the hole quicker and had the breakaway speed that Dupree didn't have.
I dunno know about this. Getting through a hole quicker it's pretty close, but there is no way AD had the breakaway speed that Dupree did. I remember reading Dupree could run the 100yd dash in 10flat in full pads which was faster than what AD could do it without pads. I think AD was a lower 10 second guy in the 100yd dash if I remember correctly. I know the 30for30 on Dupree said he did the 100yd dash in 9.5, but I've also read where he ran it as fast as 9.3 as well. And Dupree was slightly bigger than AD.
I was going to post the same, but you were quicker....Marcus could flat out f l y and was faster from start to finish than AD, until the end of his 13 game career when he was overweight and out of shape, i.e. bowl game against ASU when he got caught from behind like 3 times but still rushed for a record amount of yards in that game.
Besides speed, there was an anticipation when watching Marcus that each and every time he got the football, he could score - not the same with AD. Matter of fact, I would have liked to see AD run behind some of the OL that we had in the 80s and certainly in the 70s - he would have set more records than he did.
Both of them were damn good. I am hoping that this season we will get to see 2 of next best in the same backfield. ......Back to question Marcus was better, when he played OU was a strictly running team, so everyone new who was getting the ball. AD had some help with a decent passing game.
I think Billy Sims was better than either, but if I had to choose, based on pure RB talent, Marcus would be the man. He could run over, past, and through defenders like no other than Jim Brown and Hershel Walker.
I share that same sentiment. Billy is Da Man when it comes to ranking/rating OU RBs!!!
Work ethic is tangible, so it's AD between the two. I don't think we've ever had anyone with the potential that Marcus had. But I think Billy Sims is the best OU back ever, so far. He had power, speed, size, great field vision, and a little wiggle. I don't think anyone else had the combination of skills that Billy had. I wish his knees would have held up in the NFL. It's quite possible that we have two guys on the roster right now that could end up being better than all of them.
AD was faster than Dupree. It just that the athletes on defense in 1983 weren't in the class that they are now. And Dupree was only that fast for a little more than a half. Against quality competetion, he wasn't that great in the fourth quarter, because he never worked to get in shape, much less stay in shape.
Big and fast is nice. But Dupree was a detriment to his team. AD never was.
I loved watching both of them play. I take AD over Marcus, simply because AD always gave the Sooners his best effort. Not sure that Marcus did that. If you throw Billy into the conversation, I take Billy every time though. Marcus might be the best that never was, but Billy was the best ever.
That's not what the numbers say. I'm not basing who was faster by whether the defense was able to stay with them or not. Like I said, Dupree was known to run 100-yd dashes in the sub 10sec range, at least mid9's and maybe even low 9s. I never heard of AD running it in less than 10sec.
But you certainly make a legit point in AD being able to sustain his speed further in games than Dupree. No doubt AD was in much better shape and it's not even close. That's why I picked AD if you are trying to build a team for a season. AD is the more dependable player.
Billy, 100 meters is less than two feet short of 110 yards. I think it's like 109.361 yards. There is no way that 9.5 for 100 yards is anywhere close to a sub 10.0 100 meters. There is no way that Marcus ran faster than 9.5. He didn't have a good enough start for that. And there is a reason that football evaluators use 40's rather than 100's. It's more applicable.
I have heard Barry say that he ran 9.6. if you think he could run another nine and a third yards in .7 or close to that. And by the time he got to OU, those last ten yards were more like 1.2 or maybe a little more.
I have heard Barry say that he ran 9.6. if you think he could run another nine and a third yards in .7 or close to that. And by the time he got to OU, those last ten yards were more like 1.2 or maybe a little more.
Hindsight is 20/20 and there is no one that I know that would have picked MD over AD at this point. If you want to talk potential, I'd give the edge to work ethic no matter how fast/good they were and AD in every category blows out MD by a huge margin.
I'm just posting what I have read. It's up to you to choose to believe it or not. But claiming Dupree couldn't run faster than 9.5 just because you don't think his start was good enough is pretty weak. Look at Usain Bolt. Plenty of guys in the world have a start better than him, but his top end is so fast he just overtakes them all. And world class sprinters these days would run the 100yd dash somewhere in the 8s. I also read a story where Dupree raced Calvin Smith several years before graduating high school, and Dupree lost the race by only inches. And Calvin Smith was the world record holder in the 100meters under 10sec.
Yes I've read it too. But there is no high school track publication that shows Dupree's times in high school. The lists go up to 10.49.
Here is a thread discussed by guys who know a whole lot more about it than I do and care more about track times than I do. I suspect that the 9.5 number came from Barry, who used to toss numbers like that around a little. Like running backs who run 4.4. He didn't say that about Marcus, who wasn't the quickest guy out of the blocks
It's possible that when Marcus was a freshman, he might have been in some prelim with Smith who cruised home. But the only references to Dupree racing Smith, or running 9.5 are anecdotal. It's not documented anywhere.
It's very unlikely that they ran a close race.
http://trackandfieldnews.com/discussion/archive/index.php/t-145264.html
Here is a thread discussed by guys who know a whole lot more about it than I do and care more about track times than I do. I suspect that the 9.5 number came from Barry, who used to toss numbers like that around a little. Like running backs who run 4.4. He didn't say that about Marcus, who wasn't the quickest guy out of the blocks
It's possible that when Marcus was a freshman, he might have been in some prelim with Smith who cruised home. But the only references to Dupree racing Smith, or running 9.5 are anecdotal. It's not documented anywhere.
It's very unlikely that they ran a close race.
http://trackandfieldnews.com/discussion/archive/index.php/t-145264.html
Well that's the thing...we are talking about a player from over 30 years ago. You can take the same stance when you mention any of your stories from the old days, that none of them are documented and they are anecdotal at best. Or you could apply that logic to ANY story you read or hear about players in the Switzer or Wilkinson days. There are FAR more stories that are told by people who were there at the time than stories you find documented someplace.
And again...just because Dupree wasn't the fastest out of the blocks does nothing to refute claims he could run 100yds that fast. Certainly it would hurt his 40yd time because it's so short, but his real breakaway speed would show up on a 100yd or 100meter run.
And again...just because Dupree wasn't the fastest out of the blocks does nothing to refute claims he could run 100yds that fast. Certainly it would hurt his 40yd time because it's so short, but his real breakaway speed would show up on a 100yd or 100meter run.
By the 70s, there were national publications who kept track ,, no pun intended .. of the best hs times nationally, especially that website. Given the notoriety of Dupree, there would have been easy access and some record officially of his competing against Calvin. And there would absolutely have been some official record or his running 9.5. That there is not speaks loudly. Repeating unconfirmed anecdotes does not make it true.
Well it may be anecdotal to you, but I'm sure there are plenty of people who played with him back in those days that will swear they saw him run those times. Official or not. It's one of those things many of us will never truly know for 100% certain since we never saw it with our own eyes. But I won't simply brush off people who say he could do it (people who were there) simply because there is no official record of it written down someplace.