Teams with the first pick in the NFL draft are under a great deal of pressure. Partly because the teams are so bad and partly because they've got everyone to choose from. No excuses. Five of these six players became Hall of Famers (the sixth is still active) and four helped their team go from whipping boys to Super Bowl contenders on a consistent basis.
#6 OJ Simpson, drafted by the Bills in 1969
The only player on the list to have never won a championship, OJ was still a spectacular star for the Bills and it's hard to imagine that any single player in the 1969 draft could've turned Buffalo into a winner. His greatest season was in 1973, when he became the first running back to break the 2,000-yard mark. He finished that year with a staggering average of 143 yards per game and 6 yards per carry. He closed out his career with two forgettable seasons in San Francisco.
#5 Paul Hornung, drafted by the Packers in 1957
To give you an idea of how good a player Hornung was in college, he won the Heisman on a 2-8 Notre Dame team. No wonder the struggling Packers thought he was the man to help them catch up with the Chicago Bears. The first year didn't go entirely to plan (to put it in perspective, the Detroit Lions were the NFL champs. I know, right?) but the versatile star led the league in scoring form 1959-61 and in the title game from 1960-62 (winning the second two). But by the 1966 season, injury kept him out of Super Bowl I and he subsequently left the team only to be picked by New Orleans in the expansion draft – however, he never played a game for the Saints due to a recurrence of his neck problem.
#4 Troy Aikman, drafted by the Cowboys in 1989
The 1988 Cowboys were awful: their 3-13 record was enough to land them with the first pick of the 1989 draft. They took Troy Aikman, who, under new coach Jimmy Jones, went 0-11 as a rookie with Dallas finishing 1-15. But the next year they went 7-9; the next it was 11-5 and the playoffs; the following season was 13-3 and a Super Bowl victory over the Bills. The dynasty was on. By keeping faith with Aikman, and allowing him to form a partnership with the other two 'triplets', Dallas became the team of the 1990s. And it all started with Aikman. He never left the Cowboys for another team despite being the only player on the list to transfer colleges.
#3 Terry Bradshaw, drafted by the Steelers in 1970
It's hard to think of the Steelers as a bottom-feeding franchise but that's exactly what they were from their founding in 1933 until the hiring of Chuck Noll in 1969. That first season was a 1-13 disaster for Noll but allowed Pittsburgh to take Terry Bradshaw with the first pick, thanks to a coinflip victory over the Bears (also 1-13). His first season was shaky, much like Aikman's, but soon helped spark a moribund offense. In 1974 he temporarily lost the starting job but won it back in time to lead the Steelers to their first ever championship. He added three more rings, winning two Super Bowl MVP awards, before retiring in 1983. Side note: In the third round, Pittsburgh selected Mel Blount. Bradshaw and Blount are the only two Hall of Famers from the entire 1970 draft. Nice work, Pittsburgh.
#2 John Elway, drafted by the Colts in 1983
The only player on the list to not play for the team that drafted him. Elway had been playing for a New York Yankees minor league team in Oneonta and told Baltimore if they didn't trade him to a better organisation, he would stick with baseball. Not wanting to have wasted the pick, the Colts accepted Denver's offer of two players and a first round pick the following season. It was a bargain for the Broncos. Elway turned them into contenders in his second season and he made his first Super Bowl appearance in his fourth year thanks to a series of plays that will be forever known as The Drive. He retired as the Broncos' greatest ever player, had five AFC titles, two Super Bowl rings and a reputation as one of the league's come-from-behind kings.
#1 Peyton Manning, drafted by the Colts in 1998
The Colts have a habit of ending up with the first overall pick (always a bad sign) in the past 20 years and using it on a quarterback. In 1983 it was John Elway (not that he ever wore the horseshoe), in 1990 it was Jeff George (a flop) and in 2012 it will probably be Andrew Luck (as sure a thing as you're going to get with a college passer). But the gold standard was when they picked Peyton Manning in 1998. In 1997, Jim Harbaugh's final season as a Colt, Indy went 3-13. The following year with Manning playing all 16 games? Another 3-13. But in his second season the Colts were on fire. Peyton was stunning and the team finished 13-3. An amazing turnaround. He won a Super Bowl ring and the game's MVP award following the 2006 season. Until 2011, Manning had never missed a start and following that rookie season only had one year with fewer than 10 wins. What might've happened if they'd chosen Ryan Leaf instead?
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