We all remember the Tom Brady’s and Joe Montana’s but here are 10 Super Bowl heroes that helped lead their team to glory that you may have forgotten.

Otis Anderson Super Bowl XXV

Anderson spent most of his career with the then St. Louis Cardinals. He rushed for over a thousand yards in his first 5 out of 6 seasons. Injuries slowed him down and then he was traded to the Giants. He played the back up role for a couple of years but then took over the starting role in 1989 and ran for a thousand yards again. In the Super Bowl against the Bills, the Giants game plan was to eat up the clock and keep the ball away from the high flying, fast paced Bills. It would have not worked without Otis who ran 21 times for 102 yards and a touchdown. He was the MVP although you could also give that title to Scott Norwood who missed the winning kick for the Bills as we just recently heard the same saying…”Wide Right!” I remember as a kid thinking how could you miss it? It was only 47 yards and my brother who was a kicker in high school and college made a 47 yarder in high school that same season. I was like dude, my brother can make that. Granted the stage and pressure may have been slightly different. Bonus shout out to Jeff Hostetler for starting in Phil Sims place since he got hurt, and playing well. And for rocking the mustache after the 80’s run of having a mustache being cool and prior to the latest trend of having a mustache being cool the last couple of years ago. Thank goodness that trend seems to be over. 

Brad Johnson Super Bowl XXXVII

Johnson benefited from an elite defense but this wasn’t a Trent Dilfer story. Brad could play and put up stats where ever he went on his journeyman career. He was Ryan Fitzpatrick before it was cool to be Ryan Fitzpatrick. He had a great year which helped the Bucs get to the Super Bowl. He had the lowest interception rate in the league and set team records for touchdowns, completion percentage and most consecutive passes without an interception. In the Super Bowl, the defense did dominate intercepting Rich Gannon 5 times. But Brad played well going 18 for 34 for 215 yards and 2 touchdowns. He also has more super bowl rings than Jim Kelly, Dan Marino, Warren Moon and Dan Fouts combined. 

Larry Brown Super Bowl XXX

Larry Brown played corner back for the Cowboys opposite Deion Sanders. You may not remember him but he was actually the MVP of this super bowl because Steelers QB Neil O’Donnell kept throwing the ball right to him. Larry had two second half interceptions that sealed the deal for the Cowboys as they scored 2 touchdowns off the short fields. Larry used the fame of being the Super Bowl MVP to get the Raiders to overpay him because the Raiders are good at overpaying people. He didn’t do much there as he got benched and suspended and only ended up playing in 12 games for the Raiders over 2 years. It’s a classic Raiders story.

Timmy Smith Super Bowl XXII

This is known as the Doug Williams game. Doug became the first black quarterback to start in the Super Bowl and he won MVP and put on a show in the highest scoring second quarter in Super Bowl history. After the Broncos got out to a 10-0 lead the Redskins scored 35 points in the second quarter including 4 touchdown passes by Williams. The ironic part is that Williams wasn’t even supposed to be the starter but he took over the job from Jay Schroeder. Everyone knows that story but everyone forgets that George Rodgers their starting running back got hurt so Timmy Smith started the super bowl. All Timmy did was set a record for most rushing yards in a Super Bowl that still stands today. Timmy ran 21 times for 202 yards and 2 touchdowns for a ridiculous 9.27 yards per carry. Any other game he would have been Super Bowl MVP. What makes the whole story that much more strange is that outside of the Super Bowl, Timmy rushed for a whopping 602 yards and 3 touchdowns in his whole career. So in one game, he did a 3rd of the production he accomplished in his career. It remains one of the oddest and greatest performances in Super Bowl history. 

Damien Williams Super Bowl LIV

Hey remember 5 years ago when the Chiefs won their first super bowl in 50 years against this very same 49ers team? We talk about Mahomes in that game and jet chip wasp and how Jimmy G missed a “wide open” Emanual Sanders. You know what we have all forgotten about? Damien Williams. he rattled off 104 yards on 17 carries and caught 3 passes for 29 yards. He also scored the td that gave them the lead and a second touchdown to seal the deal. Honestly he probably should have been the MVP. And then we just moved on from him which I would say was a bad idea but he joins the long list of Chiefs who have left not named Tyreek Hill, that didn’t do squat after leaving. 

Roger Craig a whole bunch of Super bowls

When you play with one of the top 3 Quarterback’s ever and the greatest receiver ever, it is easy to get forgotten. But Roger Craig was a beast. The dude was the best dual threat running back in the league outside of Walter Payton. He played in and won 3 super bowls and here are his lines from those 3 games:

Super Bowl XIX: 15 carries for 58 and 1 td, 7 catches for 77 yards and 2 tds. Set the record for most points and tds scored in a game.

Super Bowl XXIII: 17 carries for 71 yards and 8 catches for 101 yards. That is 182 yards from scrimmage. If Montana hadn’t led a game winning drive and Jerry Rice hadn’t had 215 yards receiving Craig would be a shoo in for MVP.

Super Bowl XXIV: 20 carries for 69 yards and 1 td and 5 catches for 34 yards. This was by far his worst performance and he still had over 100 yards from scrimmage and a td. At the end of this game he had the super bowl record for most tds, receptions and points in a career. 

Roger could flat out play and arguably should be in the hall of fame. In 1985 he had over a thousand yards rushing and receiving. He was doing things CMC does way back when I was 6 years old!

Terrell Owens Super Bowl XXXIX

Everybody forgets his role in this game because they lost but dude caught 9 balls for 122 yards…on a broken leg!!! Enough said. 

Mike Jones Super Bowl XXXIV

The greatest show on turf was almost the greatest team to never win one. We get movies about Kurt Warner and all the accolades go to the offense that had Warner, Marshall Faulk, Isaac Bruce and Tory Holt. 3 hall of famers and probably some day a 4th. But this game was headed to over time if Mizzou Alum Mike Jones doesn’t come off his man to make a td saving tackle as time expired. MIZ! ZOU! This is how much I love Mizzou, I am willing to write about a St. Louis team’s victory. But don’t worry, they would dump St. Louis later as all football teams do and go back to LA. Honestly, Mike isn’t all that forgotten because they show this play a bunch. But it was my chance to mention Mizzou and take a jab at St. Louis so I had to put him on the list. 

James White Super Bowl LI

The greatest comeback in Super Bowl History was led by Tom Brady but couldn’t have happened without James White. White had 6 carries for 29 yards and 2 tds but also had a whopping 14 receptions for 110 yards and a td. He scored the last 2 touchdowns of the game and caught the 2 pt conversion that sent the game to OT. If Tom Brady wasn’t his QB he would have been the MVP. 

Jacoby Jones and electricity Super Bowl XLVII

Jacoby Jones caught 1 pass in this game for a 56 yard touchdown in the first half. He then took the second half kickoff for 108 yards for the score. I am not sure what Jacoby did before or after this game but he accounted for 12 of the Ravens 34 points on 2 plays. And since they won by 3 I’d say that is pretty important. This was also the power outage game that took the game from being a blowout to being a great game. When the power went out early in the 3rd quarter the score was Ravens 28 and 49ers 6.  During the power outage, the 49ers obviously stole the Ravens playbooks or something because they battled back scoring 23 points and just missing a 2 point conversion to tie the game. But it wasn’t quite enough as the Ravens won by 3. 

Tune in tomorrow when I give you 10 reasons why the 49ers will win the Super Bowl.