They were both high-profile USC products who were selected by the Browns in the first round of the NFL Draft decades ago.

One’s name rolls off your tongue. It’s that of Chip Banks, a left outside linebacker.

The other’s name may be one you’ve never heard of. It’s that of Pete Adams, a left guard.

We just did a story on BrownsDailyDose.comrecently on the five Browns players through history who never got to realize their greatness — Josh Gordon, Don Rogers, Don Fleming, Ernie Davis and Tom Bloom. They all either died and/or had drug issues. Those are tragic endings.

But you can’t really do that — that is, put together such a list — without at least mentioning Banks and Adams, whose stories are similar but not the same because the tragic part of their careers doesn’t exist. Sad and disappointing? Yes, certainly, their careers were that. But tragic? No, not at all.

Banks was drafted at No. 3 overall in 1982 and became an immediate star, making the Pro Bowl — back when making the Pro Bowl really meant something — in four of the five seasons he played for the Browns through 1986. He was unblockable. Pro Football Hall of Fame head coach Hank Stram, while working as the color analyst for CBS Radio with play-by-play announcer Jack Buck on a Thursday Night Football game against the Cincinnati Bengals at Cleveland in 1983, said of Banks, “I was in the Browns locker room before the game and saw him
without a shirt on. He looked like Superman.” Banks’ teammate, fellow linebacker Eddie Johnson, added, “He makes plays that only Superman could make.”

Despite all that — and it’s a lot, to be sure — Banks could have and should have been so much better over so many more seasons in Cleveland. He could have been
the best Browns linebacker in history, and a Pro Football Hall of Famer. But he seemed so aloof and disinterested at times. He disappeared. Why else would the Browns trade him to the then San Diego Chargers?

Ugh!!

As for Adams, he was drafted at No. 22 overall in 1973 as the heir apparent to Hall of Famer Gene Hickerson, who retired after the 1973 season. But knee injurues kept that from happening. He got onto the field for only two seasons, 1974 and ‘76, combining to have 22 starts, before the knee issues forced him to retire. Had he been able to stay healthy, then Adams could have been a very good player for a very long time.

But it wasn’t meant to be.

Steve King