Mount Rushmore of Browns fullbacks – Superman, Motley, Mike and Mack

EDITOR’S NOTE: This is the 21st in a series of stories about the Mount Rushmore-worthy players – the best players – in Browns history. Today we look at fullbacks.

By STEVE KING

Fullbacks in today’s NFL aren’t what they used to be – in more ways than one.

Now they’re used almost exclusively as lead blockers for running backs. They carry the ball about as often as Donald Trump and Nancy Pelosi exchange pleasantries.

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In fact, some teams don’t even have true fullbacks anymore. Instead the used tight ends in that role.

But back in the day, fullbacks did it all. Just like halfbacks, they carried the ball and caught it. The only difference is that they were much bigger – and stronger – than halfbacks.

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Through the years – about their first 50 years, to be exact – the Browns have had some extraordinary fullbacks, including Pro Football Hall of Famers Jim Brown, who played for the team from 1957-65, and Marion Motley (1946-53). Those two, along with Mike Pruitt (1976-84) and Kevin Mack (1985-93), both of whom are Cleveland Browns Legends, make the Mount Rushmore of Browns fullbacks.

Let’s take a look:

JIM BROWN

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What else can be said about him that hasn’t already been said? He is, without question, despite what you may have heard from some of the so-called “experts” who wouldn’t know Jim Brown from James Brown, the greatest player of all-time, at any position – and it’s not even close. He led the NFL in rushing for eight of the nine years he played, finishing with 12,312 yards, a 5.2 yards-per-carry average and 106 touchdowns, all numbers that were light years beyond anything that had been done before. And it should also be noted that Brown, taken in the first round, at No. 6 overall, in the 1957 NFL Draft out of Syracuse, caught 262 passes, putting him just out of the team’s top 10, for 20 touchdowns. He led the Browns in receptions once and finished second three times. Chuck Bednarik, the HOF middle linebacker from the Philadelphia Eagles who got to know Brown quite well from playing against him twice a year, every year, from 1957-62, said it best: “Jim Brown is the closest thing there’s ever been to Superman on a football field. He’s faster, stronger and more powerful than everybody else, and he’s virtually indestructible.”

MARION MOTLEY

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Before there was Jim Brown, there was Motley running over tacklers. Browns head coach Paul Brown remembered Motley from his days playing at Canton McKinley High School when Brown was head coach at arch rival Massillon in the 1930s. Brown signed Motley for his first Browns team in 1946 because he wanted a roommate for another African American player he had already signed in Bill Willis. Together, Willis, also a Hall of Famer, and Motley broke the color barrier for good not just in pro football, but pro sports overall, when they played in the first-ever Browns game on Sept. 6, 1946, nearly 8½ months ahead of Jackie Robinson shattering the color barrier in baseball. He rushed for 4,712 yards and 31 touchdowns, averaging 5.7 per carry.

MIKE PRUITT

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Pruitt, who was drafted in the first round, at No. 7 overall, in 1976 out of Purdue, struggled mightily, especially with ball security, in his first two seasons. The more he fumbled, the more he got into Browns head coach Forrest Gregg’s doghouse. And the further he got into Gregg’s doghouse, the more he lost his confidence, so much so that when Sam Rutigliano was hired as head coach shortly after the 1977 season ended, Pruitt was a broken man professionally. Rutigliano was able to restore Pruitt’s confidence, and it paid big dividends, as he had four 1,000-yard seasons in five years, finishing with 6,540 yards, the third-most in Browns history, and 47 touchdowns, the fourth-most. And the guy with supposedly bad hands also had 255 receptions, including 63 in back-to-back seasons, the first of which, in 1980, broke a team record.

KEVIN MACK

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When he was serving as the radio play-by-play announcer for Browns games, the late, great Nev Chandler nicknamed “The Mack Truck” for the way he ran over would-be tacklers, including Pittsburgh Steelers linebacker Greg Lloyd in a 1991 game at Cleveland, knocking him cold. Lloyd was once described by an NFL beat writer as “having muscles on his muscles,” but that wasn’t enough to stop Mack. One of the assortment of great players the Browns were able to pluck from the USFL (he was their first-round pick, at No. 11 overall, out of Clemson in the 1984 NFL Supplemental Draft), he is two spots behind Pruitt in Browns career rushing, standing fifth in 5,123 yards. His 46 TDs, one less than Pruitt’s total, places him fourth. He was at his best in the 1989 must-win regular-season finale at Houston, including on a fourth-quarter drive when he made one key run after another, culminating it by carrying three Oilers into the end zone on the winning touchdown burst as Cleveland rallied for a 24-20 decision to clinch the AFC Central crown for the fourth time in five years.

NEXT: Halfbacks, or running backs.

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• “Browns hater Colin Cowherd says team will make playoffs, but insults Baker Mayfield” (cleveland.com) 

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