Willie Parker’s rise from an undrafted free agent out of North Carolina to a 1,000-yard rusher on a Super Bowl-winning team is one of the better stories from Pittsburgh’s run in the mid-2000s. Parker ran for over 1,200 yards every season from 2005-2007, but his football career lasted just six seasons and 79 games. Parker was a guest with Joe Starkey on 93.7 The Fan earlier today, and he said that he thinks he just didn’t take football seriously enough.
Parker laid out the standards that are expected of you as an athlete and why he doesn’t feel as if he’s underrated.
“You gotta do things not just on the field, you gotta have the same energy off the field as well. There’s so much that comes with greatness, and when you’re young and you’re not really seeing the big picture, you actually hinder yourself from being great. I don’t think for one moment that I’m overlooked. I don’t think for one moment that people put me under the radar, it just is what it is. You gotta do certain things when you’re a professional, you can’t take that lightly. You gotta be a professional in every particular category. And if you’re not, it’s on to the next one.”
Parker said he doesn’t feel as if he was able to live up to those standards, and he wished he took football more seriously.
“I probably didn’t meet the standards that NFL athletes supposedly had met at that particular time. That’s why, you know, you live and you learn, and it is what it is. I love every single play that I played in the NFL, but I think if I could go back and turn the hands of time, I would’ve took it a little bit more seriously.”
“Fast” Willie was the perfect complement for Jerome Bettis toward the end of his career, as Bettis could still get his goal line and short-yardage touches, while Parker’s speed provided a completely different component for defenses to deal with. He excelled as Pittsburgh’s lead back, and his 75-yard touchdown run in Super Bowl XL was one of the biggest plays in securing Pittsburgh’s fifth Lombardi Trophy.
But he struggled in 11 games in 2008, coming off a broken fibula suffered at the end of the 2007 season, and he would get just 98 carries for 389 yards in 2009. For Parker, I’m sure he feels he could’ve done more in the weight room and taken more focus on building his body up, given that the injury was sort of the point where his career took a turn for the worse.
A broken fibula is sort of a freak injury, though, and it’s not really something Parker could’ve prevented from happening. But he clearly still feels like there’s more he could’ve done to dedicate himself to football, potentially giving him a longer career with the Steelers. He was one of the best backs in the league when he was healthy in the mid-2000s, making the Pro Bowl in both 2006 and 2007, two seasons where he was able to tote the rock over 300 times.
The lifespan of running backs in the NFL, unfortunately, just isn’t very long. Willie Parker already defied the odds as an undrafted free agent making an impact in the NFL. With Parker’s cousin, Jaylen Warren, now in the Steelers’ backfield, he’ll look to follow in Parker’s footsteps and become a leading rusher and Pro Bowler in Pittsburgh.
