Bill Dudley is a Hall of Fame running back whose career earned a modest career value score of 58 in the Knox value model. Dudley's enshrinement reflects a career that consistently placed him among the elite of his generation.

RBWAShistorical

Bill Dudley

"Bullet Bill"

★ HALL OF FAMETop 26% all-time RBsHigh-End Starter📊 Overvalued by voters 🌅 Early Bloomer · 1942

BornDec 24, 1921

Age104

CollegeVirginia See College Stats

Rookie yr1942

All-Time Standing

how this career measures against the all-time greats at the position

Depth

of 100

Reached 17% of the all-time Rushing Yards leader — a rotational/depth all-time profile at the position.

17% of the all-time Rushing Yards leader17

0 categories ≥25% of the all-time leader0

A 0–100 scale where 100 = matched the all-time leader at this position. Built only from visible encyclopedia data — career production vs. the all-time leader, plus efficiency (EPA) and comparable-player confidence — so it's a transparent context score, not a subjective rating. Tiers: Elite ≥ 85 · Strong ≥ 65 · Solid ≥ 45 · Depth < 45. Comparable-player confidence: 94%.

Encyclopedia Coverage

Career Value · VORP

61 career value over replacement — #1837 all-time of 4,695. 7.6/season above a replacement-level RB.

Fan Rating

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Compare Bill Dudley vs Player Report data error

StatVault aggregates multiple open-licensed and proprietary sources into a single profile. The depth indicator above shows which layers are available for this player.

Bio & DraftBirth date, height/weight, draft round/pick, college — sourced from nflverse players.csv (CC-BY 4.0). Covers all NFL eras.

Season Stats (1999–present)Week-by-week box scores aggregated to season totals: passing, rushing, receiving, defense. Source: nflverse player_stats. Counting stats are exact; rates are derived.

Advanced (EPA, 1999–present)Not available for this player

Snap Counts (2012–present)Not available for this player

Defensive StatsNot available for this player

College StatsCollege attribution is present, but this profile artifact does not yet carry a parsed college stat table.

NFL Combine / Pro DayNot available for this player

Proprietary LayersKV-H (Knox Value-Historical) — era-normalized career rating 0–100 calibrated within position group (1999+ coverage). SIS (Snap Impact Score, 2012+) — per-snap production z-scored within position. VORP — value over replacement player. Durability IQ — games-played percentile adjusted for era.

Pre-1999 players have bio + draft data but counting stats are not available from any freely-licensed source. Players with ★ Career Only see verified career aggregates from nflverse draft_picks.

Where this data comes from

Modern-era stats (1999+) come from nflverse's open data releases. Pre-1999 seasons are backfilled additively from Wikipedia and NFL.com's own official season pages — never from rights-restricted sources.

nflverse — CC-BY 4.0 — attribution required
Wikipedia — Facts extracted under Feist v. Rural Telephone; courtesy CC-BY-SA attribution
NFL.com — Official league site; facts extracted under Feist, courtesy attribution

Methodology · Trust Center

Career Aging Trajectory

vs. position group average · KV-H basis

Amber = this player (normalized to own peak). Indigo = average RBs aging curve. Group peak age: 21. Source: StatVault KV-H era (1999+).

From Scrimmage · Career

Scrimmage Yds

4,440

3,057 rush · 1,383 recv

Total TDs

18 rush · 18 recv

Total Touches

888

765 carries · 123 rec

Yds / Touch

5.0

rushing + receiving

Career Milestones4

Major career thresholds crossed, derived from regular-season totals (1999+).

19461K career rushing yards
19501K career receiving yards
1950100 career receptions
19513K career rushing yards

Understanding These Stats

Rushing

Att — Rushing attempts (carries).

Yds — Rushing yards.

TD — Rushing touchdowns.

Y/A — Yards per carry — rushing yards ÷ carries. The core rushing efficiency rate; 4.5+ is solid, 5+ is elite.

TD% — Touchdown rate per carry (TDs ÷ carries × 100) — measures scoring efficiency per touch independent of volume. Red-zone workhorses lead here.

1D — First downs gained on rushing plays.

1D% — First-down conversion rate (first downs ÷ carries × 100) — how often a carry moves the chains. Top RBs convert on 25%+ of attempts.

Fmb — Rushing fumbles lost — the key ball-security stat for running backs. Below 1 per season is elite.

Receiving

Tgt — Targets — how many times the receiver was thrown to, regardless of completion.

Rec — Receptions — catches made.

Yds — Receiving yards.

TD — Receiving touchdowns.

Ctch% — Catch rate — receptions ÷ targets × 100. Measures how reliably a receiver turns opportunities into gains. 70%+ is elite.

Y/R — Yards per reception — receiving yards ÷ receptions. Measures big-play ability; 15+ is elite for WRs.

Y/Tgt — Yards per target — receiving yards ÷ targets. The single most complete receiving efficiency metric: accounts for both drops and incomplete targets. Elite receivers post 8+ yards per target.

AirYd/T — Air yards per target — average depth of route at time of target. High values indicate a deep threat role; low values indicate a slot/check-down role.

1D — First downs gained on receiving plays.

Proprietary StatVault Metrics

KV-H (Knox Value-Historical) — Era-normalized career rating 0–100 within position group, calibrated so a 50 = average starter and 90+ = all-time great. Covers 1999–present. Built on a 5-year IQR/robust-std era window.

SIS (Snap Impact Score) — Per-snap production z-scored within position group and era (2012+). Measures how much a player produced per opportunity, not raw volume.

VORP (Value Over Replacement) — Sum of max(0, season KV-H − positional replacement level) across a career. Measures career value above the minimum-roster baseline at each position.

Durability IQ — 0–100 score reflecting how many games a player played relative to peers at the same position in the same era. Adjusts for injury-shortened seasons.

College Stats

VirginiaCollege listed; stat table pending import

College stats are not imported for this profile yet.

StatVault has the verified college attribution (Virginia), but no parsed college box-score table is present in this profile artifact. The section stays here so every profile has a consistent college-stats landing point without fabricating unavailable rows.

Franchise Succession

the room, before and after

Bill inherited the Washington Commanders RB room from Cliff Battles (1932–1937), and handed it to John Riggins (1976–1985).

Cliff Battles 1932–1937Bill Dudley 1950–1953John Riggins 1976–1985Clarence Harmon 1977–1982Joe Washington 1981–1984Kelvin Bryant 1986–1990Earnest Byner 1989–1993Brian Mitchell 1990–1999Terry Allen 1995–1998Stephen Davis 1996–2002

Bill opened the Detroit Lions RB lineage the corpus knows, and handed it to Doak Walker (1950–1955).

Bill Dudley 1947–1949Doak Walker 1950–1955Dexter Bussey 1974–1984Horace King 1975–1983Billy Sims 1980–1984Barry Sanders 1989–1998D'Andre Swift 2020–2022

The room is reconstructed from arrival order among durable members (≥4 seasons with the club) at the player’s position group — a lineage by arrival, not a week-by-week depth chart. Distinct from the league-wide positional GOAT torch.

Movementderived from season history

1953final season
Last recorded season with WAS
1950team change
Joined WAS (from DET)
1947team change
Joined DET (from PIT)
1942signing
Entered the NFL with PIT

Knox

StatVault's proprietary player intelligence, informed by full career data. How Knox works →

Historical Knox · KV-H

Era-normalized career quality — z-scored against 8-season peers. See all →

peak 59

Season Report Cards· KV-H era-normalized per season

B+1942

F1945

B1946

C1947

D1948

C+1949

C+1950

B1951

Availability

Career durability — games played vs. scheduled, across 8 seasons.

81%

19421951

1945 · cause not documented · 33%1948 · cause not documented · 58%

Durability IQ

Composite score across availability, IR frequency, and injury severity. See all →

Durable

Canton Monitor · HOF

Enshrined in the Pro Football Hall of Fame. See all →

✓

Enshrined

What carries the case

League Leads 96%Era Quality (KV-H) 4%

Monitor score 12.5 · components sum to the score (All-Pro ×12 · Pro Bowl ×3 · League Lead ×4 · ranks/era/longevity weighted).

Career Fingerprint

Statistical profile across 5 dimensions

Overall

Longevity76

Peak59

Accolades10

Consistency50

Per-Snap50

Era Translator

Rush Yds translated to the 2025 NFL — each season's standing among its own-era peers, projected onto 2025's scoring environment. Modern-era (1999+) coverage.

Season	Actual Rush Yds	Rush Yds/G	→ 2025 Rush Yds	→ 2025 /G
1942	696	63.3	1,224+528	72
1945	204	51	645+441	37.9
1946	604	54.9	697+93	41
1947	302	33.6	202-100	11.9
1948	97	13.9	0-97	0
1949	402	33.5	452+50	26.6
1950	339	28.3	428+89	25.2
1951	398	33.2	542+144	31.9

Data: wikipedia:season-stats (CC-BY-SA, facts-only), wikipedia:pfhof-inductee-list · multi-source verified via the StatVault Oracle · updated 7/10/2026

Career Geography

Journeyman · 3 crestsLeague board →

Wore 3 distinct franchise crests across 12 seasons (1942–1953) — a true nomad. The crest trail:

PIT 1942–1946 DET 1947–1949 WAS 1950–1953