Earl Campbell ranks in the all-time elite tier for running backs — a career that places Campbell in the top 3% of all players at the position. The Knox value model assigns Campbell a career score of 83, reflecting sustained impact that most players at the position never approach.

On the boards· Appears on 2 boards

Streaks4 straight · 1,000 rushing yards · 1978–81

RBNO#0ACT

Earl Campbell

"the Tyler Rose"

Top 2% all-time RBsIron Legend📊 Undervalued by voters 📉 Fades · -28% playoffs

Career Value · VORP

220 career value over replacement — #315 all-time of 4,695. 27.5/season above a replacement-level RB.

Draft OutcomeValue ↑

Pick #1 (Rd 1) · HOU · 1978 · +19.7 vs expected KV-H

83actual

63.3 expected · Δ+19.7

Fan Rating

Rate Earl Campbell — All-Time

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Compare Earl Campbell vs Player Report data error

All-Time Standing

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

Solid

of 100

Reached 51% of the all-time Rushing Yards leader — a solid all-time profile at the position.

51% of the all-time Rushing Yards leader51

2 categories ≥25% of the all-time leader67

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: 88%.

Encyclopedia Coverage4/8 data layers

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.

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+).

Playoff vs Regular Season

📉 Regular Season Player

Yards / Carry: 4.3 regular season → 3.1 playoffs (3 playoff seasons)

-28%

vs reg season

From Scrimmage · Career

Scrimmage Yds

10,213

9,407 rush · 806 recv

Total TDs

74 rush · 0 recv

Total Touches

2,308

2,187 carries · 121 rec

Yds / Touch

4.4

rushing + receiving

Career Milestones7

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

19781K career rushing yards
19793K career rushing yards
197925 career rushing TDs
19805K career rushing yards
198150 career rushing TDs
19838K 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.

Postseason Career

Rushing

Att135Yds420TD4Y/A3.1TD%3.0

Receiving

Rec5Yds45Y/R9.0

College Stats

TexasCollege listed; stat table pending import

College stats are not imported for this profile yet.

StatVault has the verified college attribution (Texas), 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.

Reference Graph

Career teammates and draft class, derived from year-by-year rosters — every name is linked.

Top Teammates

Robert BrazileOLB7y Elvin BetheaDE4y Dave CasperTE3y Rickey JacksonDE2y

Franchise Succession

the room, before and after

Earl opened the Houston Texans RB lineage the corpus knows, and handed it to Allen Pinkett (1986–1991).

Earl Campbell 1978–1984Allen Pinkett 1986–1991Lorenzo White 1988–1994Domanick Williams 2003–2005Arian Foster 2009–2015

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.

Similar Players

Statistical + physical similarity across every player in the database, position-relevant (0–100%).

Movementderived from season history

1985team change
Joined NO (from HOU)
1985final season
Last recorded season with NO
1978draft
Drafted by HOU — Round 1, Pick 1

Athletic & Unique Profile

verified measurements and curated source-tagged facts

5'11" / 232 lb

Frame

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 87

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

B+1978

A1979

A+1980

A1981

B+1982

A1983

B1984

B1985

Availability

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

93%

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
1978	1,450	96.7	1,092-358	64.3
1979	1,697	106.1	1,412-285	83
1980	1,934	128.9	2,018+84	118.7
1981	1,376	86	1,498+122	88.1
1982	538	59.8	1,172+634	69
1983	1,301	92.9	1,754+453	103.2
1984	468	39	885+417	52.1
1985	643	40.2	914+271	53.7

Data: nflverse:players, wikipedia:season-stats (CC-BY-SA, facts-only), wikipedia:pfhof-inductee-list · multi-source verified via the StatVault Oracle · updated 8/31/2026