Okay, so the other day I was watching some old NFL highlights, you know, just killing time. And I saw this massive dude just plowing through defenders. It got me thinking, who’s actually been the tallest guy to ever play running back in the league? Like, really tall for that position.
So, naturally, I grabbed my phone and started digging. My first thought was just to search for “tallest running back nfl history”. Pretty straightforward, right?
Well, kinda. A bunch of names started popping up immediately. You see guys like Derrick Henry mentioned a lot these days, and yeah, he’s a big dude, listed around 6’3″. Definitely tall for a running back.
Digging a Little Deeper
But I wanted the tallest ever. So I kept scrolling, clicking a few different pages. It wasn’t like there was one definitive list everyone agreed on, which was a bit annoying. Some sites mentioned players I’d barely heard of, or guys who maybe lined up in the backfield occasionally but weren’t really running backs, you know?
Then one name started showing up more consistently when people talked about the absolute tallest: Brandon Jacobs. I remember watching him play for the Giants. He was huge!
- Searched “Brandon Jacobs height”
- Looked at multiple sports stats sites
- Checked some old forum discussions
Most places listed him at 6 foot 4 inches. That seemed pretty legit. He was definitely a true running back, carried the ball a ton, and used that size. Compared to Henry’s 6’3″, Jacobs had that extra inch.
I saw a few mentions of other really tall guys, maybe some obscure players from way back, but Jacobs’ name was the one that consistently came up as a prominent, very tall running back who had a solid career. Trying to confirm heights from decades ago can be tricky, sometimes records are fuzzy. But 6’4″ for Jacobs seemed like a solid bet based on what I was finding.
So, after poking around for a bit, that’s kinda where I landed. Brandon Jacobs seems to be the guy most often cited as the tallest running back, or at least one of the very tallest, to have a significant NFL career. It was interesting to see how different sources sometimes had slightly different takes, but Jacobs was the common thread. It’s wild thinking about a guy that big running the ball like he did.
