Cal's Mount Rushmore

NFL.com's CFB 24/7 is currently running an interesting series of articles revealing their choices for the Mount Rushmores for ten top college football programs. A Mount Rushmore being the top four all-time NFL players from those schools. It's a fun little project undertaken by NFL Media editor Jim Reineking. The ten colleges were chosen based on the total number of NFL players produced by the school. So far, five of the ten have been revealed. Here they are.

Tennessee
Peyton Manning
Reggie White
Jason Witten
Doug Atkins

No argument here. Reggie White and Doug Atkins are in the Pro Football Hall of Fame. Peyton Manning will be. Jason Witten could be.

Miami
Ray Lewis
Ed Reed
Jim Kelly
Michael Irvin

Miami has a bunch of players worthy of having their mugs carved in stone. Warren Sapp, Ted Hendricks, and Cortez Kennedy are in the Hall of Fame. Reggie Wayne. I'd try to find room for Sapp. Perhaps at the expense of Irvin.

LSU
Jim Taylor
Y.A. Tittle
Steve Van Buren
Alan Faneca

Excellent choices.

Oklahoma
Lee Roy Selmon
Adrian Peterson
Tommy McDonald
Keith Jackson

The first three are automatic.

Nebraska
Will Shields
Roger Craig
Neil Smith
Irving Fryar

I have some problems with this Nebraska Mount Rushmore. Will Shields is the only one of the four to have an NFL career that put him in Hall of Fame. An argument can be made for Roger Craig's inclusion in Canton. Irving Fryar and Neil Smith had fine professional careers. In my book, Nebraska alums Guy Chamberlain, Link Lyman, Mick Tingelhoff, and Bob Brown are deserving of Mt. Rushmore status. Chamberlain and Lyman were two of the very best football players during the NFL's first decade. I'd put Chamberlain, Lyman, Tingelhoff, and Shields on my personal Nebraska Mount Rushmore. Tingelhoff gets the nod over Brown for the simple reason that he played for the Minnesota Vikings. A reasonable tie-breaker.

Cal has sent a lot of players to the NFL. They could be one of the remaining five colleges. I'm not waiting. I'm picking my own.

Cal's Mount Rushmore: Top All-Time NFL Players from Cal
Aaron Rodgers
Tony Gonzalez
Les Richter
Nnambi Asomugha

Despite sending several players to the NFL Cal hasn't had a lot of players with all-time careers in the league. Les Richter became the first Cal player in the Pro Football Hall of Fame when he was finally inducted in 2011. Tony Gonzalez won't have to wait the nearly 50 years that Richter had to wait for induction. Aaron Rodgers will join them five years after he retires. Nnambi Asomugha was great for a few years but probably wasn't great long enough to one day have a bust in Canton. He was still great enough to make it on Cal's Mount Rushmore. Hardy Nickerson and Matt Hazeltine also received strong consideration.