Rick Cleveland helps pick Mississippi’s all-time greats on defense of the last 50 years or so

An Ole Miss Spirit subscriber threw down a challenge the other day to the Spirit staff to name an all-time Mississippi football team comprised of players native to our great state that went to one of our colleges to play football.

I wouldn’t need much help if it was a request for an all-time Ole Miss Rebel team, but I really don’t know much about the greats from Mississippi State, Southern Mississippi, Jackson State, Alcorn, Mississippi Valley and so on.

So I called on someone who does know – Rick Cleveland, who has been writing sports in this state since 1966 when he was 13 years old, believe it or not.

Tuesday, we picked the offense. Today, the defense.

Three caveats, however. One, we did a first team and an honorable mention at some positions because this state has produced so many great players, we just felt guilty leaving great players out.

Two, we didn’t go back past when we actually saw them play, hence, the greats prior to 1970 aren’t in this, with my apologies. So this all-time list is basically the last 50 years of Mississippi football.

Three, we did this off the top of two 70-year old brains with no research. Just two “damn-what-was-his-name?” memories.

So, here’s our defensive picks.

Defensive End: Tony Bennett and Freddie Joe Nunn will represent Ole Miss at this position. Both had good pro careers and were forces in college. Rick and I debated including Wesley Walls here, but since we named him a tight end, we thought that was enough, but he was a very good DE as well in college.

MSU’s Tyrone Keys was as imposing as any player during his time and Southern Mississippi’s Fred Cook was a bad man on the gridiron. Neither Rick nor I wanted to designate any of these four as honorable mention so we just clustered them as the best DEs during our time frame.

Defensive Tackle: Again, we declined the thought of naming any of these guys honorable mention. They were just too good. No DT list would be legitimate without Bulldogs Fletcher Cox, Chris Jones and Jeffrey Simmons, but neither would a defensive tackle list be respected without Ole Miss’ Ben Williams and Peria Jerry.

We both said we’d defy any state to come up with a better fivesome than those fantastic players at the DT spot. Whereas Mississippi has been a little “light” at some positions, defensive tackle isn’t one of them.

Linebacker: Rick and I need help and input here. We came up with three that were definitely a force, but struggled beyond that. Ole Miss’ best – names like Patrick Willis and Jeff Herrod – were not from Mississippi. We settled on MSU’s Johnnie Cooks from Leland and USM’s Rod Davis, who led the nation in tackles one year. Help!

Safety: Rebels Harry Harrison and Glen Cannon, both All-Americans, were the pick of the litter here with USM’s Bud Brown getting an honorable mention nod.

Rick and I would welcome any help at LB and safety. I think by the time we got to those positions we both needed our afternoon nap.

Cornerback: Mississippi State has had two worthy of recognition in Fred Smoot and Jonathan Abram, while Southern Mississippi boasts of Norris Thomas and Ole Miss had Senquez Golson, Stevon Moore and Kenyatta Lucas. All those guys could throw a blanket on a wideout and take them out of a game.

Punter: We didn’t get into special teams too much, but we were both lamenting the fact that two of the greatest punters of all time – USM’s Ray Guy and Ole Miss’ Bill Smith – did not go to high school in our state. A great one who did, however, was Jim Miller from Ripley.

We’d love your input on any names we didn’t think of and hope you enjoyed our “brainstorm.”

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