James Kevin Smith (born September 25, 1960) is a former

American football American football (referred to simply as football in the United States and Canada), also known as gridiron, is a team sport played by two teams of eleven players on a rectangular field with goalposts at each end. The offense, the team wit ...

running back A running back (RB) is a member of the offensive backfield in gridiron football. The primary roles of a running back are to receive handoffs from the quarterback to rush the ball, to line up as a receiver to catch the ball, and block. The ...

in the

National Football League The National Football League (NFL) is a professional American football league that consists of 32 teams, divided equally between the American Football Conference (AFC) and the National Football Conference (NFC). The NFL is one of the ma ...

(NFL) for the

Los Angeles Raiders The Los Angeles Raiders were a professional American football team that played in Los Angeles from 1982 to 1994 before relocating back to Oakland, California, where the team played from its inaugural 1960 season to the 1981 season and then agai ...

, the

Washington Redskins The Washington Commanders are a professional American football team based in the Washington metropolitan area. The Commanders compete in the National Football League (NFL) as a member club of the league's National Football Conference (NFC) ...

, and the

Minnesota Vikings The Minnesota Vikings are a professional American football team based in Minneapolis. They compete in the National Football League (NFL) as a member club of the National Football Conference (NFC) North division. Founded in 1960 as an expansio ...

. He played

high school football High school football (french: football au lycée) is gridiron football played by high school teams in the United States and Canada. It ranks among the most popular interscholastic sports in both countries, but its popularity is declining, partl ...

Kankakee, Illinois Kankakee is a city in and the county seat of Kankakee County, Illinois, United States. As of 2020, the city's population was 24,052. Kankakee is a principal city of the Kankakee-Bourbonnais-Bradley Metropolitan Statistical Area. It serves a ...

at Westview High School there before the merging of Westview and Eastridge High. Smith played college football at

Purdue Purdue University is a public land-grant research university in West Lafayette, Indiana, and the flagship campus of the Purdue University system. The university was founded in 1869 after Lafayette businessman John Purdue donated land and money ...

for three seasons (1979–81) before transferring to

Elon College Elon University is a private university in Elon, North Carolina. Founded in 1889 as Elon College, Elon is organized into six schools, most of which offer bachelor's degrees and several of which offer master's degrees or professional doctorate d ...

for the remainder of his collegiate career and was drafted in the fourth round of the

1984 NFL Draft The 1984 NFL Draft was the procedure by which National Football League teams selected amateur college football players. It is officially known as the NFL Annual Player Selection Meeting. The draft was held May 1–2, 1984, at the Omni Park Cen ...

. In 1978, Smith was named All-State player of the year in the state of Illinois. He briefly played with the

Green Bay Packers The Green Bay Packers are a professional American football team based in Green Bay, Wisconsin. The Packers compete in the National Football League (NFL) as a member club of the National Football Conference (NFC) North division. It is the th ...

. At Purdue, Smith totaled 1,466 yards and 15 TDs on 360 carries. He was a member of Purdue's

1979 Bluebonnet Bowl The 1979 Astro-Bluebonnet Bowl was a college football postseason game between the Purdue Boilermakers and the Tennessee Volunteers. Background Tennessee won their first three games and entered the rankings at #19 before a game at Mississippi Sta ...

and

1980 Liberty Bowl The 1980 Liberty Bowl, a college football postseason bowl game, was played on December 27, 1980, in Memphis, Tennessee. The 22nd edition of the Liberty Bowl saw the Purdue Boilermakers defeat the Missouri Tigers, 28–25. Background After 9–2� ...

championship teams.http://grfx.cstv.com/photos/schools/pur/sports/m-footbl/auto_pdf/2016-17/misc_non_event/boilers_in_the-nfl.pdf

References

External links

NFL.com player page
1960 births Living people Sportspeople from Kankakee, Illinois American football running backs Purdue Boilermakers football players Elon Phoenix football players Los Angeles Raiders players Washington Redskins players Minnesota Vikings players National Football League replacement players {{runningback-1960s-stub