re: Best LSU RB ever??

cannon number one in hardware and in legend (heisman, halloween).
faulk number one in stats.
diesel number one in coulda been.

on a personal note, i was a freshman in 97. i made the road trip to stark-vegas when the diesel took over for 2.5 quarters.
next week, 230 vs auburn. i had very low seats for the game, and i saw him run away from players all game. he just had another gear. he was big, strong and fast. he is, to this day, the best player i have seen in a tiger uniform. but he blew it.

kfaulk dominated while at lsu, and he has managed to hang around the league as a valuable third down back for 10 years now. every year, you see kfaulk have a 2 td game as a role player in a huge game. plus i have a nice tiger stadium print with kfaulk's autograph...

so, since i never saw cannon play and because i have kfaulk's autograph,
i vote for kfaulk

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Are you sure that Cannon was playing defense at this time?? I only ask because I read this just yesterday. Maybe white team played 1st down then the chinese bandits went in for 2nd - 4th??

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Just from my limited knowledge of the period - the platoon system was being tried in a few places, but prior to the mid-50s rule change regarding limited substitutions, the best guys played both ways, period, and got relieved when they were gassed.

I don't know what the thinking was, but football instituted a rule that limited the number of substitutions (other than for injury) a team could make, and I think it was by quarter. Dietzel's response was one of the earliest successful platoon systems: Three teams, the best team "White Team", short yard offensive "Gold Team" (later shortened to "Go Team"), and the defensive specialists that came to be known as the Chinese Bandits. He would situationally swap out, and depending on what happened in the game, I believe that sometimes the Go team ended up on defense for brief periods and the Bandits ended up on offense for brief periods, but normally they were swapped based on whether or not the White Team needed a rest or not, and whether or not a substitution could be made at that point in the game.

It has always been the consensus that when the game was on the line, Dietzel wanted the White Team on the field, regardless of who had the ball and where it was on the field. I also believe that Cannon made, or assisted in, the 4th and 1 at the one to preserve the win against Ole Miss on Halloween.

Hope this helps....