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Jamal Anderson career statistics
Is Jamal Anderson the biggest one-year wonder of all time?
His 1998 season earned him 185 "VBD" points, which was by far his best season. His second best season, value-wise, was 1996. He earned 63 "VBD" points that year. That's 82 points between his best season and his next-best, making his 1998 a pretty wondrous year. But he's not the biggest one-year wonder of all time, really not even close. Below you'll find a list of players whose best season was 100+ "VBD" points better than their second-best year (note: strictly by the letter of the law, guys like Shaun Alexander would be on this list, but I'm only including players who don't figure to add any more seriously productive seasons).
Heading the list is Timm Rosenbach. Remember him? He had some injury issues and retired at a young age, citing the fact that being chased by 300-pound monsters wasn't a lot of fun. Anyway, he really doesn't belong here, because he really only got substantial playing time in one season. Other highlights include Don Majkowski, Barry Foster, Erik Kramer, Scott Mitchell, Dalton Hilliard, Steve Beuerlein, and Ickey Woods. There are a few guys on the list who are probably only there because of an unfortunate injury, and a few other guys on the list (Wes Chandler, James Wilder) who were good players that had one off-the-charts year. It's probably not fair to call them one-year wonders. Really, Anderson probably belongs in the latter category as well.
Anyway, here's the list. Enjoy.
best 2nd-best
Player season season Diff
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Timm Rosenbach 28 -176 205
Don Majkowski 126 -64 190
Mack Herron 111 -68 180
Don Woods 122 -36 158
Steve Beuerlein 155 1 154
Jeff Moore 65 -84 149
Dalton Hilliard 172 23 149
Charles White 132 -13 145
Derek Loville 76 -64 141
Terdell Middleton 75 -63 138
Steve Owens 89 -37 126
Barry Foster 159 34 124
Elvis Peacock 25 -97 123
Ickey Woods 76 -45 122
Ty Detmer 0 -122 122
Jamal Anderson 185 63 121
Wes Chandler 190 72 117
Erik Kramer 79 -36 116
Scott Mitchell 136 20 115
Terry Miller 30 -80 111
Earl Cooper 55 -54 109
Scott Brunner 4 -104 108
James Wilder 182 73 108
Chris Jones 0 -108 108
Reggie Brooks 30 -75 106
Eddie Ray 4 -98 102
Otis Armstrong 170 67 102
Bill Kenney 88 -12 101