The Missouri Tigers Legends Draft: Round XVIII

Just jumping in? Here are the previous rounds of the Missouri Tigers Football Draft:

Round XII (this has the halfway point breakdown and links to rounds 1-11)

Round XIII

Round XIV

Round XV

Round XVI

Round XVII

Welcome, Tiger fans, to #PeakOffseasonContent. Despite a lack of championships, the Missouri Football Tigers have had some excellent players throughout the years, both at the college and professional levels. There have been excellent ambassadors on and off the field, as well as some that changed the program or revolutionized a position. So what better time than now to draft a hypothetical team of these exquisite athletes?

BK and I will build a team of 22 starters (sorry, specialists!) to craft a team to play against the other. For simplicity’s sake, we’re limiting our selections to guys who played on the 2000 team going forward, including the current roster in 2020. Each Round will alternate who goes first and we’ll provide our reasoning/explanations/defense afterwards.

At the end, you all will be able to vote for who you think has the best team! And of course, we’d love to hear your picks for each round as well and why we are dumdums who don’t know what we’re talking about.

Off to Nate’s Gold Team:

Round XVIII, Pick 35: Nate selects RB Tony Temple

I was very sad when BK took Henry Josey but I will endure.

When deciding on my running back I was wavering between two gentlemen: Tony Temple and Zack Abron. Do I go with the a back who ranks in the Top 8 in school history in career yardage or the second most career yardage (and best by a running back) in school history? One who had two tremendous years or who had at least 500 yards for the 4 years he played?

In the end I went with the most dynamic playmaker, which happened to be Temple. Nothing against Abron, but he only had one 1,000-yard season to his name while Temple managed that twice. Also, while Abron was a steady contributor over his four years in Columbia, Temple had the extra pizzazz of two absolutely electrifying performances in bowl games.

A smaller “what-if” in Missouri football history is, “What if Pinkel didn’t panic-rip the redshirt off of Temple in 2004?”. During the eighth game of the year against Nebraska, the Missouri offense was out of guys to start at running back and the coaching staff decided to put in the freshman. On Temple’s sixth run he injured his ankle and was lost for the rest of the year, ending his freshman year. In 2005 he was good enough to split time as a starter, effectively rendering him a three -year player. He applied for a medical redshirt but, of course, the NCAA denied it. Can you imagine if Temple kept his redshirt in 2004, giving the Tigers a fourth-year Temple splitting the backfield with a second-year Derrick Washington in 2008? Beastly.

I grew up with Corby Jones, Devin West, and Brock Olivo running roughshod over the Big XII so they’ll always be my first favorites. But Tony Temple was the most fun running back I’ve watched in my years as a Mizzou fan.

Round XVIII, Pick 36: BK selects safety David Overstreet

Photo by Brian Bahr/Getty Images

Did you know Chase Daniel didn’t start the QB pipeline out of Dallas? Nope, that distinction belongs to one David Overstreet. Kidding, of course. But Overstreet technically committed to Mizzou as a 3-star dual-threat QB.

He spent exactly one season at quarterback while he was at Mizzou. That year was 2002, when Brad Smith burst on the scene as a freshman with 2,000 yards passing and 1,000 yards rushing.

I’m guessing that was the push Overstreet needed to move to the defensive side of the ball.

It worked out for all parties involved. Overstreet started the final three games of the ‘03 season, was a solid contributor in ‘04 and took over as a full-time starter in ‘05 when he became an Honorable Mention All-Big 12 selection. By 2006, Overstreet was a household name for Mizzou fans and finished the season as a 2nd-team All-Big 12 selection.

Is Overstreet a perfect pairing with Pig Brown? Maybe not. But Nate is putting together an offense with two tight ends. Having two strong safeties on the field at all times isn’t so bad. And, to be honest, safety might be Mizzou’s most shallow position with talent over the last 20 years.