The brothers Payton

Walter and Eddie Payton both grew up in Columbia, Mississippi — about 100 miles south of Jackson. Eddie, three years older, became Jackson State’s starting running back in 1969. When Walter was a senior at Columbia High, Eddie sold him on Jackson State as the place where Black athletes were already getting fully featured in the offense. Walter committed in early 1971.

He was a four-year starter at Jackson State under coach Bob Hill. He played fullback as a freshman behind his brother, then took over as the lead back as a sophomore. By his senior year (1974) he was the most-watched football player at any historically Black college in the country, and a Heisman Trophy candidate (he finished fourth in voting — at the time the highest-ever Heisman finish for an HBCU player).

Records that stood for decades

Payton finished his Jackson State career with 3,563 rushing yards, 65 touchdowns (then a Division I-AA record), and 464 points scored — a record across all NCAA divisions until Marshall Faulk broke it for Division I-A in 1991. He kicked extra points and field goals as a fifth-year duty assignment because Coach Hill couldn’t find a reliable specialist; Payton’s 5 career field goals are still in the Jackson State record book.

He was the Black College Player of the Year in 1973 and 1974. He was named SWAC (Southwestern Athletic Conference) Offensive Player of the Year three times. The Chicago Bears took him 4th overall in the 1975 NFL Draft — at the time the highest pick ever spent on a player from a Division I-AA HBCU.

The Payton legacy at Jackson State

Jackson State retired Payton’s #22 jersey in 1976 — one year after he left for the NFL. The school’s football complex was renamed the Walter Payton Center in 2002. The plaza outside includes a bronze bust of Payton with a quote from his 1993 Hall of Fame speech: “If you’re good at something, never do it for free.”

Payton’s son Jarrett later became a featured back at the University of Miami (2004) and signed briefly with the Tennessee Titans. Eddie Payton coached at Jackson State as the men’s golf coach from 1986 until his retirement in 2017. Sean “Diddy” Combs played for the Jackson State football team for one year while attending Howard — he transferred — and has cited Walter as the reason he wore #22 in his pre-music-industry days. Deion Sanders coached Jackson State football from 2020 to 2022 and explicitly cited the Payton legacy as a recruiting pitch.

Background facts cross-referenced with the Wikipedia article on Walter Payton and Pro-Football-Reference / Basketball-Reference public records.