5 Olympic Medalists Who Also Excelled in the NFL

The 2024 Summer Olympics in Paris are underway. The best athletes in the world are competing in 32 different sports. American football is not one of those sports — although flag football will make its Olympics debut in 2028 in Los Angeles — but there is still plenty of overlap between the NFL and the Olympics.

Dozens of Olympic athletes have played in the NFL. Not all of them were medal winners, and not all of them did much in the NFL. But a select few made a big impact in both arenas.

Here are the five biggest Olympics/NFL crossovers:

Jim Thorpe

Considered the greatest athlete of the first half of the 20th century, Thorpe won gold medals in both the pentathlon and decathlon at the 1912 Summer Olympics in Stockholm. Three years later, he became one of the first paid professional football players in the sport’s history. Before the Canton Bulldogs signed Thorpe in 1915, the team averaged 1,200 fans a game. A crowd of 8,000 was in attendance for Thorpe’s debut.

In addition to playing, Thorpe was also the first commissioner of the American Professional Football Association, which became the NFL. Thorpe was a member of the inaugural class of the Pro Football Hall of Fame in 1963. He’s one of three players to win an Olympic medal and be enshrined in Canton.

Ollie Matson

Despite missing a season while serving in the U.S. Army and being misused for a couple of seasons as a receiver, Matson retired in 1966 as the NFL’s No. 2 all-time leading rusher behind only Jim Brown. It’s understandable why Chicago Cardinals coach Ray Richards thought Matson would be a dangerous receiver. At the 1952 Summer Olympics in Helsinki, Matson won a bronze medal in the 400-meter dash and silver in the 4x400 relay. Matson, who in 1959 was traded to the Los Angeles Rams in exchange for nine players, was elected to the Pro Football Hall of Fame in 1972.

Bob Hayes

“Bullet” Bob Hayes was once considered the fastest man alive, capturing gold at the 1964 Olympics in Tokyo in both the 100-meter dash (tying the world record time) and the 4x100 relay (setting a world record). A running back at Florida A&M, it was the idea of legendary Dallas Cowboys personnel guru Gil Brandt to convert him to receiver in the NFL.

Hayes was a seventh-round pick of the Cowboys in 1964. He went on to lead the league in touchdown receptions twice and help the Cowboys win Super Bowl VI, and was elected to the Pro Football Hall of Fame in 2009.

Michael Carter

Carter is the only athlete to win an Olympic medal and a Super Bowl in the same 12-month period.

At SMU, he was a standout nose tackle in football and a shot putter on the NCAA champion men's track and field team. He was a fifth-round pick of the San Francisco 49ers in 1984.

Before the 1984 NFL season began, Carter went to Los Angeles for the 1984 Olympics. He won a silver medal in the shot put. Six months later, Carter was a member of the 49ers team that defeated the Miami Dolphins in Super Bowl XIX. It was the first of three Super Bowl victories for Carter, a three-time Pro Bowler who played for the 49ers from 1984-92.

Carter wasn’t the only world-class athlete on the 49ers’ 1984 roster. Record-breaking hurdler Renaldo Nehemiah was a prohibitive favorite to win gold at the 1980 Olympics, but the United States was one of 65 countries that boycotted the Games in Moscow. Despite never previously playing football, Nehemiah signed with the 49ers in 1982, catching 43 passes for 754 yards and four touchdowns in three seasons. Super Bowl XIX was Nehemiah’s last game with the team (he was targeted twice but had no catches). They drafted Jerry Rice in 1985, rendering the track star expendable.

Ron Brown

After winning gold in the 4x100 relay at the 1984 Games in Los Angeles, Brown began an eight-year NFL career as a receiver and kick return specialist, mostly with the Los Angeles Rams. In 1985, Brown made the Pro Bowl after leading the NFL with a 32.8-yard return average and three kickoff return touchdowns.

Notably, that gold-winning 4x100 relay team also included Sam Graddy, who played five years in the NFL, and legendary nine-time Olympic gold medalist Carl Lewis. Even though Lewis never played football in college, he was a 12th-round draft pick of the Cowboys in 1984. The Cowboys figured it was worth a shot, though Lewis never played in the NFL.

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