Denzel Washington (born December 28, 1954) is a retired American football running back who played professional football for the Birmingham Gators from 1977 until 1984. After four seasons at Texas Tech University - in which he rushed for over 5,000 yards cumulative as a Red Raider and four winning seasons, four bowl wins and two Top Ten finishes in his freshman and senior seasons in which Tech lost only to Texas, he was drafted by Gators head coach Fob James in the second round of 1977 NFL Draft. As a Gator, Washington was part of a team that played in, and lost, four straight Super Bowls from 1979-82, and in his time there he rushed for more than 1,000 yards every season as a Gator, and is the only player in NFL history to rush for more than 2,000 yards in two separate seasons, in 1979 and 1981 respectively, breaking OJ Simpson's single-season rushing record in the latter year in rushing for 2,017 yards and having fallen two yards short of the mark in 1979 (this record would in turn be broken in 1986 by Eric Dickerson of the Baltimore Colts), and won both NFL Most Valuable Player and Offensive Player of the Year in both years. In 1983, after a cumulative 12,751 career yards, he broke the 20-year record for rushing yards held by Jim Brown. In total, he would rush for 14,320 yards in his career, being the fastest player to reach 10,000 yards in NFL history in doing it in only 5 seasons.
After surprising the NFL by retiring at age 30 following the 1984 season, Washington branched out into acting, writing, public speaking on football as well as Christianity, coaching at his alma mater Texas Tech in the early 1990s, and finally has been an NFL broadcaster for CBS Sports since 1997, serving as the main host of CBS's NFL coverage since 2006. In 1991, he was inducted in the Pro Football Hall of Fame.