Herschel was the more durable football player but Bo was more electric and agile, shifty.

See the number of college carries and yards per carry in college for reference.

Herschel Walker in 3 seasons
5259 yards, 994 rushes, 5.3 yards per rush

Bo Jackson in 4 seasons
4303 yards, 650 rushes, 6.6 yards per rush

Herschel was a workhorse. He had many more rushes in fewer seasons but Bo averaged almost 25% more yards per rush (6.6-5.3)/(5.3) which is a lot.

Bo played with several other RBs that played in the NFL such as Agee, Little Train Lionel James and Brent Fullwood who was a top 4 overall draft pick.

In terms of speed, their times are so close that it’s futile to debate as Herschel focused more on track in college than Bo & Deion Sanders for that matter.

Back in those days, they ran the 60 yard dash. To convert to the metric system, they often times try to convert the 60 yard time to a 55 meter time and the times get skewed slightly as 60 yards is actually 54.864 meters.

To my knowledge, they raced 2x in college and split 1 to 1 over 60 yards.

In the 60 yard dash,
Herschel was in the 6.12-6.15 range
Bo was in the 6.15-6.18 range in far fewer races

Bo & Deion both played college baseball which overlapped with track. Hence, they rarely practiced track. No matter how good of a natural athlete you are you will not reach your fastest time without some level of practice, not even in the 60 yard dash and definitely not the 100m dash as you will not have the speed maintenance without the track reps.

This post was edited on 8/12/22 at 3:08 pm