Desmond Howard

Desmond Kevin Howard was born on May 15, 1970, in Cleveland, Ohio. He went on to play 11 seasons as a wide receiver in the NFL. Before turning pro, he played college football at the University of Michigan, where he won the Heisman Trophy in 1991. The Washington Redskins picked him fourth overall in the 1992 NFL draft. Over his pro career, he also suited up for the Jacksonville Jaguars, Green Bay Packers, Oakland Raiders, and Detroit Lions.

Howard spent most of his career as a return specialist. He still holds the NFL single-season record for punt return yardage, a mark he set with the Packers in 1996. That same year, he became the only special teams player ever named Most Valuable Player of a Super Bowl. In Super Bowl XXXI, he returned a kickoff 99 yards for a touchdown—the longest return in Super Bowl history at the time. He earned first-team All-Pro honors in 1996 and made the Pro Bowl in 2000 with the Lions. Since 2005, he has worked as an analyst on ESPN’s College GameDay. He was inducted into the College Football Hall of Fame in 2010.

Howard grew up in Cleveland and attended St. Joseph High School, where he played tailback. As a senior, he earned All-American and All-Ohio honors, rushing for 1,499 yards and 18 touchdowns while also intercepting 10 passes. Over his high school career, he totaled 5,392 rushing yards. He earned three varsity letters in football, three in track, and one in basketball.

At Michigan, Howard set or tied five NCAA records and 12 school records. His 19 receiving touchdowns in a single season remain the program’s all-time best. In 1991, he caught 62 passes for 985 yards and scored 23 total touchdowns. He also rushed for 180 yards, gained 694 yards on special teams, averaged 27.5 yards per kickoff return and 14.1 yards per punt return, and led the nation with 19 receiving touchdowns while co-leading in scoring with 138 points.

He won the Heisman Trophy, Maxwell Award, and Walter Camp Award, and was a unanimous All-American. He captured 85 percent of the first-place Heisman votes, the largest margin in history at the time. He earned a bachelor’s degree in communications in 1992. In 2010, he was inducted into the College Football Hall of Fame and named the inaugural Michigan Football Legend, a program that honors former players with a retired jersey number equivalent.

Michigan players wearing his No. 21 jersey now wear a patch recognizing him and use a locker with a plaque bearing his name and tenure. Over three seasons at Michigan, he finished with 249 rushing yards, 134 receptions for 2,146 yards, 1,211 kickoff return yards, 339 punt return yards, and 37 touchdowns.

Howard arrived at Michigan as a tailback but initially struggled for playing time. He met with counselor Greg Harden, who helped build his confidence. Howard told 60 Minutes in 2014, “If Greg Harden wasn’t at the University of Michigan…I don’t win the Heisman.” In 2014, the Big Ten Network included him on “The Mount Rushmore of Michigan Football,” chosen by online fan voting, alongside Charles Woodson, Tom Harmon, and Anthony Carter. On November 28, 2015, his No. 21 was officially retired alongside numbers for Gerald Ford, Tom Harmon, Ron Kramer, Bennie Oosterbaan, and the Wistert brothers. Howard said afterward, “Any time you have your name mentioned along with Gerald Ford, you’ve done something right.”

Born and raised in Cleveland, Howard was very familiar with the Michigan–Ohio State rivalry. In the 1991 season, after becoming a Heisman contender, he decided to do “something special” during the Ohio State game as a shout-out to Ohio. Ohio State coach John Cooper ordered his team to avoid giving Howard scoring chances. The punt Howard returned for a touchdown was supposed to go out of bounds, leaving Ohio State’s special teams unprepared.

In the end zone, Howard wanted to do a backflip but “chickened out”; instead, he imitated the pose of the Heisman Trophy bust. The act drew heavy media attention. Steve Rushin compared it to Muhammad Ali’s taunting, noting that while the pose didn’t exactly match the statue, “that looks more like the Heisman Trophy of our imagination than the Heisman trophy itself…thousands of people must have instantly picked up some object and tried to do the same thing.”

Howard later said “all of a sudden, everyone was doing it,” and the pose has been imitated by athletes, celebrities, and Presidents George W. Bush and Barack Obama. He avoids doing it himself because “the more I do it, it kind of cheapens it.”

After college, the Washington Redskins selected Howard fourth overall in the 1992 draft. The pick was seen as a luxury for a team that had just won Super Bowl XXVI and already had receivers Art Monk, Gary Clark, and Ricky Sanders. Worried the Green Bay Packers would take Howard at the fifth spot, the Redskins traded their two first-round picks (6th and 28th) and their third-round pick (84th) to the Cincinnati Bengals for the fourth overall pick.