I think the Advocate's article said sub second yard dash. So basically what these guys said. He was a world class athlete. He would absolutely start in some capacity for any team in the country in ETA: I think his 9. But the crazier part is that he was the best sprinter, then walked over out of breath at the track meets and shot put over 54 feet.
All of this without the state of the art training that athletes today receive. No telling what he would've been capable of if he was training from an early age like kids today and had nutritionists and trainers in college.
Replies 4. Bolt's record is 9. Cannon ran a 9. Easily would be sub 4. My pop tells the story of a dads vs. A hit to the outfield was fielded by Billy after he fell down, got back up and still beat my dad to the ball. I guess they were early 40's in age. Yah, except Cannon was a freak. For other uses, see Billy Cannon disambiguation. Outside the Lines. Retrieved Baton Rouge State Times , March 12, , p.
Retrieved May 7, Alexandria Daily Town Talk. Retrieved February 20, American football portal Biography portal Dentistry portal Louisiana portal. White Green Allen H. White A. Smith Bush T. Johnny Roland. John David Crow. Universal Conquest Wiki. RB , TE. College Football Hall of Fame , American football portal. Biography portal. Dentistry portal. Louisiana portal. Preceded by Abner Haynes. American Football League Rushing Leader 14 games yds, 4.
Succeeded by Cookie Gilchrist. The Heisman Trust subsequently decided to leave the award vacated. Alabama Crimson Tide.
Arkansas Razorbacks. Auburn Tigers. He watched, amazed, as his friend smiled and signed every last thing. In the car back to the hotel, Garland turned to Cannon and said, "Big boy, you ain't bad.
The effort paid off. Once Cannon opened himself up, so many things came back to him. Twenty-five years after revoking his membership, in , the College Football Hall of Fame elected him again. In late November, he walked onto the field at Tiger Stadium. His family had told him he was being honored at halftime for his re-induction. They had lied. After a short presentation for the Hall of Fame, the public-address man turned everyone's attention to the southeast corner. A black drape fell to reveal Cannon's No.
The rumble started at the top of the upper deck, and by the time it reached the field, the old stadium shook. The roar would make the hair stand up on your arm. There was poignancy in the crisp fall air, and redemption and forgiveness, too. But there was also order: This was how the story of The Punt Return was supposed to end. Cannon played his role, and the fans played theirs.
Everyone felt the love in that stadium. The fans, his friends, his family. The people stood and screamed and clapped, and down near the end zone, Billy Cannon stared up at them, the mass of blurry colors and noise. He licked his lips. He swallowed hard and blinked.
I've never seen tears in Billy Cannon's eyes. The Southeastern Conference threw him a party in a fancy Manhattan hotel. Later, bouncing from party to party, he seemed to revel in his acceptance, in the reclaiming of things he'd imagined gone forever.
But his daughter Bunnie Cannon, who traveled with him, said they had worried about losing him in the Atlanta airport and was happy to have gotten him to the Big Apple at all. He'd considered not coming. All of this, it's very different. At the news conference, with a room full of New York reporters in person and more on the phone, he wiped his forehead and then his hands.
He sweated. This was the part his family worried about. What if all anyone cared about was his conviction? What if it ruined the entire trip for him? Instead, predictably unpredictable, Cannon brought up his past himself. Only a few people laughed, but there was something wonderful about the silence. The joke fell flat, but only because people didn't get it. Some didn't remember. Others didn't care. They weren't seeing a disgraced legend, just someone who had won the Heisman Trophy thanks to the most famous punt return in football history.
The schism of the moment and the man was over. When the news conference was finished, Cannon noticed an Associated Press reporter lingering, the poor guy whose job it was to ask an old man about the worst thing he'd ever done. Now, Cannon might be a lot of things, but he's no dummy.
He knows no news story about him can ever run without something about the counterfeiting. So instead of hiding from his past, he confronted it. When the reporter asked the question, Cannon said, "I did the crime and I did the time.
I haven't had a speeding ticket since. They walked out of the hotel together, headed to lunch, two generations in tow. It hadn't been easy, but Billy Cannon seemed to have emerged from his ups and downs mostly intact. He uses the word "beautiful" a lot these days. He laughs even more. A few weeks ago, he called Garland.
He wanted to know the height of a goalpost and the thickness of a crossbar. It seems Cannon was trying to figure out whether he could have dunked a football over it in his prime. These are the things that take up the spare time of a Louisiana legend.
He hangs out with Dot and plays with his horses and looks forward to the holidays when his home fills up with grandchildren. It's how far across this valley we're in. Think about that sometime before you go to bed at night. It's not how high or how low. It's how far across. There is a balance now. He goes to all sorts of public events. He makes jokes about his stint in prison; at a press event not long ago, he looked at the tape recorders and cracked, "The last time I saw those, the FBI was in town.
He enjoys that time, but he won't let it consume him, just as there are parts of himself he will not share with the world. He's seen the nature of public adoration, how it's fickle, how it's more about moments than men. He guards the places in his life that might solve the mystery he presents to the world. More than a year ago, when I asked whether I could come see his horses and his house, he snapped that he didn't want anyone there.
His horses are private. His home is private. He knows he's an enigma to many -- "I think I'm pretty self-aware," he says -- and he uses that to protect himself. He cultivates an image of floating above his own legend; when he let the sports bar display his trophy, he asked the guy picking it up to fib and tell reporters they found it beneath an old oil-cloth in the garage, which he did, which became another chapter in the myth.
There is utility in his persona, value in the way he interacts with the world. I'm a little gruff and defensive. It works. Because they will keep their distance. His antenna about people -- the thing that got him into so much trouble for much of his adult life -- is more finely tuned now.
Now how much did it cost you to make that decision? Sometimes more than you want to talk about. That's his journey. He's a year-old man sitting in a white rocking chair outside the main gate of Angola. The sky is huge, the air hot and muggy, just like Halloween 50 years ago. That night still hangs around him, as if dawn only just took it away.
The legend is his life, the broken tackles, the Tiger Stadium roar, the adoring restaurant, all of it. Cannon still remembers The Punt Return. He ran so fast it was a blur. Run toward your colors and away from theirs. That's what he kept telling himself as he headed toward the sideline.
The first time he saw the replay, more than a dozen years after the run, something seemed off. Then he realized: He remembers it in color. His vision of his own life has always held little in common with the people who clamor to know him. When presented with evidence that he's changed, he just smiles and insists that he's always known who he is.
He is man who ran through tackles. He is a man who survived five heart bypasses and cancer. He is a man who made millions of dollars of fake money and never really explained why. He is a man who spent years avoiding the public, then, suddenly, handled it with ease. He can be surrounded by people, yet remain alone inside his own mind. He was born a mystery, and he remains one. He stands up from the rocking chair. He's like a puff of smoke when he wants to disappear, just gone, a memory.
He's headed home to his beloved horses. He feels safe with them. He likes to groom them alone, to watch them work their muscles. Horses can't be known; they can only be watched with awe. They don't have pasts or futures.
They only have the run. They are at peace at full speed, the world around them a blur. Sometimes horses win every race and pass gracefully into old age. Sometimes even the best horses break down. Yankee Stadium's Legends Suite was sparsely populated at times this season -- a sign of what greed does to loyalty.
Sal Aunese died tragically before he could realize all his football goals. Now, 20 years later, the son who never knew him is trying to complete the dream. Al Joyner feels the presence of Florence Griffith 25 years after Olympic glory.
Now, in their daughter, he sees a young Flo Jo. A World Series hero in , Willie Mays Aikens lost nearly 15 years of his life to prison and crack cocaine. Now 54, he's trying to repair a life that once held so much promise.
The story of the U. In his final days, as he battled ALS, Lou Gehrig penned his most personal thoughts in a series of revealing letters. AP Photo. Billy Cannon's famous punt return, courtesy LSU athletics.
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