The 10 NFL Teams With The Most Players Who’ve Won Rookie Of The Year

Every NFL team heads into the draft hoping to scoop up a rookie who’s able to make an immediate impact. They can only hope they end up with (at least) one of the two players who earn a Rookie of the Year award for their contributions during their first season in the league, and some franchises have had a bit more success in landing those guys than others.

These are the NFL teams with the most Rookie of the Year winners

The Associated Press presented its first NFL Offensive Rookie of the Year award in 1957 (the legendary Jim Brown was the first recipient), and defensive players had to wait a full decade to get the same honor (Lions CB Lem Barney got the nod in 1967).

As things currently stand, the Eagles and the Jaguars are the only two franchises that have not had at least one player who’s won the award in either category. There are also teams on the other end of the spectrum that have reaped the benefits of some standout first-year talent more frequently than the rest.

Cardinals: 5

• RB Johnny Roland (1966)
• RB Ottis Anderson (1979)
• DE Simeon Rice (1996)
• WR Anquan Boldin (2003)
• QB Kyler Murray (2019)

There was once a time when St. Louis was home to two professional sports franchises known as the Cardinals, as the city had an NFL team that ripped off the MLB team that has been there since 1892 during its stint from 1960 to 1987.

Two running backs—Johnny Roland and Ottis Anderson—won Rookie of the Year during that run. Simeon Rice became the first (and, to date, only) defensive winner and the first to win it in Arizona, and Anquan Boldin and Kyler Murray eventually joined the club.

Cowboys: 5

• RB Calvin Hill (1969)
• QB Tony Dorsett (1977)
• RB Emmitt Smith (1990)
• QB Dak Prescott (2016)
• LB Micah Parsons (2021)

All but one of the players who’ve won Rookie of the Year with the Cowboys did so thanks to their contributions on the offensive side of the ball. Two of them, Emmitt Smith and Tony Dorsett, ended up in the Pro Football Hall of Fame, and it seems like there’s a solid chance Mich Parsons could follow in their footsteps.

Titans/Oilers: 5

• LB Robert Brazile (1975)
• RB Earl Campbell (1978)
• RB Eddie George (1990)
• DE Jevon Kearse (1999)
• QB Vince Young (2006)

The Titans are the only team on this list that relocated and rebranded, but I’m going to take the players that won when they were still the Oilers into consideration.

The first three guys on the list won Rookie of the Year when the franchise was still in Houston, and Jevon Kearse was the first to get the nod in Tennessee before Vince Young was welcomed into the fold.

Commanders: 5

• RB Charley Taylor (1964)
• RB Mike Thomas (1975)
• QB Robert Griffin III (2012)
• DE Chase Young (2020)
• QB Jayden Daniels (2024)

We’ve got another team that can largely credit its appearance here to offensive players, as Chase Young is the only guy to play in Washington who’s won Defensive Rookie of the Year.

Jets: 6

• S Erik McMillan (1988)
• DE Hugh Douglas (1995)
• LB Jonathan Vilma (2004)
• DE Sheldon Richardson (2013)
• WR Garrett Wilson (2022)
• CB Sauce Gardner (2022)

We’re switching things up here, as the lion’s share of the guys listed here won Defensive Rookie of the Year.

The Jets got a boost in 2022 when Garrett Wilson and Sauce Gardner became the third set of teammates to win both awards in the same season, joining Mel Farr and the aforementioned Lem Barney of the Lions (1967) and Alvin Kamara and Marshon Lattimore of the Saints (2017).

Vikings: 6 (all offense

• WR Paul Flatley (1963)
• RB Chuck Foreman (1973)
• WR Sammy White (1976)
• WR Randy Moss (1998)
• RB Adrian Peterson (2007)
• WR Percy Harvin (2009)

The Vikings, on the other hand, are the first and only team on this list that is only represented in a single category, as they’re still hunting for their first Defensive Rookie of the Year after producing a sextet of winners on the other side of the ball.

Bears: 7

• TE Mike Ditka (1961)
• RB Ron Bull (1962)
• RB Gale Sayers (1965)
• DT Wally Chambers (1973)
• S Mark Carrier (1990)
• Brian Urlacher (2000)
• RB Anthony Thomas (2001)

The Bears are responsible for the only tight end who’s won Rookie of the Year, as no one at that position has taken home the award since Mike Ditka secured it all the way back in 1961.

He and Ron Bull were also the first offensive players on the same team to win the honor in back-to-back years (Brian Urlacher and Anthony Thomas pulled off a similar—and slightly more common—back-to-back feat at the start of the millennium), although they were eventually joined by another duo we’ll discuss in a moment.

Rams: 7

• LB Isiah Robertson (1971)
• RB Eric Dickerson (1983)
• RB Jerome Bettis (1993)
• QB Sam Bradford (2010)
• Aaron Donald (2014)
• RB Todd Gurley (2015)
• Jared Verse (2024)

This is the second time St. Louis is factoring into the equation, as Sam Bradford, Aaron Donald, and Todd Gurley won it during the run in the city that was sandwiched between two separate stints in Los Angeles.

Steelers: 7

• WR Jimmy Orr (1959)
• DT Joe Greene (1969)
• RB Franco Harris (1972)
• LB Jack Lambert (1974)
• WR Louis Lipps (1984)
• LB Kendrell Bell (2001)
• QB Ben Roethlisberger (2004)

The Steelers have managed to strike a pretty solid balance on both sides.

Pittsburgh was racking up the Rookie of the Year awards at a pretty good clip until the hiatus that transpired between Louis Lipps winning in 1984 and Kendrell Bell getting 17 years later—a drought that’s still shorter than the one the team has been facing since Ben Roethlisberger became the most recent recipient in 2004.

Lions: 8

• WR Gail Cogdill (1960)
• CB Lem Barney (1967)
• RB Mel Farr (1967)
• WR Earl McCullouch (1968)
• DE Al Baker (1978)
• RB Billy Sims (1980)
• RB Barry Sanders (1989)
• DT Ndamukong Suh (2010)

Last, but certainly not least, we have the Lions, who got off to a hot start in the 1960s and can currently claim more Rookies of the Year than any other NFL franchise.