Sam Hubbard’s Rudi Johnson story only adds to the legacy the former Bengals great now leaves behind
Johnson passed away earlier this week.
Former Cincinnati Bengals running back Rudi Johnson passed away this week, but the legacy he leaves behind is still very visible.
Take Sam Hubbard for example. Another former Bengal himself, Hubbard grew up in Cincinnati rooting for Johnson and the hometown team. He eventually fulfilled his dream by playing for the Bengals for as long as Johnson did.
There was even a moment in his childhood when the two of them crossed paths, and it’s not one Hubbard has forgotten.
Rudi Johnson created a lasting memory for Sam Hubbard
Johnson hung up his cleats a decade before Hubbard donned the stripes for the first time. No one could’ve told a sixth-grade Hubbard he’d be following in Johnson’s footsteps at the time, but the Cincinnati kid was starstruck when he got the star tailback’s autograph all those years ago.
“I ran into Rudy Johnson, the running back for the Bengals at a Halloween Express in Kenwood,” Hubbard said on The Mental Game Podcast back in 2022. “It’s really, really random, but I remember him giving me a piece of paper autograph, and I put it on my wall, like it’s still sitting there, and it’s, like, just a cool memory that, yeah, I thought was the cool, like, the best item I owned at one point.”
On his childhood bedroom wall, that autograph would eventually become a reminder of how far Hubbard took his football dream.
“Me and my friends were in there shopping for our costume, we’re like, ‘Is that Rudi Johnson?’ We like swarmed him,” Hubbard recalled “And, obviously, like, same thing that happens to me with kids now, so it’s just like, it all comes full circle.”
Hubbard played two more years with the Bengals after this interview was recorded, and has signed many an autograph for young Cincy fans who were just like him when he saw Johnson all those years ago. That won’t stop even post-retirement.
Heroes of yesterday once inspired the heroes of today. Johnson’s legacy will live on through stories like these.
Cincinnati Bengals News
Sam Hubbard’s post-retirement revelation speaks to how much he cared about the Cincinnati Bengals being his only team
“I’m so happy with how everything played out.”
