With Herschel Walker being picked by "The Sporting News" as the No. 1 college football player of all time, there is something downright sensational about his performance in the 1981 Sugar Bowl that has never been given the acclaim it deserves.

Consider these salient facts:

• Notre Dame's defense was truly outstanding; it had not given up a hundred yards rushing to any back all season.
• The Irish defenders made no bones about their objective to keep Herschel from reaching that familiar benchmark.

If you are in touch with the statistics from that memorable game which confirmed the national championship for Georgia, look at what happened. Herschel, a 1999 College Football Hall of Fame inductee, gained substantially more than the running back benchmark for rushing yards for a single game. He gained 150 yards, BUT with a dislocated (right) shoulder. On the second play from scrimmage, Hershel was hurt. He came off the field with dismay enveloping the Georgia sideline. I remember watching Dr. Butch Mulherin snap his injured shoulder back in place which caused Herschel to wince slightly.

On the next play, he went back into the game and in workmanlike fashion pounding the Irish defense for four quarters. Later, when you saw films of the game, he would turn his left shoulder to where it would take the brunt of the defense's licks. Talk about playing hurt, a long time harbinger of a player's worth in the eyes of seasoned teammates.

Herschel's performance was not flashy. It was not even recognized by the 77,895 in attendance, nor was it noted by the overflow media which covered the game for outlets across the country. To be fair, nobody knew about it. If it had been disclosed, Herschel would have scoffed at it being a big deal.

It was not like Illinois' fabled Red Grange scoring five touchdowns in 1924 to upset defending champion Michigan. Nothing as statistically compelling as Tom Harmon scoring all his team's points in a 27-7 victory over Iowa in 1939.

No headline massaging as Jim McMahon earned ten days earlier, flinging Brigham Young to a spine tingling comeback in the Holiday Bowl by completing 32 of 49 pass attempts for 446 yards and four TDs; or Johnny Manzell's Cotton Bowl masterpiece in 2013 when he accounted for 229 yards rushing to set a Cotton Bowl rushing record; Or Tim Tebow's total offensive mark of 533 yards versus Cincinnati or Doug Flutie's Hail Mary game against Miami in 1984. In addition to his sensational clock-expired touchdown pass, Flutie threw for 34 completions in 46 attempts for 472 yards and four TDs.

This questions comes sallying front and center. If any of the aforementioned had received a dislocated shoulder on the second play from scrimmage, would they have continued?  No question about that today.  They would have taken respite on the bench or in the locker room.

Herschel's performance propelled his team to the national championship in the process, but it gets little attention because it was simply a routine Herschel Walker performance.

It was like a doctor performing his 500^th surgery; a dentist filling his 1,000^th tooth; a professor making his/her 5,000^th insightful lecture, a farmer ploughing a field for decades or a carpenter hammering a nail for the millionth time.

Even today, all Georgia fans swoon to the touchdown runs of Herschel's fabulous career, giving him the highest marks for his individual performances and for his consummate team-first attitude.

Nobody in history moved the chains like Herschel and never did he do it more courageously and emphatically than he did in the Sugar Bowl on Jan. 1, 1981.

That has to be one of the greatest performances of all time which is why the poll by "The Sporting News," declaring him the best college football player of all-time has to be legitimate.

For those who might take a contradictory position, I invite them to read the play-by-play sheets and get out a game tape of the Sugar Bowl and review it with the knowledge that he helped Georgia win a national championship by taking 34 snaps in a championship game with a dislocated shoulder and tell me if any player ever rendered a greater performance in a big time game.