We’re not going to engage in a discussion of O.J. Simpson and his life after football. It’s hard to avoid, of course, but even when we dismiss overrated sports figures here, it’s for their on-the-job realities—not so much whatever they did off the job (looking at you, Kobe Bryant). There is nothing nice to be said about Simpson’s final 30 years of life, so we will not be discussing that today in the wake of his death. Nope.

What we will examine are the realities of his football career: from his college days at USC to his final professional seasons with the San Francisco 49ers … and a lot of emphasis on the in-between days with the Buffalo Bills where Simpson was perhaps at his best. In reality, we’ve already discussed his 2 seasons in college and his NFL peak, via awards analyses for the Pac-8 MVP, the Heisman Trophy, and the NFL MVP.

That’s a pretty impressive slate of post de facto accolades. Of course, Simpson did not win the 1967 Heisman, due to silly, unwritten voting conventions at the time, but he should have. He also did not win the 1975 NFL MVP, but he should have. He led professional football in rushing 4 times over a 5-season stretch (1972-1976), and he posted a league-high 25 AV in the 1975 seasons yet only finished second in the MVP voting, strangely.

His statistical dominance in that 5-year span might be unmatched: 4 rushing titles, 3 scrimmage-yards titles, etc. Our choice for the NFL GOAT is probably the only person who could match such dominance, and ironically, both Simpson and Barry Sanders never reached/won a Super Bowl. Simpson was that good as a professional athlete, although the rough-and-tumble sport took its toll on Simpson quickly. Here’s why:

From 1972-1976, Simpson had 1,611 touches, averaging 302 rushing attempts per season. This was an era where a lot of abuse on the field went unnoticed and unregulated by the officials: even this YouTube clip makes it seem like the “fight” was Simpson’s fault, but it was New England Patriots defensive end Mel Lunsford was the one who was getting rough in a time when dirty play was the norm against NFL stars.

By 1977 at age 30, the wear and tear on Simpson had caught up with him, physically. He missed half the season, did not score a touchdown, and played in the fewest games of any year in his career. He was still effective when he played, however, despite the lack of scoring: his 4.4 yards-per-carry average was the 4th-best of his career, still, and so the belief was that he just needed to be healthier to be dominant again.

Enter the San Francisco 49ers, the Juice’s hometown team.

After losing in the NFC playoffs 3 straight times to the Dallas Cowboys from 1970-1972, the 49ers had fallen on tougher times, posting a combined 29-41 record in the 5 seasons since then, without a postseason berth. In 1977, the S.F. organization posted a 5-9 record and surmised it was closer to getting back to the playoffs than it truly was. Thus, the 49ers coughed up 5 draft picks for Simpson, and they dreamed of big glories.

It was a mistake, as Simpson played in just 10 games in the first year of the NFL’s 16-game season, running for a mere 593 yards and 1 TD at age 31. His 3.7 ypc mark was the worst of his career, and the team dropped to a 2-14 record overall. They’d only given up 1978 second- and third-round picks in the trade; that wasn’t the reason for decline, but the gamble to build around a long-gone version of Simpson was the big error.

What hurt more was the loss of the 1979 first-, second-, and fourth-round choices the team had given up for Simpson. Ironically, the 49ers drafted Joe Montana in the third round and Dwight Clark in the tenth round of that 1979 draft, and we know how that story ends. But another 2-14 season followed in 1979, Simpson’s last, as the Juice posted 460 yards and 3 TDs in 13 games played (8 starts). His career was over.

(By the way, the Bills used all those picks to build an AFC East division winner in 1980.)

There have been bad trades in NFL history, and this ranks right up with the worst; the 49ers were saved, basically, because they struck gold with Montana in the third round of a subsequent draft. Not all teams that make bad trades are able to recover so well, of course. What’s ironic is Simpson’s “purpose” as a bridge between eras of 49ers football, as evidenced by the picture attached to this post: O.J. with Jim Plunkett.

San Francisco had started Plunkett in all 14 games during the 1977 season, but the organization released him prior to the start of the 1978 season. He landed with the Oakland Raiders and went on to impressive glories there, but releasing him illustrated that the 49ers had no idea what they were doing at the time (and not just via the trade for Simpson, of course). The team suffered through 1978 and then found Montana.

We may be exaggerating circumstance, but Simpson was the sacrificial lamb, in essence, that the 49ers franchise offered up in order to set the table for a decade-plus of success from 1981-1994 that led to 5 Super Bowl victories. No, O.J. didn’t get any of those rings, but he certainly did play a big part in getting the 49ers to the Promised Land. Simpson touched both Plunkett and Montana, in essence, and they became legends.

Perhaps it’s ironic, therefore, that Simpson never played for the Raiders. However, one of his USC successors at Tailback U—Marcus Allen—did, and along with Plunkett, he helped the Los Angeles Raiders win a Super Bowl. Maybe, retrospectively, that’s where Simpson should have been all along: with the Raiders in Los Angeles. That would have been a fitting situation for the man who once stopped L.A. traffic.