Marcus Dupree

Marcus L. Dupree was born on May 22, 1964, in Philadelphia, Mississippi. He attended Philadelphia High School, where he played for the Philadelphia Tornadoes high school football team from 1978 to 1981. Dupree also competed in track & field, recording a 4.29 40-yard dash. As a freshman in 1978, Dupree scored five touchdowns as wide receiver and seven more as a kickoff and punt returner, including a 75-yard kickoff return touchdown on his first play in high school. As a sophomore in 1979, he was switched to running back and rushed for 1,850 yards and scored 28 touchdowns. He also played on Philadelphia High's basketball team, which finished the year with a 33–4 record and reached the semifinals of the Mississippi state basketball tournament, and played first base and catcher for the baseball team, hitting for a .481 average. In 1981, Marcus's final high school football game was played on the Choctaw Indian Reservation's tribal high school's Warriors Stadium. Author Willie Morris described the audience at Dupree's final high school game as "the most distinctive crowds I had ever seen...four thousand or so people seemed almost an equal of mix of whites, blacks, and Indians...After Marcus scored his touchdown, [Sid Salter] saw Cecil Price, Sr. [a Klansman who had been involved in the murders of Chaney, Goodman, and Schwerner during the Civil Rights Movement]. 'He was jumping up and down and cheering as hard as anyone...ain't that a kick in the pants?'" Dupree was heavily recruited by the major college football programs, and during the final month of the recruiting period, his high school coach, Joe Wood, answered more than 100 phone calls a day from colleges. Oklahoma assistant coach Lucious Selmon spent six weeks in the Downtown Motor Inn in Philadelphia, and after Dupree verbally committed to Fred Akers and the Texas Longhorns while on his visit there, OU head coach Barry Switzer sent former Oklahoma Sooner and Heisman Trophy winner Billy Sims to the town by private plane to appeal to Dupree. On February 12, 1982, Dupree announced he would attend Oklahoma instead of the other finalists, Texas, UCLA, and Southern Miss. ==College career==

When Dupree arrived at the University of Oklahoma in 1982, head coach Barry Switzer said, "He was the best player on the field. Earl Campbell was the only other guy I ever saw who was like that—physically ready, as a true freshman, to be the best player on a great college team. Maybe even ready for the NFL at that age." For the fourth game Switzer abandoned his favored wishbone offense and made Dupree the tailback in the I formation to take advantage of his skills. He made his first start against Oklahoma State and scored two touchdowns. Among all his other great runs, he also had a 77-yard punt return against Colorado, an 80-yard run against Kansas State, a 70-yard run against Missouri and an 86-yard run against Nebraska. Despite not starting until the seventh game of the season, Dupree finished with 1,144 yards rushing and 13 touchdowns. He was named second-team All-American, first-team all-Big Eight Conference and Big Eight Newcomer of the Year. Dupree's much-anticipated sophomore season did not turn out as planned. He reported to campus late, missed the team photo and put on considerable weight. Although Switzer was known for running a loose ship, Dupree's lackadaisical attitude was too much for him, and he called Dupree "lazy." Hampered by injuries, Dupree gained 369 yards on 61 carries with three touchdowns while playing in four of the first five games of the season. After suffering a concussion in a loss against Texas, he vanished for a week. When he resurfaced in Mississippi, he announced he was leaving OU and transferring to the University of Southern Mississippi. Upon being informed that because of NCAA rules, he would have to sit out both the remainder of the 1983 season and the 1984 season, he left after three months. Statistics ==Professional career==

USFL Dupree was signed by the New Orleans Breakers of the United States Football League in 1984. The upstart league had initially sworn off underclassmen in hopes of appeasing college coaches and officials angered by the blockbuster signing of Herschel Walker after his junior year. However, after a federal judge ruled that the eligibility rule violated antitrust law, the Breakers–who had just moved from Boston–quickly persuaded the New Jersey Generals to give up their territorial rights to Dupree (OU was among the Generals' territorial schools) in return for their first-round pick in the 1985 USFL draft. after a five-and-a-half-year absence from the football field. In April that year, he asked his former USFL coach, Dick Coury, then the quarterbacks coach for the Rams, if he could work out for the team if he got into shape, and impressed Coury and head coach John Robinson enough to earn a contract. Dupree was placed on injured reserve, meaning he would have to sit out for four weeks before he could play for the Rams. During week nine of the 1990 season, Dupree made his first appearance and rushed for 22 yards on four carries, wearing number 34 in honor of Payton instead of his usual 22. He started his first game in week 16 and rushed for 42 yards on 13 carries. He finished his first NFL season with 72 yards on 19 carries, in three games played. In 1991, Dupree missed the first seven games due to a toe injury suffered in practice. Returning in week 8, he played more often and scored his only NFL touchdown that year. He finished the season with 179 yards on 49 carries with one touchdown, in eight games played. The San Francisco 49ers brought Dupree into training camp in 1992 to play fullback, a position he had never played. Before the 1992 season, Dupree led the Rams in rushing in the preseason, which included a 100-yard game in the final preseason game against the Los Angeles Raiders, but was one of the 14 players cut by coach Chuck Knox to trim the team down to the 47-player regular-season roster, and he retired shortly afterward. Knox, who had replaced John Robinson earlier that year, had told Dupree and the press that Dupree was not versatile enough for his one-back offense. He said he preferred running backs who "were a little more well-rounded, could catch the ball coming out of the backfield and could do some of the other things besides run with the football." He finished his career with 251 yards on 68 carries during regular season play, for a 3.7 yards-per-carry average, rushing for one touchdown. ==Career statistics==

USFL statistics NFL statistics ==Post-football life==

After he was released by the Rams, Dupree performed as a professional wrestler for the USWA in 1995. He also ran a sports bar and worked as a casino-greeter for a short period of time. In 2011, Dupree was diagnosed with prostate cancer but recovered. Earlier in 2011, he was running a pro wrestling promotion organization, called Mid South Wrestling. Dupree is also a licensed truck driver with OTR experience. He later was found to have had a role in the Mississippi welfare funds scandal. ==Personal life==

Dupree has three sons, Marquez, Landon and Rashad. He also has a grandson. ==Representation in other media==

• Willie Morris' book titled The Courting of Marcus Dupree explored colleges' recruiting Dupree to play. • ESPN had a film documentary on Dupree, titled "The Best That Never Was" (2010), directed by Jonathan Hock. It aired on November 9, 2010, as part of the 30 for 30 series of 30 films celebrating ESPN's 30th anniversary. • [Clarion-Ledger] On March 13, 2020, an article in the Jackson Mississippi newspaper Clarion-Ledger identified $104,974 in allegedly misappropriated TANF (Temporary Assistance to Needy Families) that was paid to Dupree for his role as a spokesperson for the charity Families First. These and other payments are now under criminal investigation. ==References==