William "Chip" Banks (born September 18, 1959) is a former All-Pro professional

American football American football (referred to simply as football in the United States and Canada), also known as gridiron, is a team sport played by two teams of eleven players on a rectangular field with goalposts at each end. The offense, the team wi ...

linebacker Linebacker (LB) is a playing position in gridiron football. Linebackers are members of the defensive team, and line up three to five yards behind the line of scrimmage and the defensive linemen. They are the "middle ground" of defenders, ...

High school and college career

Banks graduated from

Lucy Craft Laney High School Lucy C. Laney Comprehensive High School (Laney High School) is a public high school in the Laney-Walker district of Augusta, Georgia, United States. It was formed in 1949 by combining the A. R. Johnson and Haines Normal and Industrial Institute ...

Augusta, Georgia Augusta ( ), officially Augusta–Richmond County, is a consolidated city-county on the central eastern border of the U.S. state of Georgia. The city lies across the Savannah River from South Carolina at the head of its navigable portion. Georgi ...

. He played college football at the

University of Southern California , mottoeng = "Let whoever earns the palm bear it" , religious_affiliation = Nonsectarian—historically Methodist , established = , accreditation = WSCUC , type = Private research university , academic_affiliations = , endowment = $8.1 ...

(USC), from which he graduated in 1981.

Professional career

Banks was drafted by the

Cleveland Browns The Cleveland Browns are a professional American football team based in Cleveland. Named after original coach and co-founder Paul Brown, they compete in the National Football League (NFL) as a member club of the American Football Conference (A ...

with the third overall pick in the

1982 NFL Draft The 1982 NFL draft was the procedure by which National Football League teams selected amateur college football players. It is officially known as the NFL Annual Player Selection Meeting. The draft was held April 27–28, 1982, at the New York Sh ...

. He was awarded the

NFL Rookie of the Year Award Various entities present a National Football League Rookie of the Year Award each season to the top rookie(s) in the National Football League (NFL). The NFL considers the (rookie) of the year awards by the Associated Press (AP) to be its officia ...

and was a four-time AFC

Pro Bowl The National Football League All-Star Game (1939–1942), Pro Bowl (1951–2022), or Pro Bowl Games (starting in 2023) is an annual event held by the National Football League (NFL) featuring the league's star players. The format has changed thro ...

er (1982, 1983, 1985, 1986) with the Cleveland Browns. Banks was traded to the San Diego Chargers on April 28, 1987 as part of a deal that saw the Browns and Chargers swap first- and second-round selections in the 1987 NFL Draft. Banks expected to get a new contract from San Diego and when the Chargers demanded he play out his under-market deal from Cleveland, Banks angrily refused to report again and sat out the entire 1988 season. He was traded to the Indianapolis Colts and played there for four seasons before retiring after the 1992 season.

NFL statistics

References

External links

* 1959 births Living people African-American players of American football American football linebackers Cleveland Browns players Indianapolis Colts players San Diego Chargers players USC Trojans football players American Conference Pro Bowl players National Football League Defensive Rookie of the Year Award winners Sportspeople from Lawton, Oklahoma Players of American football from Augusta, Georgia Ed Block Courage Award recipients {{linebacker-1950s-stub