Raymont LaShawn Harris (born December 23, 1970) is a former

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 with ...

running back A running back (RB) is a member of the offensive backfield in gridiron football. The primary roles of a running back are to receive American football plays#Offensive terminology, handoffs from the quarterback to Rush (American football)#Offen ...

. He played

college football College football (french: Football universitaire) refers to gridiron football played by teams of student athletes. It was through college football play that American football rules first gained popularity in the United States. Unlike most ...

Ohio State University The Ohio State University, commonly called Ohio State or OSU, is a public land-grant research university in Columbus, Ohio. A member of the University System of Ohio, it has been ranked by major institutional rankings among the best publ ...

. Harris played professionally for six seasons in the

National Football League The National Football League (NFL) is a professional American football league that consists of 32 teams, divided equally between the American Football Conference (AFC) and the National Football Conference (NFC). The NFL is one of the ...

(NFL) between 1994 and 2000 with the

Chicago Bears The Chicago Bears are a professional American football team based in Chicago. The Bears compete in the National Football League (NFL) as a member club of the league's National Football Conference (NFC) North division. The Bears have won nine NF ...

, the

Green Bay Packers The Green Bay Packers are a professional American football team based in Green Bay, Wisconsin. The Packers compete in the National Football League (NFL) as a member club of the National Football Conference (NFC) NFC North, North division. It ...

, the

Denver Broncos The Denver Broncos are a professional American football franchise based in Denver. The Broncos compete in the National Football League (NFL) as a member club of the league's American Football Conference (AFC) West division. The team is headquart ...

and the

New England Patriots The New England Patriots are a professional American football team based in the Greater Boston area. They compete in the National Football League (NFL) as a member club of the league's American Football Conference (AFC) AFC East, East divisio ...

. He was nicknamed the "Ultraback" because of his versatility. He is currently director of development for The Ohio State University Department of Athletics.

College career

Harris attended

, where he set the school record for most rushing yards in a bowl game (235) and finished his career at Ohio State as the school's sixth-leading rusher of all time. Harris finished his career with 2,649 yards rushing and is currently still ranked fourth in most yards in a single game (235 versus BYU) and eighth all-time in single season rushing attempts (1993). He graduated with a

Bachelor of Arts Bachelor of arts (BA or AB; from the Latin ', ', or ') is a bachelor's degree awarded for an undergraduate program in the arts, or, in some cases, other disciplines. A Bachelor of Arts degree course is generally completed in three or four years ...

degree in communications.

NFL career

Harris was selected in the fourth round of the

1994 NFL Draft The 1994 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 24–25, 1994, at the Marriott Mar ...

with the 114th overall pick by the

. He subsequently became the starting fullback for the Bears after

Merril Hoge Merril DuAine Hoge (; born January 26, 1965) is a former professional American football player. He played eight seasons at running back for the NFL's Pittsburgh Steelers and Chicago Bears, retiring after the 1994 season. Since 1996 he had been a ...

suffered a career-ending injury. Harris became an integral part of the 1994 Chicago Bears playoff team. He went on to lead the Bears in rushing for the

1996 File:1996 Events Collage.png, From left, clockwise: A Centennial Olympic Park bombing, bomb explodes at Centennial Olympic Park in Atlanta, set off by a radical Anti-abortion violence, anti-abortionist; The center fuel tank explodes on TWA Flight 8 ...

NFL season. His career best season came in

1997 File:1997 Events Collage.png, From left, clockwise: The movie set of ''Titanic'', the highest-grossing movie in history at the time; ''Harry Potter and the Philosopher's Stone'', is published; Comet Hale-Bopp passes by Earth and becomes one of t ...

where he had a career-high of 276 rushing carries for 1,033 rushing yards. He also finished tied for sixth in the NFL with ten rushing

touchdown A touchdown (abbreviated as TD) is a scoring play in gridiron football. Whether running, passing, returning a kickoff or punt, or recovering a turnover, a team scores a touchdown by advancing the ball into the opponent's end zone. In Ameri ...

s. Harris left the Bears after the 1997 season. The rest of his career was plagued by injuries, causing him to miss the 1999 season. He spent the final two years of his career with three teams. He retired in 2001 with 2,509 career rushing yards, 114 receptions for 739 yards, and 17 touchdowns.

Life after football

Harris joined The Ohio State University Department of Athletics in March 2010 as Director of Development. He was responsible for major gifts for all athletic priorities, including endowments and capital projects. He retired from OSU in September 2022. Before going to the Department of Athletics, Harris served as Assistant Director of Development for the

Fisher College of Business The Max M. Fisher College of Business is the business school of The Ohio State University, a public research university in Columbus, Ohio. Fisher's campus is located on the northern part of the university within a partially enclosed business ca ...

. In his time at Fisher, Harris oversaw their annual fund, managed the Fisher share holders, and worked to develop the Fisher Commons. Raymont currently is the CEO of a coaching and executive consulting company he owns called Elite Mindset and Performance (EMP). He is also a professional speaker and does keynote speaking engagements for football teams, athletic teams, organizations, events, meetings and more. His website is: www.raymontharris.com

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Harris, Raymont 1970 births Living people American football running backs Chicago Bears players Denver Broncos players Green Bay Packers players New England Patriots players Ohio State Buckeyes football players Ohio State University staff Sportspeople from Lorain, Ohio Sportspeople from Greater Cleveland Players of American football from Ohio Brian Piccolo Award winners