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| No. 26, 21 | |||||||||||||||||
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| Positions | Halfback, Return specialist | ||||||||||||||||
| Personal information | |||||||||||||||||
| Born | (1935-04-20)April 20, 1935 Los Angeles, California, U.S. | ||||||||||||||||
| Died | January 16, 2021(2021-01-16) (aged 85) Lake Oswego, Oregon, U.S. | ||||||||||||||||
| Height | 5 ft 11 in (1.80 m) | ||||||||||||||||
| Weight | 197 lb (89 kg) | ||||||||||||||||
| Career information | |||||||||||||||||
| High school | Manual Arts (CA) | ||||||||||||||||
| College | USC | ||||||||||||||||
| NFL draft | 1957: 1st round,2nd overall pick | ||||||||||||||||
| Career history | |||||||||||||||||
| Awards and highlights | |||||||||||||||||
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| Career NFL statistics | |||||||||||||||||
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Jon Dwane "Jaguar Jon"Arnett (April 20, 1935 – January 16, 2021) was an American professionalfootball player. He was a first-teamAll-American out ofUSC and was chosen in the first round, second pick overall, of the1957 NFL draft by theLos Angeles Rams.
During a successful 10-year career in theNational Football League, Arnett was selected five consecutive times to thePro Bowl from 1957 to 1961 before chronic knee pain reduced his effectiveness. He was elected to theCollege Football Hall of Fame in 2001.
Jon Arnett was born April 20, 1935. He attendedManual Arts High School inLos Angeles, for which he competed on the schoolgymnastics team.[1] Arnett later attributed much of his career success as an elusive running back to this early background in gymnastics.[1] Arnett also participated intrack and field in high school and later in college, specializing in thelong jump.[1] In 1954 Arnett posted a near-record of 24'8.75" in an NCAA meet.[1]
During his 1952 senior season, Arnett scored a total of 112 points, eclipsing the old single-season high school record of 110, in leading the Manual Arts Toilers to the Los Angeles city championship.[2] The All-Southern California Board of Football, working through the Helms Athletic Association, named Arnett to the first team of the Los Angeles All-City high school football team and selected him as the 1952 Player of the Year.[2]
Arnett attended theUniversity of Southern California, for which he played football and ran track.
Arnett was the multiple recipient of theW. J. Voit Memorial Trophy as the outstanding football player on the Pacific Coast. Arnett won the Voit Trophy in both 1955 and 1956.[3][4]
During his sophomore season USC was granted a bid to the1955 Rose Bowl despite a second-place finish in thePacific Coast Conference, owing toUCLA being ruled ineligibile.[6] The speedy Arnett acquitted himself well, finishing with 123 yards gained on just 9 carries, including a 70-yard scamper in the fourth quarter, but the Trojans fell nonetheless by a score of 20–7.[6]
Arnett was a first team All American during his 1955 junior year at USC but was limited to only half a season of eligibility in 1956 due toNCAA penalties against the Pacific Coast Conference for recruiting violations.[1]
Arnett was also anAll-American long jumper for theUSC Trojans track and field team, finishing runner-up in thelong jump at the1954 NCAA track and field championships.[7]
Arnett was selected by theLos Angeles Rams in the first round of the1957 NFL draft, the number two choice overall, one of two running backs picked ahead of legendarySyracuse fullbackJim Brown in that lottery.[1] His initial contract signed with the Rams was a one-year deal for $15,000.[8] The most he ever made in a single season during his ten-year career was $37,000.[8]
In addition to averaging 4.6 yards per carry during his first four seasons with the Rams, Arnett also served as a punt return and kickoff return specialist and was among the team's leading pass receivers.[1]
Arnett's production fell off after the 1961 season — his last of five consecutive trips to thePro Bowl — when a chronic "knee sprain" began to exact its toll.[9] Largely robbed of the fluidity which made his open-field running a constant big play threat for the Rams, Arnett came to be viewed as expendable by the team in the run-up to the1964 season.[9] Arnett acknowledged his status, declaring "The hardest thing with any athlete is to be injured. The relationship with players and coaches becomes different."[9]
With predictions of the forthcoming move rife, Jon Arnett was traded to theChicago Bears in August 1964.[10] In the 3-for-1 trade the Rams received four-year startingguardRoger Davis,centerJoe Wendryhoski, a veteran of theCanadian Football League, and rookiedefensive backFrank Budka ofNotre Dame.[10]
Legendary Bears head coachGeorge Halas declared that the addition of the veteran Arnett helped fill a "gaping hole" for his club in the aftermath of the death of left halfbackWillie Galimore.[10] "Ron Bull has been filling in adequately," Halas said, "but we needed another man at the position."[10]
Arnett would play three largely uneventful seasons for the Bears, retiring after the1966 campaign.
Arnett was known by teammates as "The Cat"[1] and by the popular nickname of "Jaguar Jon."[8] Arnett's nicknames were attributed to an "unusual sense of balance and body coordination which enables him to dodge, cut, and slip from tacklers."[1]
| Year | Team | Games | Rushing | Receiving | |||||||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| GP | GS | Att | Yds | Avg | Lng | TD | Rec | Yds | Avg | Lng | TD | ||
| 1957 | LAR | 12 | 9 | 86 | 347 | 4.0 | 68 | 2 | 18 | 322 | 17.9 | 66 | 3 |
| 1958 | LAR | 12 | 12 | 133 | 683 | 5.1 | 57 | 6 | 35 | 494 | 14.1 | 75 | 1 |
| 1959 | LAR | 12 | 11 | 73 | 371 | 5.1 | 80 | 2 | 38 | 419 | 11.0 | 38 | 1 |
| 1960 | LAR | 12 | 12 | 104 | 436 | 4.2 | 31 | 2 | 29 | 226 | 7.8 | 24 | 2 |
| 1961 | LAR | 14 | 14 | 158 | 609 | 3.9 | 26 | 4 | 28 | 194 | 6.9 | 29 | 0 |
| 1962 | LAR | 10 | 7 | 76 | 238 | 3.1 | 40 | 2 | 12 | 137 | 11.4 | 40 | 0 |
| 1963 | LAR | 9 | 8 | 58 | 208 | 3.6 | 20 | 1 | 15 | 119 | 7.9 | 41 | 1 |
| 1964 | CHI | 14 | 8 | 119 | 400 | 3.1 | 21 | 1 | 25 | 223 | 8.9 | 27 | 2 |
| 1965 | CHI | 14 | 3 | 102 | 363 | 3.6 | 24 | 5 | 12 | 114 | 9.5 | 30 | 0 |
| 1966 | CHI | 14 | 1 | 55 | 178 | 3.2 | 21 | 1 | 10 | 42 | 4.2 | 11 | 0 |
| Career[11] | 123 | 85 | 964 | 3,833 | 4.0 | 80 | 26 | 222 | 2,290 | 10.3 | 75 | 10 | |
Arnett was married in June 1959 to a former USC classmate andRose Parade princess, Yvonne Flint ofPasadena.[12]
During his NFL years Arnett worked in the off-season as a stock and bond broker for the firm of Hayden, Stone & Co. ofBeverly Hills.[1]
Arnett ran a distribution service and supplied frozen foods toCostco,Sam's Club, andWal-Mart. After living for many years in theLos Angeles County coastal town ofRancho Palos Verdes, Arnett and his family moved toLake Oswego, Oregon.[8]
"I went to grammar school, junior high school, high school, USC, and the Rams, all within a 5 mile radius," Arnett told an Oregon journalist in 2008. "I was really a Southern California person. Now you couldn’t get me to go back there."[8]
Arnett died on January 16, 2021, from heart failure inLake Oswego, Oregon.[13]
Arnett was inducted into the USC Athletic Hall of Fame in 1994 and theCollege Football Hall of Fame in 2001 as a member of the USC Trojans.[14]