North Carolina Ranks as the No. 19 State to Produce NFL Players
Do the states and colleges these players come from correlate to their success? And is there a college that produces more NFL players than the others? A new report by Sidelines has analyzed the data to serve as an official guide to the most successful players’ roads to NFL greatness. Turns out, North Carolina has some pretty good ballplayers!
To find out which states have produced the most NFL players over the years, the report compared the number of players produced to the population of the states to find how many NFL players have been produced by that state per capita (100,000).
Producing current NFL players such as Chris Spencer (C, Tennessee Titans), Jamarca Sanford (DB, Minnesota Vikings), and Damien Lewis (OL, Seattle Seahawks), Mississippi has produced the most NFL players per capita (26.6) than any other U.S. state. In total, the state has seen 788 players head to the professional leagues since 1936.
Nebraska comes second, producing 21.26 NFL players per capita. Compared to their average population of 1,951,996 people, having 415 players hailing from this state since 1936 is an impressive achievement. Some of the most iconic Nebraskan players in NFL history include Pat Fischer (DB), Mick Tinglehoff (C), and Neil Smith (DE).
Having produced 848 NFL players in total since 1936, Oklahoma comes in third place producing 21.25 players per capita. Players from this state who have been drafted into the NFL include Gerald McCoy (DT), Chris Harris Jr. (CB), and James Winchester (LS).
North Carolina has come in 19th out of 50 states. Other states producing high numbers of NFL players include Iowa, Indiana, West Virginia, Wyoming, and Utah, while Alaska has produced zero. My theory on some of these is that there aren’t enough people in the area to produce the NFL players.
| Rank | State | Number of NFL players (since 1936) | Number of NFL players per capita (p/100,000) |
| 1 | Mississippi | 788 | 26.6 |
| 2 | Nebraska | 415 | 21.3 |
| 3 | Oklahoma | 848 | 21.3 |
| 4 | Louisiana | 981 | 21.2 |
| 5 | Alabama | 839 | 17 |
| 6 | Iowa | 522 | 16.5 |
| 7 | Indiana | 1055 | 15.5 |
| 8 | West Virginia | 272 | 15.4 |
| 9 | Wyoming | 88 | 15.1 |
| 10 | Utah | 486 | 14.7 |
| 11 | Kansas | 403 | 13.8 |
| 12 | Arkansas | 406 | 13.4 |
| 13 | Tennessee | 924 | 13.3 |
| 14 | South Carolina | 606 | 11.5 |
| 15 | Oregon | 454 | 10.6 |
| 16 | Kentucky | 443 | 9.9 |
| 17 | Idaho | 183 | 9.8 |
| 18 | Michigan | 959 | 9.6 |
| 19 | North Carolina | 1024 | 9.6 |
| 20 | North Dakota | 72 | 9.4 |
| 21 | Pennsylvania | 1103 | 8.6 |
| 22 | Montana | 92 | 8.5 |
| 23 | Texas | 2515 | 8.5 |
| 24 | Ohio | 955 | 8.2 |
| 25 | Colorado | 477 | 8.1 |
| 26 | South Dakota | 67 | 7.5 |
| 27 | Washington | 557 | 7.1 |
| 28 | Wisconsin | 414 | 7.1 |
| 29 | Virginia | 591 | 6.9 |
| 30 | New Mexico | 143 | 6.8 |
| 31 | District of Columbia | 48 | 6.7 |
| 32 | Massachusetts | 435 | 6.3 |
| 33 | Arizona | 473 | 6.3 |
| 34 | Florida | 1327 | 6 |
| 35 | Georgia | 646 | 6 |
| 36 | Minnesota | 328 | 5.7 |
| 37 | California | 2185 | 5.5 |
| 38 | Missouri | 328 | 5.3 |
| 39 | Maryland | 317 | 5.2 |
| 40 | Hawaii | 72 | 5.1 |
| 41 | Illinois | 637 | 5.1 |
| 42 | Rhode Island | 43 | 4.1 |
| 43 | Delaware | 40 | 4 |
| 44 | New Hampshire | 47 | 3.4 |
| 45 | Nevada | 100 | 3.1 |
| 46 | Connecticut | 110 | 3.1 |
| 47 | New York | 415 | 2.2 |
| 48 | Maine | 22 | 1.6 |
| 49 | Vermont | 7 | 1.1 |
| 50 | New Jersey | 98 | 1.1 |
| 51 | Alaska | 0 | 0 |
