Tennessee football: Alvin Kamara joins troubling list of former Vols RBs with legal issues

A program like Tennessee football is naturally going to have former players suffer legal issues. It was really problematic for the Vols in the late 1990s in early 2000s when three separate players (Leonard Little, Dwayne Goodrich and Donté Stallworth) were involved in fatal vehicle crashes.

Putting the seriousness of that aside, though, the Vols seemed to have a troubling list of running backs getting into trouble off the field for other issues, particularly some of the best former players at the position. Well, former Vol Alvin Kamara seems to have joined that list.

Kamara was arrested on battery charges after Sunday’s Pro Bowl in Las Vegas, according to a report from Mike Triplett of ESPN. Police said a person at a local hospital had reported battery at a nightclub, and Kamara was determined to be the person responsible for it. He was taken into custody without incident and posted bond Monday.

This arrest happened on the heels of Kamara’s fifth straight Pro Bowl. He has made it every year in the NFL, and the New Orleans Saints running back now has a case to be the greatest NFL running back in Tennessee football history. Unfortunately for the Vols, three running backs have that case, and two of them now have had legal issues.

Obviously, this situation puts Kamara in the camp as one of those two. The other is Jamal Lewis. UT’s all-time leading rusher in the NFL, Lewis had a 10-year career and started 126 of 131 games. He rushed for over 2,000 yards in 2003 and set the NFL mark for yards in a game against the Cleveland Browns that year, later broken by Adrian Peterson.

Also, Lewis won a Super Bowl title his rookie year with Baltimore. However, he has had numerous legal woes. In 2005, he spent four months in federal prison after being caught up in a cocaine trafficking sting. Luckily, he didn’t miss any games in the 2004 or 2005 seasons, but it was a bad look for a guy a year removed from a historic rushing season.

Of course, Lewis was part of the most elite stable of backs Tennessee football ever enjoyed in college with Travis Henry and Travis Stephens. Of those three, Henry became the school’s all-time leading rusher in 2000, a record that still stands.

Well, Henry ended up with his own personal issues once he reached the pros. He has been arrested for unpaid child support in the past and has had ongoing problems making child support payments. Then he was sentenced to three years in prison in 2009 for, like Lewis, being caught up in a cocaine trafficking operation.

Then there’s Stephens, who was behind Henry and Lewis. He became the starter after Henry left and set the school record for rushing yards in a season in 2001. Although he didn’t see much NFL action, he was with the Tampa Bay Buccaneers in 2002 when they won the Super Bowl. Although not as serious in the eyes of the law, Stephens has had a DUI.

So if you’re keeping score at home, the all-time leading rusher for the Vols, the single-season leading rusher for the Vols and the all-time and single-season leading NFL rusher among former Vols were all on the same team from 1997 to 1999 and have faced legal issues since leaving. Now, Kamara joins that list of running backs.

To be fair, there is another player who has a claim to the best former UT running back in the NFL in Arian Foster. He twice led the league in rushing yards and was a four-time Pro Bowler and has had no legal issues. Ironically, though, Foster and the Vols have a strenuous relationship because  of fans’ anger at his key fumbles and his claim he took money while on Rocky Top.

Still, Charlie Garner and James “Little Man” Stewart were also successful former Vols in the NFL, and neither of them have had any off-the-field legal issues. So it’s not all disastrous for Tennessee football. However, Kamara being with Henry, Lewis and Stephens is troubling.