Florida State football: 5 most underrated players in Seminoles history

The five most underrated Florida State football players in program history.

Florida State football has had some unbelievable players over the years.

For decades, the Florida State Seminoles have sent blue-chip prospect after blue-chip prospect to the NFL. Many former Florida State greats have gone on to be legendary players at the professional level, including wide receiver Fred Biletnikoff, cornerback Deion Sanders and linebacker Derrick Brooks. Florida State seems to always have the necessary talent on the field.

The Seminoles really became a national powerhouse in the 1980s initially under the legendary head coach Bobby Bowden. Florida State became a college football institution during his time in Tallahassee. To date, Florida State has won three national championships and had three different quarterbacks go on to win the Heisman Trophy. How many other programs can even say that?

However, when you have so much greatness at your disposal like Florida State football has had over the years, even some truly spectacular players end up getting overlooked. There are players who end up getting outshined by guys who starred before them and certainly well after them. That’s the just part of the sport of college football.

So what we are going to do today is look back at some of the very best Seminole football players who don’t get the credit they deserve from their time in Tallahassee. Many may have been All-Americans, but not have been inducted into the College Football Hall of Fame. You could consider this quintet of former Florida State greats to be of the underrated variety.

Here are the five most underrated players in Florida State football ever.

Injuries derailed his NFL career, but his time with Florida State football was memorable.

Despite being an all-state lineman and tight end in Miami-Dade County, Florida, Andre Wadsworth was tremendously underrecruited out of high school. His only scholarship was to Stony Brook up in New York. So Wadsworth decided to bet on himself and walk-on to the Florida State football program. Four years later, he was named the 1997 ACC Defensive Player of the Year.

Wadsworth came to Tallahassee the year after Bowden’s first national title at Florida State in 1993. Initially, he played defensive tackle for the Seminoles, earning Second-Team All-ACC honors as a freshman, sophomore and junior in 1994, 1995 and 1996. Then a position change to defensive end as a senior led him to having his best season ever of his football career.

Not only was Wadsworth the ACC Defensive Player of the Year, but he was the ACC Player of the Year and earned consensus All-American status. Wadsworth was a finalist for the Lombardi Award, as he ended up with 59 tackles, 19 for a loss of yardage and 16 sacks. He could have been a top-10 pick in the 1997 NFL Draft had he left early. Wadsworth went even higher in 1998.

He went No. 3 overall to the Arizona Cardinals in the 1998 NFL Draft. Wadsworth went after Peyton Manning to the Indianapolis Colts and Ryan Leaf to the then-San Diego Chargers, but before Charles Woodson to the then-Oakland Raiders. Knee injuries and the Cardinals’ inherent dysfunction led Wadsworth to being one of the biggest busts in the 1998 NFL Draft class.