Clemson Football: C.J. Spiller’s name belongs in Death Valley

There are only a select few Clemson football figures who have their names etched into the Ring of Honor in Death Valley and C.J. Spiller should be one.

There are just a select few Clemson football players who been inducted into the Ring of Honor, but there’s no question that C.J. Spiller deserves to be one of them.

Spiller, who was announced as a 2020 inductee to the Clemson Athletic Hall of Fame, has now met the criteria to be considered for the Ring of Honor.

For those who don’t know, the Ring of Honor is the highest honor a Clemson student-athlete can receive. To be eligible, they must be inducted into the Clemson Athletic Hall of Fame, earn at least an undergraduate degree from the university and make a significant contribution to the heritage of Tiger athletics, according the ClemsonTigers.com.

The Clemson football players who are inducted into the Ring of Honor officially have their jersey number retired and then have their name etched in Death Valley.

When we look at the criteria, there’s no doubt that Spiller fits that bill perfectly.

Spiller came to the Clemson football program at a time where it wasn’t popular. He was a Florida native and had a heavy fanbase group of friends and family who were expecting him to become a Gator. It wasn’t easy on him to leave his home state as a 5-star recruiting and  travel up to Clemson, a program that was certainly experiencing its share of disappointments at the time.

Spiller joined forces with James Davis to form the group ‘Thunder and Lightning’ and his career began to take off.

Though he could’ve been drafted rather highly after his junior season, Spiller made the decision to come back to school for one more season under Dabo Swinney– the coach’s first full season. Spiller took the Tigers to the ACC Championship game and finished as an All-American.

Without his contributions, who knows if Swinney would’ve even been given an extended chance to grow the Clemson football program? Without Spiller, there’s no guarantee that other 5-star would’ve begun to consider Clemson when they were looking at schools.

In many ways, this entire ‘golden age’ of Clemson football started because of C.J. Spiller and there’s no doubt he should be honored for his contributions.