Sam Hubbard's Rudi Johnson story only adds to the legacy the former Bengals great now leaves behind

Former Cincinnati Bengals running back Rudi Johnson passed away this week, but the legacy he leaves behind is still very visible.

Take Sam Hubbard for example. Another former Bengal himself, Hubbard grew up in Cincinnati rooting for Johnson and the hometown team. He eventually fulfilled his dream by playing for the Bengals for as long as Johnson did.

There was even a moment in his childhood when the two of them crossed paths, and it's not one Hubbard has forgotten.

Rudi Johnson created a lasting memory for Sam Hubbard

Johnson hung up his cleats a decade before Hubbard donned the stripes for the first time. No one could've told a sixth-grade Hubbard he'd be following in Johnson's footsteps at the time, but the Cincinnati kid was starstruck when he got the star tailback's autograph all those years ago.

"I ran into Rudy Johnson, the running back for the Bengals at a Halloween Express in Kenwood," Hubbard said on The Mental Game Podcast back in 2022. "It's really, really random, but I remember him giving me a piece of paper autograph, and I put it on my wall, like it's still sitting there, and it's, like, just a cool memory that, yeah, I thought was the cool, like, the best item I owned at one point."

On his childhood bedroom wall, that autograph would eventually become a reminder of how far Hubbard took his football dream.

"Me and my friends were in there shopping for our costume, we're like, 'Is that Rudi Johnson?' We like swarmed him," Hubbard recalled "And, obviously, like, same thing that happens to me with kids now, so it's just like, it all comes full circle."