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Joe McKnight doesn’t mind having to make a name for himself up here in the CFL.

In fact, he’s looking forward to it.

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It’s something he wishes he would have focused more on back when he was first breaking into pro football.

Instead, the fourth-round draft pick (112th overall) of the New York Jets in 2010 had already become well accustomed to being compared to some big names that came before him.

The top-ranked running back in the nation coming out of John Curtis Christian high school in River Ridge, La., McKnight has been called,“the most exciting prospect the state of Louisiana has produced since Marshall Faulk,” and “the next Reggie Bush.”

It didn’t help that he decided to play for Bush’s alma mater, the University of Southern California, either.

“No, it doesn’t help,” McKnight said of the lofty comparison to Bush, the second-overall pick in the 2006 NFL draft. “I’m going to be honest with you, it hurt me because I was trying to be like him so much to the point I lost who I was.