James Edgar Lindsey (born November 24, 1944) is a former American football running back for the Minnesota Vikings of the National Football League, having played from 1966 to 1972.

Lindsey was a member of the 1964 national championship-winning football team at the University of Arkansas, and founded Lindsey & Associates in Fayetteville, Arkansas in 1972. James Lindsey is a member of the Kappa Sigma fraternity at the University of Arkansas - Xi Chapter.

Lindsey was a member of the University of Arkansas board of trustees and was a central to many of the decisions made by the board, including the hiring of head football coach Houston Nutt in 1997 and the decision to continue to play football games at War Memorial Stadium in Little Rock, Arkansas.

In 1976, Lindsey filed for governor of Arkansas as a Democrat but lost in the primary election to incumbent David H. Pryor. He ran as a conservative and questioned a 20 percent increase in violent crime in Arkansas during 1975, Pryor's first year in office. Lindsey was initially approached by Republicans about carrying their gubernatorial banner in the general election. When Lindsey spurned the GOP recruitment, the party nominated an unknown plumber from Pine Bluff, Leon Griffith, to act as its placeholder nominee. Lindsey joined the GOP several years later.