NFL Draft Preview Part 1: RB & TE Rookies

It's harder to get above that hump of the weight despite the breakaway production. Ronald Jones? It sounds a lot like you're talking the way we talked about Ronald Jones last. Yeah, but Ronald Jones didn't have pass catching in his profile at all. He did not have pass catching in his profile, but the breakaway runs, the top speed. Some of the things that made Ronald Jones attractive that made him such a high draft pick for Tampa exists for Darrell Henderson, but they both struggle with the size.

I thought he looked great on film, but I'm with you. I think that he's going to play a complimentary role. He's not somebody that's going to come in and surprise, and by end of season, you're going to end up, you know, the way Nick Chubb ended up last year, somebody that could come in and handle every carry. But explosive, his highlight reel is full of touchdown. So 22 of them last year, 25 total, three through the air. Make it guys miss. And also one thing to point out for statistics that.

proved to be the most valuable as predictors from college at the running back position. I believe it was Roto World that wrote an article kind of highlighting that the most predictive stat for incoming rookie running backs was actually rushing touchdowns. So that's great. He's got a pile of them. He's got several. Damien Harris, the other piece of the Alabama backfield, 511, 216, ran a 457 at the Combine.

four-year player at Alabama, never surpassed 150 carries, but did that last season. What do you think about Damien Harris? Josh Jacobs takes a lot of the headlines. He's at the top of a lot of the dynasty draft boards. But I like Damian Harris. What do you guys think? Damien Harris was strange for me when I was scouting him because I'm watching going, eh, he's looking slow. He's...

He's not getting. He's not breaking any taggles. And then holy crap, he was the fastest man I'd ever seen because he got the edge and just took off. And after that, it was, it was just funny to me how I happened to start my film watching on this just bad string of carries for Damien Harrison. He's, he is also a special player. He's not as good as Josh Jacobs in my opinion. But if he, man, I don't.

We're just going to keep saying it. Depending on where he gets drafted, Damien Harris could skyrocket up the boards. I think that he has the tail. He's better than David Montgomery, in my opinion. Yeah, it's funny that you bring him up because I see a lot of similarities, like very well-rounded, but not necessarily just completely elite at any one thing. But when I looked at my comps for those two players, David Montgomery, I gave a comp of modern-day Frank Gore.

He's a little bit slower, but he's still valuable on an NFL field, can do everything. You think any rookies excited about getting compared to modern-day Frank Gore? No. And I gave Damian Harris a comp of Frank Gore. Like,

back in the day coming out of college. He doesn't have... All his comps are different ages of Frank Gore. That's all there is. Sliding scale of how... It's one through 10 Frank Gore. He's more like a 29-year-old Frank Gore. Right. No, this, yeah, exactly. Oh, this was his 25 year old season. I see it. But it was ironic that you brought him up because that's kind of what I see. And after we, after I first watched both Josh Jacobs and Damien Harris...

I assume Damien Harris would be better for fantasy than Josh Jacobs. That was back before all the buzz of Josh Jacobs' draft capital is in the wind. I just assumed teams would prefer to have. He's a really good zone runner, upright, gets north-south. He reminds me of Mark Ingram, and not just because he wore the Alabama numbers. But he caught enough passes last year, too, 9.3 through the air. I think he's a versatile player. I think he is more – he's built to hold up.

more than Josh Jacobs is, but both of those guys were platooning with one another, and we don't know it's going to come down to fit. I think I agree with you on that. Yeah, I mean, with him, at least he's got three years in a row of over 1,000 all-purpose yards, whereas Josh Jacobs had zero. Rodney Anderson out of Oklahoma, 6-1-224. Rodney Anderson. He should not be on the list this high up in the show. 2015, fractured fibula, 2016, fractured vertebra.

2018 torn ACL. Yeah, he's made of glass, but it's fancy glass. It's stained glass window. It's beautiful. Look, Rodney Anderson is my favorite running back in this year's class by a mile if you're just talking about talent. And I'm not, he's not my number one running back on my list in general because you have to factor in that insane injury history. Three season ending injuries.

And the NFL's going to factor it in. They're not going to draft him as a first rounder or a second rounder. I was hoping when I watched film, maybe third round. But really, he's probably going to go, now I'm hoping for a fifth round pick. But if a team like, say, Kansas City, if the chiefs were to draft him, and he's only visited two teams for one-on-one interviews, and one of those two teams was Kansas City, I believe he has enough talent.

to beat them out. If you go and put on film of his one basically full season back with Baker and Oklahoma in 2017, he was unbelievable and he checks every single box I look for. He's stronger than the defender. He's faster than the defender. He can catch better than most any running back in this draft class, not named, or at least nicknamed.

Booby air booby. Yeah. You know, so there was nothing I didn't like about him. It's just an injury history. And if a team takes a shot on him, then I believe he can win. Look, it's just a little injury history. It's, yeah. It's just, look, I'm with you. When you watch the year that he actually played, he was sensational. But, well, he had a breakout campaign. I mean, that season was, was a monstrous year, almost 1,500 yards from scrimmage. But he.

When he wasn't breaking out, he was breaking down. I'll be here all week. Unfortunately. Thank you. Actually, you probably won't the way you're snorting. No, I'm going. You're hitting the doctor. Here's the thing about it. It comes down to exactly what you said. Does a team draft him high enough or does he get an opportunity due to injury in front of him to showcase any of this talent? If a team takes him in the fifth, six, seventh round, good luck. It's going to be more difficult for him to break through.

Now, if you told me that Rodney Anderson ends up on the Oakland Raiders, I'd start to be more interested because I feel like there are opportunities with a backfield like that that's hodgepodge together, you know, Isaiah Crowell and Jalen Richard and, you know, all of a sudden a talent can emerge because whoever, you know, those guys are rentals. Yeah. And the only two teams that he did visit was the Kansas City Chiefs and the Houston Texans. Interesting.

Texas is interesting. He's a big boy, 6-1 at the running back position as well. Runs very upright. Trevion Williams, Texas A&M. Miles Sanders. We'll talk about those two guys to round out the running backs today. What are your thoughts? Trayvion. So Trayvio Williams is an absolute production monster. That's part of why I love him. In the reception game, over 10 yards, I catch 27 receptions this past year.

271 carries was running for 6.5 a carry, but he is a little bit small. But I like to see that his usage. I mean, it's, if you've already proving it that you can carry the ball 270 times, catch the ball over 20 times, I think that helps teams to take the chance on Trayvion Williams. To me, he's a.

he'll be taken on the second day. You believe in his past catching ability? Yes, I do. Enough that he could come in and be a secondary type of guy on a good system? Yes, I do. I mean, because that's what it comes down to for me with what he brings to the table at 59206. If you believe in the past catching production at Texas A&M, I think he could be complimentary. Yeah, I agree. And my first note on him watching was can catch. I think he's, I watch enough, you know, if you look at just the metrics, you go, well,

He's got, you know, he's in the low 20s for receptions, but it's not always a matter of that. It's like, watch the film and see how fluid are they at catching. And I think he's, he's absolutely fine at that. He was huge in the office. But he's going to be an RBBC. He's going to be a committee back. Yeah, probably. But I'm saying like that, his usage in size, that reminded me more of Christian McCaffrey, who when he was at Stanford, he was, he's an outlier where his size wasn't where you want it to be, but you saw full utilization.

And you saw an offense on his back. So that's why I at least have confidence in Trayvion. Miles Sanders out of Penn State had the luxury of coming after Sequin. When you watch the film. I wouldn't call that a luxury. No, not at all. When you watch the film, obviously a big season last season, 1,400 or I'm sorry, yeah, just over 1,400 yards from scrimmage. Not a lot of passing production. His first couple of years, but last year had an opportunity, but it's really not that much production.

I fast feet. I'm not sure how this guy translates. I've seen him as high as number two in dynasty rankings at the running back position. So I think opinions are all over the map with Miles Sanders. Yeah, I mean, they're even all over the map when it comes to individuals like myself. Because when I first watched Miles Sanders, first two games I watched, I wrote, watched two games, haven't seen anything from Sanders.

Just a guy. He's got four, four, nine speed, doesn't show up on film. Today I went back. I watched more film to make sure, because I've seen some people that I like similar to what I did with David Montgomery, and I saw things that I liked a little bit more. And you could certainly create the narrative for him. He was a five-star recruit coming out of high school. So he's super highly recruited. Comes and has to be behind Saquan-Barkley. Couldn't beat him out if you asked me. No way you're beating out Saquan-Barkley. That's a big. And then once he gets the-

shot has 1,200 yards, nine touchdowns. So, yeah, I mean, I think it's going to depend where he goes, but he's okay. I told you we were going to say that a lot. I know. It's annoying because I don't feel like, I mean, it always every year it does, but this is a group. Like, I'll say this. Before the show, I said, yeah, here's this year's running backs. I don't like them. Like, I don't like the running backs. However, that's, it's kind of not true because this is a deeper year.

I feel like there's just not the differentiation that you've seen in years past. Yeah, the top end talent doesn't seem to be here, but there are like 15 guys where if they, whoever goes to the right spot, they're going to produce for fantasy. Well, I think that there are, it's just strange to have a guy like Josh Jacobs at the top of the list that doesn't have the college production, that doesn't have the production in the running game and still have him be separated from this other group.

both in the minds of NFL GMs and fantasy owners, when you have other players that, you know, have massive production between the tackles, and all of a sudden one of them slides into one of those starting jobs on another team, and I feel like they could run away with kind of the rookie of the year at the running back position, where Jacob seems stuck to be maybe a heavily used but part of a platoon. Devin Singletary. Here's where we get interesting.

Devin Singletary, a lot of people like him. I wasn't one of those people. To me, I think you described, but was it Henderson earlier about being okay? Like Singletary, to me, there wasn't something if... Montgomery. How dare you? Oh, sorry, it was Montgomery. Careful. Careful with Dary. Not Henderson. No, I like him too. But a 46640 was depressing for me from Devin Singletary because the one thing that you saw in college was massive amount of production, obviously.

A touchdown monster, but I don't know if 466 is going to get it done in the NFL. It's a lot. It's funny, too, because I... The problem is... That's a lot of touchdowns. That speed at just over 200 pounds. When you're just over 200 pounds, you better be agile or you better be fast. And Devin Singletary is not those things. So...

For me, Florida Atlantic. Yeah, the competition wasn't that great. He's playing for a smaller school against small school guys. His offensive line was atrocious. Man that I love, I mean, just really enjoyed watching me. You want to have a good time put on Devin's Singletary film and just watch him work. I don't think he translates to the NFL.

because he doesn't have that breakaway speed and at his size that's going to be hard. I literally wrote, would be awesome if he had 4-4 speed. Because you can tell he can make the guys miss nonstop. Nobody ever, the first guy will never tackle him over and over, makes the first guy miss. But then can't break away to the next level, at least I don't think, against NFL competition. He is one guy, though, that if he gets drafted by a team that had, by.