More 2020 Hype: "If You Need A RB or WR, this is the draft for you."

[bjd5211]

I would rather have a RB with all the physical tools that needs to learn the technique of the position, than a RB with all the technical abilities of the position without the athletic ability. Technique can be taught, athleticism can't.

[Dynasty DeLorean]

If we're talking RB scouting, the biggest red flags from watching film that I've noted that anyone can easily see (not this pseudo-science nitpicky mumbo jumbo) is a combination of being awful in pass blocking (not that they can't learn it but I believe it's insight into work ethic) and not looking like a dynamic player. By dynamic player I mean some combination of contact balance, burst, power, fluid agility. Basically, you know it when you see it. For example, if you were looking at Guice and Penny coming out of college, I liked both players but Guice was clearly dynamic and Penny was not. Guice showed a willingness to pass block and Penny did not. Clearly they were concerns at the time, but in hindsight and going forward they will be even bigger concerns for me personally. Penny's career YPC is 5.3 so not saying he couldn't have been/won't be successful given a full workload, just that I've seen this with several players now (Foreman was very much the same way as Penny) and in the future i'm going with the more dynamic player 10/10 times. Henry also had these flaws to some extent which is maybe why he took so long to break out in the NFL, but he also has a trump card in that he's just a monster of a human being so...

[AussieMate]

RB scouting is such a wonderfully messy business as it is near impossible to separate back from scheme and O-line- just like it is on Sundays.

The only thing I am sure about in my own mind is that we don't weight interior line play enough when assessing college backs. Anyone who is going to play on Sundays can see an Edge flash as he clears a blocker and put a move on him in space. It won't always work, but give an NFL talent a line of sight and a couple of yards of space and he's going to look great. I missed horribly on Abdullah for this reason. He kept killing guys in this situation and I kept being impressed. Then the Vikings ran him into a muddy interior and he had nothing. Unless the back is lucky enough to play in a superior scheme (Shanahan/Kubiak/Payton/Reid etc) or behind a top flight line, then being able to dead-leg a tackler the way that Swift does five times a game is just going to be an occasional bonus.

Better tape-heads than me will be able to see which back in a good scheme is being flattered. I can't tell. I know Taylor, Dobbins and Swift get good running lanes and they look brilliant with them. I have no insight at all as to whether they are getting full value from them. I love Waldman's tape sessions, but RB play is so cumulative and so much about beating the odds, rather than winning every time, that watching him click through 3 reps 10 times doesn't help me.

I can't watch a guy like Akers take a bad decision or be indecisive in the hole and see that as his fault, when the damned hole wasn't there the last four times they ran that play. So I don't think I can get a read on the backs in bad situations either. The one thing I feel confident in saying is that what a lot of you call instincts is not that at all. It's decision-making. Incredibly quick, reactive decision-making that happens so fast based off tiny cues that the back might not always know why they did what they did, but decision making that is coached, practiced and improves over time. A guy like Ballage doesn't have bad instincts. He just can't make NFL decisions. Why I think this matters is that if you are continually asked to make decisions and there are usually one or two right answers each time, you will make good choices, feel confident, react quickly and show your best self as a runner. If you keep making choices and there are no bad decisions then you lose confidence, have to gamble, are slow to react.

Very long-winded and deserving a TLDR. In short, I think any attempt to judge a back's decision making behind a bad interior line is going to fail. If a guy like Akers was a highly touted recruit, if he looks good in space, if he checks the athleticism box and if an NFL team decides he can play, then I am not going to ding him for not showing mythical Jedi instincts to find holes that were rarely there. If you think Akers is stiff, then ding him for that. If you think that Akers doesn't pull through contact as well as he should for a back of his size, ding him for that. If you see him fail to set up second level guys when he has time to do so, ding him for that. Don't ding him because you think that a real talent would have averaged more PPC, or because you think you've seen a lack of instincts...

I get what you're trying to say but what you described is instincts is it not? Processing small cues really fast and making a decision is basically what we call instincts. In saying that it can improve but generally not by a lot as some people just have a cap on how quick they can process things these cues.
It's the difference between an athlete and a football player.
Maybe the player never really had any sort of good instruction in this area and can turn it around in the NFL with good coaches so I can see the appeal.
I agree I'm probably a bit too harsh on Akers about his vision as he was behind a terrible line, I just can't move him into the top 3 as I believe Dobbins Taylor and even Swift are going to test as freak athletes in their own right, so why would I take the risk on Akers for his upside which is about equal to the other 3 but they have also shown more in college?

[FantasyFreak]

Why wouldn't I "ding" someone for showing a perceived lack of instincts? Not just Akers, anyone? Nah. I'm going to go ahead and ding for that. RB is a very instinctive position. A lack of instincts will lead to less yards, and perhaps more injuries. RB's with poor instincts tend to get dinged up more.

[mild]

Ooh if that’s the case that makes Taylor 1.01 a very nice and easy choice for me. Boys I’m starting to fall off the Swift bandwagon. Good player, but I think he’s smaller than I thought he was and takes a lot of big hits. Great receiver, above average vision, but nothing close to Taylor. My top backs are like this:

Tier 1:
Jonathan Taylor
J.K. Dobbins

Tier 2:
D’Andre Swift

If his listed weight is correct he has a greater BMI than both Taylor and Dobbins. And for those thinking that CEH is too small, he has a greater BMI than those two as well.

Shhhhhhhhh... I would very much like this idea of D-Swift being the third best back in this class to persist, my SF 1.05 thanks you...

Dobbins and JT blowing the doors off the combine sounds excellent to me, personally!

[FantasyFreak]

Ooh if that’s the case that makes Taylor 1.01 a very nice and easy choice for me. Boys I’m starting to fall off the Swift bandwagon. Good player, but I think he’s smaller than I thought he was and takes a lot of big hits. Great receiver, above average vision, but nothing close to Taylor. My top backs are like this:

Tier 1:
Jonathan Taylor
J.K. Dobbins

Tier 2:
D’Andre Swift

If his listed weight is correct he has a greater BMI than both Taylor and Dobbins. And for those thinking that CEH is too small, he has a greater BMI than those two as well.

Shhhhhhhhh... I would very much like this idea of D-Swift being the third best back in this class to persist, my SF 1.05 thanks you...

Dobbins and JT blowing the doors off the combine sounds excellent to me, personally!

Too late. That post changed "every-thing". The cats out of the bag, now.

[Factory of Sadness]

The reason you wouldn't ding someone for not showing these mythical 'instincts' is that they are largely illusory. Super-quick decision making is what's happening. Aussie Mate points out above that perhaps instincts is just another name for this quick decision making. The reason I don't think it is - whilst recognising that things like spacial awareness and an intuitive sense for tempo exist and can help separate the absolutely elite- is that seeing it as purely innate is misleading about the realities of the position. It leads us to us believing that Player X would have used his Spider-senses to avoid that D-Tackle and Player Y didn't because his instincts are poor. In fact- assuming both players are good enough to get drafted - both players used the arsenal of moves and choices that they had, making quick decisions based on coaching and experience. This distinction is crucial because if Player X is running behind a bad line - or put in a bad situation by down/scheme- a lot of his decisions are going to seem like bad decisions. If Player Y is running behind a great line - or advantaged by down/scheme- then a lot of his choices are going to look good. Most importantly, Player Y will rarely be caught second-guessing- because he doesn't need to very often. Player X, who has to make his living making penetrating defenders miss, or finding small gaps he wasn't tasked to run into is going to look less decisive, and less instinctual than his counterpart. Project this gap in instincts forward to Sundays and you see Player Y making great choices most of the time and Player X slow to read and slow to react.
In short, you are being very short-sighted to compare what you see as the poor instincts of a back behind a bad line, in bad situations with what you see as the good instincts of a back behind a good line, in good situations. If you want to compare the decision making of two backs in similarly bad situations, that makes sense. Comparing two backs in good situations makes sense. Comparing the athleticism, burst, power, agility and elusiveness of a back behind a bad line to a back behind a good line can make sense too. There's no better way to make a mistake with RBs though than to compare what you see as the instincts of a back in a great situation with those of a back in a bad situation.

[OhCruelestRanter]

The big problem I have with Akers is that I can’t see “Akers” and not think David. I would suggest calling him by his first name, but we already have a player who goes by “Cam.”

[Johnny B. Goode]

The big problem I have with Akers is that I can’t see “Akers” and not think David. I would suggest calling him by his first name, but we already have a player who goes by “Cam.”

Cakers?

[Factory of Sadness]

I like him more now he's Cakers.

[Jigga94]

Cakers 1.01?

[Ray Finkle]

I’d like to say thank you to everyone who has contributed so much to this thread. I’m what is referred to around these parts as a lurker, I watch little to no college ball and have essentially zero input to offer on incoming classes ever. Thanks to you guys though, I feel like I’m now equipped to watch the NFL draft with some background, then will be able to react accordingly and not completely butcher my own draft that follows.

[Packerland]

Yea don't pull a Finkle on draft day, Laces out!

[Tvols]

Is anyone concern with a back from Wisconsin? I not sure they ever had a successful back in the nfl . Montee and day dyane still haunt me

[Orenthal Shames]

Is anyone concern with a back from Wisconsin? I not sure they ever had a successful back in the nfl . Montee and day dyane still haunt me

Melvin Gordon sad face