What we've got and what we lost

[SWC75]

Well, we lost Robert Washington. But we still have Jordan Fredericks, Dontae Strickland, Tyrone Perkins, (this year) and Mo Neal (next year) coming in. I thought I’d post all their HUDL tapes and ask people to rank them just based on what they see here.


JORDAN FREDERICKS 5-10 210 4.49 40 yard dash



Comments: HUDL lists Fredericks as ‘210’ but most sites have him around 195. He’ll probably grow into 210 while he’s here. Jordan has a “straight-up” running style that reminds me of Walter Reyes. (Ground rule: Just because a prospect reminds me of a famous player doesn’t mean I’m predicting he’ll be as good as that player.) Walter was faster than Jordan, (he claimed a sub 4.29 time in the 40) so I’m not saying Jordan will be that good, (I’d rate Walter our best running back since Joe Morris), but I think the style may help him see what is going on around him and a low him to react better to what defenders are doing. He’s not a zig-zag guy. He wants to run north-south if he can. When he makes moves they depart from straight ahead as little as possible and he finds ways to keep moving forward. He has a knack for breaking leg tackles. He’s obviously outrunning peoples, (not him catching a guy from behind at 3:26), but these are high school people, not college people and also the quality of high school players can vary from area to area so it’s hard to judge speed vs. the other son this lost, who are also out-running people. Jordan doesn’t appear to be running hard but that may be because there’s no wasted effort. Others are failing their arms and legs trying to keep up with him but that’s not the most efficient means of locomotion. Jordan Fredericks looks like potential “feature” back to me: one that could run between the tackles but who also has the speed to break one. College defenders might turn some of those 60 yard TDs into 20 or 30 yard gains, but I’ll take those, too.

 

[SWC75]

DONTAE STRICKLAND 6-0 185 UTL 40 time



Comments: Dontae’s tape seems about equally divided between offensive plays, defensive plays and kick returns. He’s a guy that could be switched to defense if we needed him there and a guy who could get our kick-returning game going. On the offensive plays there’s a couple of shots of him taking hits and still moving forward but the whole idea was clearly to get him in space with passes, sweeps and outside pitches. He looks faster than Fredericks and is a great open-field runner, being unafraid to change direction completely to find an opening. (Somewhere Marcus Allen is smiling.) That can be a high risk/high reward running strategy because you start going east-west instead of north south and you set your blockers up for clips. College defenders will be harder to beat to the sideline. But Dontae is certainly an exciting player and I look forward to seeing him play this year. He seems more the H back type than a feature runner but he may grow into something more.

 

[SWC75]

TYRONE PERKINS 6-0 175 4.50 40 yard dash

HUDL had a basketball highlight for Tyrone, not a fooball highlight, perhaps because he missed his senior year. You-Tube has this junior highlight tape, (from someone who likes to run the tape backwards and forwards or fast forward it):



Comments: Tyrone seems similar to Dontae, except the tape had no kick-return highlights. There are only a couple of defensive highlights, showing him “playing center field”. But it’s almost all offensive highlights. Again, the plays all seem to be wide, nothing between the tackles. He goes out on actual pass patterns, not just swing passes. He might be a good-wide-out if we needed him there. He doesn’t seem quite as fast as Strickland but he seems to have Jim Brown’s habit of conserving energy by not gong any faster than he needs to. When he needs a burst, it’s there. He can change directions but isn’t always looking to create his own play. If an opening presents itself, he can burst through it. I love his gliding running style. He makes it look easy.

 

[SWC75]

MOE NEAL 5-11 160 4.54 40 yard dash



The 40 time must be old because Moe looks like the fastest of these guys in his film. He also runs with a crowd pleasing, high-stepping, whirling élan. He’s always looking for a way to break it and can really turn on the jets when he sees the opening he wants. That run he makes down the sideline and cutting across the field at 4:30 reminded me of O.J. Simpson’s famo0us game winning run against UCLA in 1967. A couple words of caution: I recall Gayle Sayers had a high-stepping style that everyone said would eventually result in a serious knee injury and everyone was right. Here’s hoping that doesn’t happen to Moe. That flashy style might not please the opposition too much, either. But the fans will love it. All the plays shown are on offense. A lot of them are passes so he’s a guy that could be a running back or pass catcher.

 

[SWC75]

ROBERT WASHINGTON 5-11 201 4.47 40 yard dash



HUDL lists Washington at 201 but I’ve seen him listed at 215 elsewhere and he looks it in these tapes. Almost all the shots are not of touchdowns but of 10-15 yard runs where Washington ends up being gang tackles. But he does have some break-away runs, (especially early in the tape) that show he has good speed, although I doubt he’s as fast as Fredericks, Strickland, Perkins or Neal, (40 times are fish stories). I think if he had come here he would have contested the running back positon with Fredericks and they probably would have wound up alternating there. Washington’s tape contains no defensive plays or kick returns so I think running back would be his only role on the team but he could certainly have wound up being a load there. His presence would have permitted Strickland, Perkins and Neal to be used as H-backs, receivers or defensive backs and kick-returners. Without him, one of those guys is going to have to become more of a full time running back. I’m sure we’ll find someone capable. I see o evidence in this tape that Washington is a more talented runner than the others. I think he was rated 4 stars to their three primarily because he’s bigger and stronger. If Lester wants to “run downhill”, we certainly lost a guy who can do that and wear down the defense. On the other hand if we move toward a wide-open offense that uses the pass to open up the defense and then run the ball into the gaps created, the guys we have are going to be more useful than the one we lost, because they are going to be really good in open space.

 

[SWC75]

My ranking:


1) Strickland

2) Perkins

3) Fredericks

4) Washington

5) Neal


I like all of them and wish we had all of them. I don’t see Washington as so great a talent that we are severely damaged by his absence. I think his value was as much in the publicity he generated and now that has been negated.

 

[CUSU]

MOE NEAL 5-11 160 4.54 40 yard dash



The 40 time must be old because Moe looks like the fastest of these guys in his film. He also runs with a crowd pleasing, high-stepping, whirling élan. He’s always looking for a way to break it and can really turn on the jets when he sees the opening he wants. That run he makes down the sideline and cutting across the field at 4:30 reminded me of O.J. Simpson’s famo0us game winning run against UCLA in 1967. A couple words of caution: I recall Gayle Sayers had a high-stepping style that everyone said would eventually result in a serious knee injury and everyone was right. Here’s hoping that doesn’t happen to Moe. That flashy style might not please the opposition too much, either. But the fans will love it. All the plays shown are on offense. A lot of them are passes so he’s a guy that could be a running back or pass catcher.

Moe was lasered at 4.39 supposedly.

 

[Cuseregular]

thanks for taking the time with all of this Steve. Great stuff. There's some talent there to say the least with hopes for the future. I for one have zero concerns about losing Washington given what's already in the stable and on the way skill position wise.

 

[ImperialOrange]

It's tough ranking junior vs senior highlights. That said it may be a fun exercise to compare the two frosh's senior tapes that we have vs those of Morris and RunDMC as hs seniors.

RB certainly isn't an area of concern for the foreseeable future. That group along with our LBs seem to be the deepest.

 

[JHarris44]

Pretty safe to say the trend has been across all of football, with few exceptions, that solid running backs in quantity is better than rolling all of your dice on 1 single feature back and promising him the world.

 

[Upstate]

I think it was either Shurburtt or someone from 247 who actually said that he liked Fredericks better than RW. Take it with a grain of salt, of course, but many folks gave him a lot of crap for that. Maybe he was actually right, as we're hearing that Fredericks has been very impressive.