-
Ben Baby
Among the subjects The journalists wanted the Boise Stateton Corridor Ashton Jeanty to discuss during his media session at the NFL Combine this year, a topic was repeatedly mentioned to the Draft Top-5 prospect.
Last year, Saquon Barkley showed what a corridor can lead to a modern offensive with a massive season that helped take the Philadelphia Eagles to a Super Bowl victory. At the university level, Jeanty had a similar impact. It became the first corridor selected as a finalist of the Heisman trophy since 2017 (Bryce Love of Stanford) and took the Broncos to the university American football playoffs.
“It’s a good time to enter this league,” Jeanty said in February. “I can see that the value of the runners will definitely rise again. Definitely return at a perfect moment.”
This year is the 30th anniversary of the Cincinnati Bengals that selected the Ki-Jana Carter No. 1 of Penn State in the Draft, which was the last time a corridor was taken with the superior selection. That streak will remain intact since it is projected that the former field marshal of the University of Miami, Cam Ward, is the first in general to the Tennessee Titans, but could the tide be changing? When speaking with multiple coaches and executives throughout the league this low season, the perceived corridor fall has been exaggerated.
Jeanty and the rest of this year’s draft class will help reflect how much value the position in modern NFL contributes, especially as offenses change even more towards a dynamic game by land. In his last simulated draft, Mel Kper Jr. De ESPN has Jeanty and Omarion Hampton of North Carolina that goes No. 6 and No. 12, respectively, and three more runners in the second round. Only one was in the first two rounds last year, Jonathon Brooks to the Carolina Panthers in No. 46 in general. Brooks, who lost the first nine games rehabilitating a knee injury he suffered in Texas, ended up playing parts of three games and had 22 yards in nine haules.
“If you have a special factor player in the position, you can really improve your offensive,” Jeanty said in the harvester.
Barkley and Derrick Henry of the Baltimore Ravens showed that last season. They had the highest combined total (3,926 yards) of the best league runners since Shaun Alexander and Tiki Barber totaled 3,740 yards per land in 2005, according to ESPN Research. Barkley was appointed offensive player of the NFL year, a year after Christian McCaffrey of the San Francisco 49ers won the prize. It was the first time that the runners won that honor in the consecutive years since 2005 and 2006 (Alexander, Ladainian Tomlinson).
Even so, it will take a unique talent, and it would probably have to be a negative year for quarters, wide receptors and advantage corridors, so that a team runs again at number 1 again.
“If Walter Payton were in this draft, I might think about taking it to No. 1 in general,” said Personnel Director of the Bengals players, Duke Tobin. “But our game has changed a lot. So you would have to be quite special.”
Barkley’s path The defenders hindered, the discarded taclers and the field below by the long touchdowns in 2024 evoked memories of a time when the best runners not only dominated the game, but also dictated how it was played.
In 1995, nine runners had 300 or more attempts by land. In 2023, there were none. Part of that can be attributed to the increase in two back systems. Five teams had multiple runners with 150 haules or more in ’23.
There were six players last year that had more than 300 haules. Barkley (345 carries) and Henry (325) achieved those exploits after signing with new teams in free agency.
“These are boys who touched the ball,” said the general manager of the Ravens, Eric Decosta, in the harvester. “These are the boys who impact the games.”
The change in the way football is played also prevails in how the teams have treated the most premium draft team.
Since 1996, the year after Carter went to the Bengals, the first five positions written with a selection of the 10 best have been centered on the pass: Campo Mariscal, offensive Tackle, open receiver, defensive wing and defensive back. There has been almost double offensive tacle (43) in that range during that period that runners (23).
“There are more runners [in the draft] Maybe some of those other positions, “said Green Bay Packers coach Matt Lafleur, at the Annual League meeting in Palm Beach, Florida.” I think that is a great reason why [teams have waited to draft running backs]”
The teams did not expect much in 2018. In fact, if the Cleveland Browns had not been on a historically bad streak of the field marshal, deny Kizer was the headline in the ’17 since the Browns were 0-16, they could have taken Barkley to the top of the draft. On the other hand, they took Baker Mayfield and the New York giants selected Barkley No. 2. Barkley was voted as an offensive rookie of the year, foreshadowing his great season last year when he ran for 2,005 yards and 13 touchdowns.
“I think they are probably replaceable by some people,” Decosta said. “But if you have an excellent, if you have a historic, you can’t replace those guys.”
In 2023, Jeanty He caught 43 passes for 569 yards and five touchdowns. Those numbers fell to 23-138-1 last year, but Jeantty realizes the weight that the skill leads to the runners entering the NFL.
“You see the way in which the game is in a trend, the backs that are classified in terms of the NFL, which is paid more, that is the goal obviously, they are able to catch the ball of the field,” Jeanty told ESPN in 2023. “The really good can also align in the slot and run on the routes.”
The Detroit lions corridor, Jahmyr Gibbs, who was chosen No. 12 in 2023, made more than just catching. Last season, Gibbs had 33 profits of 15 or more yards, most among all the players in their position when the lions arrived at the NFC title game. To put that in perspective, the open receptor of the lions, Amon-ra St. Brown, had 34 of those profits, good for the third more in the League.
“The explosive plays are very close to the billing margin,” said the coach of the Carolina Panthers Dave channels to ESPN at the League meeting. “If you can (have a more-2 margin) in explosives, over the years we have learned that it is almost the same as obtaining a ball from the opponent. It is really a close percentage in terms of generating victories.”
That last part, more than anything, is the reason why the value of the runners has increased the entry into this year’s draft.
“We have just seen a corridor [in Barkley] He simply assumes our league last year and wins the Super Bowl, “said the coach of the Atlanta Falcons Raheem Morris.
A COUPLE OF Months after the Buffalo Bills made him the ninth general selection in 2010, the CJ Spiller corridor had to know.
Then he found Buddy Nix, the general manager of the Bills at that time, and asked Bigna. Why, exactly, the Bills wrote it so high? At that time, Buffalo had other runners on the list, including Marshawn Lynch and Fred Jackson
Nix had a simple answer: I always take the best player available.
In 2012, even in a difficult season for the Bills, Spiller had the type of year that Gibbs published last year: 1,703 scrimmage yards and 6.8 yards per touch, most of any corridor that season with at least 150 touches.
Spiller, now a university assistant in Clemsson, has loved to see people like Gibbs and the Bijan Robinson of the Falcons join veterans like Barkley and Henry with an impressive production. For a corridor to be high in the draft, Spiller said that a franchise is needed to believe that a player can be a true manufacturer of the difference, especially when it comes to forcing a defense to stay honest against the race and open deep passengers.
“Trust me, all offensive line coaches do not want to be in five men [pass] Protection of the entire game, “Spiller told ESPN in March.” And all the offensive coordinators and main coaches who have an offensive fund will not want to launch quickly [passes] The whole game. They will want to take some shots in the field. “
While the positional value of a corridor is increasing, it can still be a time, if ever, so that one is chosen No. 1 in general again.
“It’s like hiring a person who can hit home runs against someone who can play a good defense and hit singles,” said the general manager of Los Angeles Rams, Les Snead. “You both need, but they probably recruit you before, maybe in the first round, if you are that person who can win the offensive scheme and the players give that person a fold and get 60 [yards] instead of 12.5 or eight “.
A AFC chief coach told Quarterbacks, receptors and ELITE EDGE edge has priority over other positions, including runners.
That was not the case in 1995 when the Bengals changed to the numbers 5 and 36 selections to the expansion panthers to recruit Carter, Heisman’s runner -up that helped take Penn State to an undefeated season and at the national end of the second place.
But Carter never realized his potential, since the injuries limited him to parts of seven seasons. His yardage career was 464 in 1997, his only season with more than 100 attempts by land (128).
Jeanty also ended as Heisman’s runner -up, but the comparisons he points out to involve behind the backs that have helped revolutionize the position.
“Alvin Kamara, Christian McCaffrey, compared to those guys all the time,” said Jeanty. “It is good to be so versatile. [increase] My draft stock, but helps my game even more. “
Sarah Barshop contributed to this report.
