Dear Daniel Lasco -
You are a talented back with good speed and great size. You have pretty solid evasiveness, and you can run with power. You are a tremendously valuable player on this team, and you have a bright NFL future ahead of you if you keep up the hard work.
Unless you get yourself killed trying to jump over guys, in which case you will probably spend the second half of this season watching from the sidelines with a completely unnecessary injury, while our entire offense suffers as a result.
No running back really needs to try to hurdle defenders -- it is a high risk, low reward move that rarely results in anything good. But it is a particularly bad move when you are physically larger and stronger than every defensive back you come up against, and comparably large and strong relative to most linebackers. Sure, if you do clear the guy, land on your feet, and keep running, SportsCenter will treat you like a God for a day. But usually, that isn't what happens. What usually happens is you get upended and wind up gaining about the same amount of yards that you would have if you had lowered your shoulder and plowed through the defender. Sometimes less. And sometimes, you end up landing on your head, or awkwardly on a leg or shoulder, and you are carted off the field and spend the night in the ER.
It isn't worth it, Daniel. When you have a defender in front of you, you really have two viable options. You can make a cut and try to shake your way past him, or you can lower your shoulder and plow him over, fall forward, and pick up an extra yard or two. Trying to jump over a D-1 defensive back is not a good option. It doesn't work, and it's dangerous.
Thanks for hearing me out. Great game against SDSU. Hope your hip is okay, because we are going to need you against Texas and beyond.
-AB
You are a talented back with good speed and great size. You have pretty solid evasiveness, and you can run with power. You are a tremendously valuable player on this team, and you have a bright NFL future ahead of you if you keep up the hard work.
Unless you get yourself killed trying to jump over guys, in which case you will probably spend the second half of this season watching from the sidelines with a completely unnecessary injury, while our entire offense suffers as a result.
No running back really needs to try to hurdle defenders -- it is a high risk, low reward move that rarely results in anything good. But it is a particularly bad move when you are physically larger and stronger than every defensive back you come up against, and comparably large and strong relative to most linebackers. Sure, if you do clear the guy, land on your feet, and keep running, SportsCenter will treat you like a God for a day. But usually, that isn't what happens. What usually happens is you get upended and wind up gaining about the same amount of yards that you would have if you had lowered your shoulder and plowed through the defender. Sometimes less. And sometimes, you end up landing on your head, or awkwardly on a leg or shoulder, and you are carted off the field and spend the night in the ER.
It isn't worth it, Daniel. When you have a defender in front of you, you really have two viable options. You can make a cut and try to shake your way past him, or you can lower your shoulder and plow him over, fall forward, and pick up an extra yard or two. Trying to jump over a D-1 defensive back is not a good option. It doesn't work, and it's dangerous.
Thanks for hearing me out. Great game against SDSU. Hope your hip is okay, because we are going to need you against Texas and beyond.
-AB
