Christian McCaffrey: A Complete Rookie Profile

Stephen Gill

Introduction

Listed height: 5’11”

Listed weight: 202

Age: 20.6 (21 in August)

School: Stanford

High School Ranking: .9557, 4-star (247)

Christian McCaffrey saw limited action in his freshman season at Stanford in 2014. The next year, he broke onto the scene, putting up a season, statistically, that no one has ever done before. He recorded 3,864 all-purpose yards, an NCAA single-season record, crushing Barry Sanders’ previous record of 3,250. He finished as a Heisman finalist and put an extreme exclamation point on the season in his cross-country Rose Bowl performance against Iowa. It’d be five months until he turned 20 years old.

In 2016, Stanford’s longtime quarterback graduated, as did three full-time offensive line starters. His production suffered greatly, as his scrimmage yards decreased by a total of 751… to a mere 1,913. In a season where his production on the surface dropped off a cliff, McCaffrey managed to become a more efficient runner, increasing his YPC from 6.0 to 6.3; despite touching the ball on offense 92 fewer times, he scored three more times.

When I watched McCaffrey game to game across seasons, I had no trouble in seeing how he came to be such an electric player. What follows is a dive into what I observed in all his areas as a runner (and as an overall player).

Production

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McCaffrey’s 2016 was disappointing from a narrative standpoint, but I’d argue this “drop off” was much more due to circumstance than anything else. The year prior, his team competed on the national stage, narrowly missing the college football playoff. In 2016, Stanford got off to a slow start and fell completely off the national scene. Combine a lack of attention with West Coast time-zone games, and McCaffrey fell way off the radar. He overcame a great overhaul in his offense and increased his efficiency.

Career Stats:

Rushing

YearAttemptsYardsY/ATouchdowns
14423007.10
1533720196.08
1625316036.313
Total63239226.221

Receiving

YearReceptionsYardsTouchdowns
14172512
15456455
16383173
Total100121310

Kick / Punt Returning

YearK AttYdsAvgTDP AttYdsAvgTD
1459118.20915417.10
1537107028.91151308.71
161431822.7010969.60
Total56147926.413438011.21

Skill Grades

(A quick glossary of terms, since this is the first time):

  • Size: height, weight, and the build of a player’s body
  • Ball security: not fumbling
  • Quickness: how fast a player moves to get to spots
  • Vision: how a player identifies holes in blocking and where to run
  • Acceleration: burst, how well a player gets into their next speed after getting to a hole and into space
  • Speed: how well a player pulls away from pursuing defenders
  • Strength: how a player sheds tackles with their power
  • Elusiveness: how a player sheds tackles with leverage and more finesse means
  • Attitude: the style in which the player runs
  • Pass blocking: self-explanatory, in terms of willingness, ability, and technique
  • Hands: how natural a player catches passes, and if they consistently hold on
  • Agility: footwork to get a player where they need to be; closely related to quickness (think of agility in terms more of lateral footwork, quickness more north/south)
  • Balance: how a player absorbs contact and stays upright; related to strength and elusiveness

Size: C-

When I look at McCaffrey, he appears closer to 5’10” than 5’11”, but I don’t think there’s a huge difference between those two heights. I’ve seen 6’0” in some places, which he is certainly not, and which does make a difference. To be clear, he is a small guy. He’s shorter than most other players on the field and could stand to put some more weight on. On the other hand, he’s not too small to keep him from playing certain roles, which is really the important part with McCaffrey.

Christian is short, but he’s not too short. He can take hits from linebackers without crumpling into a heap. He doesn’t get caught in the wash of trench play. McCaffrey is compact, but he’s not skinny. He’s built enough to take hits and occasionally bounce off them. His size enables him to catch passes, take it in the open field, off tackle, and run up the gut. Inside running is not his strong suit by any measure, but it is huge that he’s big enough to run inside, as all of his runs of this sort give him an additional chance to get to the second level, and when he gets to this next level, he is special.

I’ve seen players smaller than McCaffrey, and I’ve certainly seen them bigger. While he won’t excel, he’s big enough to do everything.

Ball Security: Pretty good

By FoxSports’ numbers, McCaffrey was pretty good keeping the rock safe: he fumbled once his freshman year, twice his sophomore, and three his senior. Fumbling 4/731 times is a pretty good rate, though I’ll admit I’m not sure if Fox is counting reception fumbles (if he had any). My ball security looks aren’t super thorough at this point, as they’re essentially all stat-based, but it’s a good enough indicator for me.

Quickness: A

McCaffrey has exceptional short speed, and as a result is quick to any and all holes. He works best without any clutter in the backfield, though he can adjust his course and get upfield well too. His combination of quickness and agility is among the best I’ve seen of anyone, and as a result, he can make it to virtually any hole he is given.

Vision: A-

Whether running inside, outside, or off the tackle, Christian McCaffrey makes the correct decision as to where to run nearly all the time. He understands where his blockers are, and where they will be in order to position himself correctly and move to hit the correct spots. At the next level, he has shown flashes of a greater ability to see what will happen, making cuts that look to be going nowhere that turn into huge plays. He’s definitely got a sense for where he is supposed to go, but I am docking him a bit for running in the Stanford system, where the skill and style makes his job reading blocks easier.

Acceleration: B+

Similar in his stop-start quickness, McCaffrey shifts into his next gear well once he has found a spot (watch how quickly defenders change their pursuit angles once he’s reached the hole). Once in the clear, his foot frequency increases, strides lengthen, and he takes off. His best trait in this department is how well he moves from one speed to another, not in just going from slow to fast, but when weaving through blockers and defenders, he changes speed, direction, and stride length with exceptional ability.

On the other hand, McCaffrey isn’t too explosive once he gets to his spot, so he can be caught. He has to rely on keeping or increasing footspeed while doing the same with his strides, whereas a more explosive type can do both in a quicker, simpler set of steps, and thus be caught by pursuers less often.

All in all, he’s just fine when getting into second gear, but what makes him pretty good is how he can slow down and speed up to navigate through clutter in order to manufacture more yards.

Speed: B+

Given all that’s been said so far about his feet and general prowess in terms of movement, some might be left fairly disappointed in the running back’s open-field speed. By no means at all is he slow, but at least from what I saw, there do appear to be guys faster to the goal line than he. With that said, this category doesn’t matter much to me, as separating a 30 yard run from a 45 yarder is a smaller priority than getting to one of these chunk plays in the first place, which he certainly excels at. Even then, once he’s in the clear, most pursuers will be left in his dust. In games, he looked to run somewhere in the 4.4s, but I wouldn’t be shocked to see him break that mark.

Strength: D+

Strength is the most obvious flaw in McCaffrey’s game. I observed the back use power to shed tacklers a handful of times from game to game. His body simply isn’t designed to do so. As mentioned before, his current build is lean, and when combining that with his height, he just has very little momentum to run behind. You can see this problem in play in almost all of his 2016 game against Washington.

An additional hindrance here is that his arms just look kind of short. This isn’t a huge problem in the grand scheme of things, but it would be a nice partial compensation if he were able to use his arms more in running, with stiff arms keeping defenders more off-balance when approaching for a tackle. At his current state, McCaffrey really isn’t going to get past defenders if he can’t beat them to a critical spot.

I’ve said some pretty alarming stuff about his strength already, so why isn’t he graded lower?

Attitude: A-

McCaffrey does a really good job to make up for his small build in his running style. In the open field, he’s all about cutting and putting moves on tacklers, but when given no daylight, he makes a great effort to get low, drive his feet, and finish forward. For such a small guy, I think it’s a bit impressive in just how often he falls forward when being tackled by a front-seven player. His efforts turn losses into net zeroes, and three yard gains into five-to-six yarders. These small boosts in the inside running game make him a much more viable runner up the middle. He doesn’t thrill you when caught in some mess and he certainly doesn’t look to make guys hurt, but he can do it. And I’d say that’s worth it, given everything else he offers.

On the flipside in his attitude with the ball, I like that the Stanford man balances his feet and vision with modesty when going outside. For someone so explosive, you’d expect him to try to do too much constantly, swinging for the fences instead of taking chunks. In my observation, though, he really doesn’t have a problem with that. He occasionally tries to bounce ill-fated plays, but he largely understands when it is necessary for him to get upfield for an unsexy pickup (side note: check how fast he runs when he plants his foot and turns upfield). When he runs off-tackle, he stays disciplined to the play design, and on sweeps, he is eager to turn from east-west into north-south.

All in all, an essential aspect to McCaffrey’s excellence is how he puts his strengths (and weaknesses) together to optimize his play.

Elusiveness: A

The Stanford back has proven to be one of the most slippery running backs in the entire 2017 class. He includes jukes, stutters, and angle changes in his arsenal of moves to get past defenders in space. McCaffrey will use his intelligence and footwork to keep defenders off-balance when tackling him, and with such an advantage, he is strong enough to run through or get past them. Once he has reached the second level, it’s really hard for players to get their hands on him, and he is great at using his leverage when they manage to do so. (Iowa 8)

Pass blocking: C

Functional. That’s what I’d say. McCaffrey is a willing pass protector, but the problem comes in his technique and the general plausibility of him blocking guys 50 pounds heavier than he. He’ll never be able to consistently stand up an edge rusher or stone an inside linebacker, so he mostly relies on cut blocks. They’re not terrible, but not great either, and the margin of error greatly shrinks for a cutter in comparison to an upright blocker. McCaffrey is sloppy when sweeping defenders’ legs out, hitting the ground too early, missing targets, and generally being ineffective at times. His ceiling here isn’t very high, and he hasn’t met that either, but what’s encouraging is that he largely gets the job done and seems like the type to work on an area of weakness (and reach that relative top level).

Hands: A

Christian McCaffrey looks terrific when the ball is thrown his way. He plays passes as a receiver would, and is sure-handed when the ball gets to him. He’s not making jump balls any time soon, but we’re not asking for that out of an RB.

Bonus Section: receiving potential

I’d be remiss not to address how damn nice he looks in the passing game. He runs some of the best routes of anyone I’ve seen in this class, never mind the position, whether out of the backfield or split out. He’d be a legitimate threat if he were solely used as a receiver, because his route running is sexy as hell in concert with his footwork.

Agility: A

Holy hell, can this guy move. When a dude can just jump a defensive lineman in his periphery when running sideways navigating a cluster of blockers you know he’s special. He moves side-to-side so damn well, and if it’s not his best trait, it’s my favorite. He shakes linebackers in the hole. He dodges backfield muck (important in that it can make up for part of what he loses in terms of size and strength, his ability to manufacture yards out of evasion instead of power). He sifts through the second level. It’s awesome to watch.

Balance: B-

All things considered, Christian is solid with contact. As mentioned before, players hitting him head on will almost certainly bring him down. On the other hand, a player getting a shot at his legs from an angle is often less successful. He doesn’t often bounce off tackles, but he ensures that he has leverage when he can, in turn making it easier for him to keep up, in the event that he can’t shake a defender completely. He also has showed some skill in regathering himself after contact, losing minimal speed and momentum after absorbing a shot.

Skill Synthesis

Christian McCaffrey is an open-field specialist with an extreme array of versatility. Need him to run inside? It won’t be pretty, but he’ll do it. Off tackle? He’ll find a hole if it’s there, and work his magic to get places much more often than not.

It’s third down. Does his quarterback need additional protection? He’ll try, and his effort is typically enough. Well, on a more fun topic, are we throwing to him? Hell yes we’re throwing to him. This jerk drops linebackers out of the backfield, and burns corners on double moves as a flanker. He’s just mean.

For this reason, he serves a lot of roles, and his optimal one is somewhere between a do-it-all third down back with manufactured touches all around the field and a fully supported workhorse back, taking carries whenever and wherever. And because of the constant home-run potential he brings to runs everywhere, I’ll give him the rock on first, second, and third. He makes awesome stuff happen way more than bad stuff, so I’d want him getting as many touches as possible. To make him a pass-catching running back is a huge missed opportunity, although he’ll be great at that in itself.

Strengths

  • Footwork
  • Intelligence
  • Versatility

Weaknesses

  • Diminutive stature
  • Pass blocking

Overall

Christian McCaffrey set the PAC-12 and college football ablaze in his sophomore season, and quietly followed up on that last year… it’s not hard to see why. His many assets in speed-based movement combined with intelligence and maturity allow him to succeed in any scenario when enabled. As I’ve mentioned already, he’s a Swiss Army knife, if half the knife’s tools were of premium quality.

His dark spots, stemming from his lean build, are partially alleviated by these skills, as he doesn’t run like the typical small homerun hitter. Then, when you consider the big-play potential he adds whenever he runs, coaches should feel much more confident in giving a 200 pounder the ball inside.

Most of the following is self-explanatory, but I’ll stress the relative importance that he receives at least one of the following: a good coach, a crafty coordinator, a solid offensive line. He’s not big enough to take a beating that a bad offensive line provides or consistently gain yards through contact when defenders are in the backfield. Additionally, a bad OL doesn’t provide him the small holes and breathing room that make him special. In the running game, he’ll be largely ineffective, because his skills do largely rely on what he’s given.

If management doesn’t provide this to McCaffrey, a good coach or OC can at least identify his prowess in unconventional RB territory. He could simply make a career out of being a receiver, and a coach with no successful running game could turn to unleashing him in the passing attack, through exotic plays or just allowing him to be better than pass defenders, something I think he is capable of.

If he lands in a situation where he gets all of the above, I think David Johnson-type versatility in production isn’t out of the question. He’ll be a nightmare when handed the ball, inside, off-tackle, or on a sweep, and with it thrown his direction, whether on a swing, screen, slant, or otherwise.

On the other hand, if he can’t get any of the three, he’ll turn into some sort of disappointing pass-catching third down back. He’ll make plays and all, but he will be shackled in the running game by a lack of holes and handcuffed in the passing game by simplicity and conventionality.

All in all, he has a decent floor, and a ceiling topping or approaching that of essentially any other RB. The problem is that in comparison with other top tier backs of this class, his worst-case scenario is worse than others. I view Dalvin Cook and Leonard Fournette as three-down-backs regardless of where they land, so if given all these bad circumstances, they still become inefficient workhorses, better than a guy catching screens and swing passes. Thus, landing spot is especially crucial for him. All things considered, he has a lot of ideal landing spots, so it’s easier to identify the worse ones: teams with other established backs and places with a combination of poor offensive coaching and OL play (LA was the obvious example until Jeff Fisher was canned).

So, where do I put him? It’s hard to be exact, as I haven’t watched everyone in this class yet, and my memory of some guys is rustier than others. However, he slots in quite comfortably in my second tier of rookies. It’d take a Zeke-to-Cowboys type fortuitous turn for me to consider him among Cook, Fournette, Mike Williams, and Corey Davis, but he is perfectly fair game for being picked 1.05 and on. He’s not quite as sexy when you draft him after this apparent top four, but it’ll be much more fun once the great white hope is housing punts and generally wrecking stuff for you from game to game.

Bonus Highlight Reel for Making it to the End

Bonus Play Because There’s a Lot Happening and it Didn’t Fit into a Single Category

Observations:

  • McCaffrey shows patience in slow-rolling the line to enable the OL to set its blocks up…
  • Then plants his foot in the ground upon the hole’s opening
  • In this plant, he places a solid jab into the ground, as well as a slight head fake, in order to freeze 22
  • Thereafter, his foot is in the ground, and he explodes through the hole
  • Having found daylight, he bends outside as a pursuer scrapes over the top from the left, maximizing the distance and giving the defender a bad angle for tackling
  • The defender leaps and grabs him, but with this advantage, McCaffrey is too strong to be brought down, maintaining his speed, and immediately…
  • Sets up the next pursuer with a series of stutter steps, followed by a cut back to the other side, pulling his tackler off balance before he totally crosses him over
  • Eyes in the back of his head sense a tackler from behind, he stiff arms and finishes his run hard, generating five yards after initial contact

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stephen gill