Rookie Profile: Elijah Hood, RB North Carolina
Editor’s note: With the NFL Draft fast approaching, we’ll be covering the incoming skill position players in-depth with our rookie profiles. Using information from Player Profiler and Mock Draftable, we offer a taste of what each player has done, their athletic profile, and what they can achieve in the future.
The NFL Draft is less than a month away and there is still a lot of time to form an opinion on each of the prospects. This year’s draft is real deep in all the skilled positions, allowing talented players to fall through the cracks and not receive the notoriety that they deserve. The running back position in this draft class is especially deep, and I wouldn’t be surprised if there are a couple undrafted free agents from this class who make can impact fantasy leagues.
A player that could potentially fall through the cracks and drop to the later rounds or possibly even undrafted is Elijah Hood, running back from North Carolina. He’s a player nobody is talking about, and is currently not on the radar of a lot of draft analysts. DLF has him ranked 12th amongst rookie running backs and 27th in their overall rookie rankings. He’s not one of the top backs in this class but he is a player with a lot of talent and he deserves more consideration when it comes to comparing him to some of the better backs in this draft class.Â
[am4show have=’g1;’ guest_error=’sub_message’ user_error=’sub_message’ ]
Hood was a four-star recruit from Charlotte Catholic High School which is in Charlotte, North Carolina. There he rushed for combined 5,250 yards and 83 touchdowns during his junior and senior seasons. After high school, he received an invitation to play in the U.S. Army All-American Bowl and was named the U.S. Army Player of the Year, which is regarded as the highest individual honor for a high school football player. He was ranked 46th overall and eighth amongst running backs in his recruiting class per 247Sports. There were a number of schools that showed interest in Hood during the recruiting process including Notre Dame, Clemson and Duke.
Statistics from Sports-Reference.com
He had an uneventful freshman season, rushing for 259 yards and four touchdowns. An ankle injury caused him to miss five games in the middle of the season. His best game of the year came during week four against Clemson when he managed to rush for 71 yards and a touchdown.
Hood broke out during his sophomore season, ranking 16th in the nation in rushing with 1,463 yards and 17 touchdowns while eclipsing the 100 yard mark in eight games. The yardage total was the second highest single season total in school history. He had an amazing performance against North Carolina State during week 13, when he rushed for 220 yards and two touchdowns. His stock in devy leagues dramatically increased after his sophomore campaign due to his youth and workhorse like production.
North Carolina’s offense relied less on the run in 2016, running the ball 126 times less than the previous season. The departure of run-first quarterback Marquise Williams affected the run game because his ability to make plays while scrambling out of the pocket allowed the offense to open up the running lanes. Hood’s efficiency dropped drastically as his yards per carry decreased by almost an entire yard from his sophomore (6.7) to his junior season (5.9). He only had three games with over 100 yards rushing and posted sub optimal performances against the bigger schools like Florida State, Miami and Pittsburgh.
Playerprofiler.com does an amazing job at providing an easy digestible snapshot of a player’s athletic and production metrics. Let’s take a look at what they have in store for Elijah Hood.
First off, by only participating in the bench-press at the combine, Hood didn’t provide much to work with when it comes to figuring his athletic metrics. Therefore, we do not have data on his height-adjusted speed, burst, agility and SPARQx score.
Hood’s 21.4 percent college dominator rating grades well below average amongst running back prospects. This statistic is important because it emphasis how important a player is to their team by taking the player’s yards and touchdowns and weighing the statistics against the team’s totals in both yards and touchdowns. Hood’s dominator rating suggests that he wasn’t an impact player for the Tar Heels.
Player Profiler averages out a player’s most efficient season in yards per carry with their final season to provide a more accurate depiction of a player’s efficiency. For Hood’s case, Player Profiler averaged out his sophomore and junior season. His 6.3 yards per carry is in the 80th-percentile amongst running prospects, which is really good, because it shows that he’s capable of maximizing his opportunities while running the football.
Mock Draftable is another site I like to use to compare athletic metrics for prospects. They are famous for their spider-web charts that show how a prospect stacks up to his peers in certain athletic metrics. With all that being said, let’s take a gander at Hood’s profile page.
Hood has a very limited spider-web chart due to not participating in many of the events at the combine. We just have his height, weight and some of his measurements to use for player comparisons. Even with having a limited number of metrics on his profile page, there are still a few positives to take away from his spider-web chart.
First off, he has the size to handle a large amount of carries, short yardage and goal line work at the NFL level. His 232-pound frame ranks in the 91st-percentile amongst running back prospects and when compared to most running backs he is better equipped to handle the impact on a play to play basis.
His 18-rep bench press shows he’s strong enough to get the job done. He may not win many powerlifting competitions in his weight class, but he does possess the requisite strength to protect himself from the routine rigorous impact that ball carriers tend to endure, and has the strength to power through defenders at the point of contact.
Despite not running at the combine, Hood did perform the 40-yard dash at his pro day, providing times at 4.64 and 4.63 seconds. Reports state that he looked sluggish and it appears he didn’t workout since the combine. Of course, the numbers aren’t good, but they aren’t a total death nail, since there have been backs in the league who have performed well with less than optimal 40-yard dash times.
Below is his game footage against North Carolina State that took place during his sophomore season. This was arguably the best game of his career as he rushed for 220 yards and two touchdowns. From sweeps to power runs up the middle, this game shows a large variety of touches, providing a solid glimpse of his overall skill set as a runner.
Hood is a power runner by trade and his specialty is lowering his shoulders to drive back defenders at the point of contact. He’s very good at moving the sticks on short yardage and goal line situations. He does an excellent job at using his footwork to avoid the opposition by sticking his foot in the dirt and cutting laterally to swiftly move by the defender. Hood’s vision and patience allows him to get downhill and hit the hole at the appropriate time, which allows him to fully maximize his power when he hits the second level of the defense.
He wasn’t a hyper-productive receiver during his collegiate career but he is capable of catching the ball of the backfield. There’s a tale of two stories when it comes to his pass blocking. Some plays he looks like an all-world pass blocker as he’s able to utilize his size and anchor his hips to keep defenders at bay. Then there are other plays where he completely whiffs, allowing the defender to easily beat him. Inconsistencies in pass blocking are typical for running back prospects, because most of them are not completely fine-tuned in that skill-set. What’s important is that he’s a willing pass blocker who is capable of standing his ground and making his block when needed.
Not all running backs are perfect and Hood definitely has some short comings. Like most power backs who weight in the 230-pound range, he doesn’t have the speed to blow by defenders and he often gets caught from behind in the open field. Hood also lacks burst and he’s slow to regain speed after making his cut to avoid a defender. He’s a stiff hipped runner, which inhibits his ability to move laterally and change directions.
He’s not the perfect runner but he’s talented enough to carve out a niche as a power back at the NFL level. His services would do best in a power run scheme with an offensive line that’s capable of opening clear consistent rushing lanes for him. Speed and quickness is not his game and he will need to rely on his power to carve out a role, but he does have enough talent to become a fantasy asset if given the opportunity. Keep in mind, his stellar economy of footwork while hitting holes and making defenders miss negates some of his lateral agility issues.
Hood is projected to be a mid-to-late round pick in rookie drafts this summer. There’s a chance he could creep into the second round if he gets drafted by a running back needy team like the Raiders in the middle rounds of the NFL Draft. He’s a solid stash at his projected price point, because he has the talent to become a usable fantasy asset if given the opportunity. If given the chance the start, Hood has the potential to become a high RB2 in fantasy. More than likely, he will be a situational short yardage grinder in a committee. I’ve been following Hood throughout his collegiate career and I believe he has a lot of potential.
[/am4show]
- 2024 NFL Draft: What We Expect for Day 1 - April 25, 2024
- Dynasty Fantasy Football Rookie Profile: Luke McCaffrey, WR Rice - April 19, 2024
- 2024 Dynasty Fantasy Football Rookie Profile: Will Shipley, RB Clemson - April 6, 2024
