Tag: Loaded

Prospect Profile

December 22, 2024

Former(?) phenom hiding in plain sight in loaded draft class

Continuing our theme of partying like it’s 2022 is another Buckeye, albeit one whose claim to fame remains his exploits in the Southeast Conference.

Background

Hailing from Pike Road, Alabama, the almost-19-year-old Judkins arrived in Oxford as a modest 3-star recruit rated as the #53 running back in the nation. As a true freshman with no experience in anything resembling a pro-style offense (Judkins only caught 16 passes in his last two seasons of high school football), Judkins was primarily intended to be a hot spare in the event that anything should happen to Zach Evans, the former 5-star recruit freshly transferred from TCU (and perhaps run out of Fort Worth by the emergence of one Kendre Miller).

Once Lane Kiffin’s staff realized what they’d stumbled upon in Judkins those plans changed: Judkins rumbled for 87 yards on 14 carries in his college debut, forcing Evans into the short end of a platoon over the next several weeks and leading the Rebels to a surprise run all the way to a #7 ranking in the AP poll. Shortly thereafter, Judkins would formally disband the committee with a 34-carry, 205-yard eruption against Texas A&M on his 19th birthday, kicking off a five-game close to his freshman year that saw him pile up 797 yards against an all-SEC gauntlet that included Alabama, Arkansas and Mississippi State. Quinshon Judkins closed out 2022 as the crown jewel of dynasty nerds far and wide… that were looking three years down the road.

Alas, Judkins and the Rebels couldn’t bottle the lightning that was their 2022 ground attack. Amid offensive line issues, a third-year leap in play from QB Jaxson Dart (himself a longshot name of some intrigue in this upcoming class) and a nagging injury or two, Judkins saw his YPA tumble from a sterling 5.7 yards per tote to an awful (for a future NFL hopeful) 4.3 last year. At this point Judkins was at a bit of a crossroads: stay in Mississippi for what he knew would be his final year of college ball and another fall spent piling up runs between the tackles (and the wear and tear that accompanies such work), further demonstrating what NFL scouts already knew he could do? Or make the jump to an even bigger pond that could even better showcase his talents?

Judkins chose the latter (and yes, the few hundred thousand NIL bucks that came with it), heading up to Ohio State and partnering with TreVeyon Henderson to form one of the very most talented one-two punches in college football this year. The cumulative stats were tame (career lows across the board actually), but the efficiency returned (5.5ypc) and perhaps more importantly, Judkins avoided both injury and mileage.

Tape

Listed at 6’0″ and 219 pounds, the now 21-year-old Judkins is built pretty much the way you would want a workhorse back to be nowadays: plenty of grunt and lower body mass, but not so big that he has no wiggle to him; narrower through the hips than workhorse backs in the past. Judkins demonstrates all of the traits you need to have as a runner in order to be trusted with bell cow volume, consistently anticipating holes based on blocking assignments and defensive alignments and being patient but decisive when hitting them. And Judkins has an excellent second gear for a bigger back, able to identify the precise moment that a running lane is open for business, stomp the gas and shoot through the first level to maximize his options at the second. He also has a noticeably smooth power band all the way up to top speed that can eat up pursuit angles, frequently making defenders think they have him pinned to the sideline when they don’t.

But Judkins is neither the hyper-athletic bulldozer like the larger (and faster) Saquon Barkley or Jonathan Taylor, nor does he have the joystick-y, ‘make you miss in a phonebooth’ gifts of a Kyren Williams or Bucky Irving, instead existing somewhere in the middle of this spectrum. And that may well prove to be his NFL ‘killer app’, as Judkins has an almost preternatural ability to pre-diagnose incoming contact and mitigate it with the least inertia burn possible. Built like a no nonsense north-south battering ram, Judkins’ play style leans on his beefy lower half to allow him to use shortened strides that keep his feet near the ground and ready to chop step while still moving at near-full speed, not unlike Breece Hall. Always navigating in traffic with purpose and a plan, watching Judkins in action often makes it seem like he’s already calculating how to beat the second would-be tackler before he’s finished escaping from the first.

A cerebral player, Judkins looked to me to be determined to avoid injury at all costs this year while still being effective with his touches. His primary solution was to begin bracing incoming tacklers with his off-ball arm a lot in 2024, seemingly to keep them away from any disastrous hits to his knees – not a stiff arm, but rather using his arm as a shock absorber, bending to lay it across the shoulders of defenders as they arrived. But what may have started out as a risk management technique became a legitimate tool for disrupting tacklers, allowing Judkins to utilize both his excellent balance through contact to sap their momentum and his ruddy trunk to ‘soccer clench’ his man at the shoulder and dump them. This is just one example of his ‘dancing bear’ talents; Judkins credits a love of skateboarding with helping his balance on the football field, and with how he reacts to abrupt challenges to his center of gravity that is easy to believe. In an NFL where gang tackling away from the line of scrimmage is all but dead and defenses ask their players to make tackles one-on-one in space constantly, Judkins profiles as the type of runner that can make defensive coordinators think twice about leaving both safeties high.

But make no mistake, Judkins certainly arrives on the NFL scene with question marks. While he does a great job of utilizing what is just a naturally high degree of tension through his hips to tap into above average straight-ahead power while still having some lateral shakes, he is going to make very little hay at the next level with any stop-start, east-west shenanigans. And a physical composition that makes him a real maestro navigating the first two levels of the defense quickly turns against him when he breaks one – you’d be forgiven for thinking Judkins was playing with a pulled hamstring when watching him try to elongate his strides in a sprint at Ole Miss (although I will say he looked more fluid at full gallop this year).

But, as with many a prolific rusher before him, the real concern is going to be his abilities on passing downs. It’s not 1994 nor even 2004 anymore and running backs can’t be one note artists if they want to play on Sundays. This is far and away the biggest knock on Judkins now, and the first thing teams are going to want to find out about him: ‘… okay, but where’s he at with his pass blocking?’ Judkins also isn’t what I’d call a natural pass-catcher at this point, often looking tentative when passes arrive and looking the ball all the way in before making a football move. But he has shown glimmers of potential as a receiver, and in Judkins’ defense he only just turned 21 and spent his first five years of serious football on teams that wanted him focused on doing what he does best. Plus, Ole Miss and Ohio State just didn’t throw to running backs period – Judkins’ 52 receptions in college were out of the 97 total receptions by all running backs on his team during his three collegiate seasons. And he’s nothing if not willing as a blocker.

Projection & Fit

The obvious elephant in the draft cohort is Heisman runner-up Ashton Jeanty, with Omarion Hampton creeping up draft boards and heading toward an outside shot at joining him to make this just the third NFL Draft in the last seven to feature more than one running back taken in the first round; we probably have a half-dozen multi-year starters at the position coming down the pike, if I had to guess. But before those two captivated us with their excellence the last two seasons, a freshman running back led the 2022 Rebels to a 7-0 start and hammered two touchdowns down LSU’s throat in the first nine minutes of their eighth game. The Tigers would ultimately survive their brush with Judkins, but I believe more than a few NFL scouts still have his name in their phones from two years ago and will not let him fall further than the third round.

I will admit, unless you know somebody who knows somebody in scouting for a particular NFL front office then guessing at where a running back might land after Day 1 of the NFL Draft is bunk science at best, but let’s muddle through: the Vikings have only Ty Chandler under contract in 2025 on the depth chart currently, but another trip around the sun with Aaron Jones seems likely. Teams whose likelihood of reuniting with their free agency-bound starters is less clear include the Steelers, Broncos, Cowboys and, as much as they have a starting running back, the Raiders.

But there are two spots that just feel right, and one is the Browns. Cleveland has done right by Nick Chubb in letting him play out his full contract, and they may well even opt to bring him back in 2025 – but the writing is on the wall and I don’t think they’re sold on Jerome Ford as the guy. Nobody can actually replace him, but Judkins conceivably could slide into the Nick Chubb role of yore pretty seamlessly. The other landing spot for me is the Chargers; a Jim Harbaugh team sputtering through the stretch run because they can’t run the ball to save their lives is sure to be a priority fix for them in the spring. Under different circumstances this would be a slam dunk Judkins landing spot for me, but with bigger names at the position ahead of Judkins (who would have been the unquestioned RB1 at this time in last year’s class; this year he’s not yet even a unanimous top 5) it’s conceivable the Chargers use their mid-to-late first rounder on Jeanty or Hampton. I’ll stick with it though, as a full court press on restocking the cupboard for the Charger offense in the early rounds would clearly be draft capital well spent.

Draft: 2nd round, 53rd overall to the Los Angeles Chargers
Ceiling: Josh Jacobs
Floor: Tyler Allgeier

Next Up: Omarion Hampton

—Luke Wilson