Alfredo Schefter's RB Report: Snell Ya Later

Benny Snell Jr. | Kentucky | 5’11” | 223

Games Watched:

• v. Georgia (2016)
• v. Florida (2017)
• v. Florida (2018)
• v. Mississippi State (2018)

Context:

Background:

Snell was a 3-star recruit in the top 50 RBs nationally by all major recruiting services. Was his district's OPOY, 2-time all-district 1st, and had offers to Iowa, Cincinnati, Boston College, Toledo, and West Virginia. His father was an RB for the Ravens and great uncle was an RB for the Jets during their Super Bowl. Pre-media arts major. Volunteered to read books at an elementary school as a freshman twice. Favorite meal is PB&J with banana, a true man of culture. Kentucky is in the SEC and runs a spread, mixed-run system. UK had solid OL play, adequate talent surrounding him, and poor passing game production. Snell was used as an all-around back, short-yardage specialist, and wildcat operator.

Accolades:

• (2018)All-SEC First Team
• (2017)Associated Press All-SEC First Team
• (2017)Coaches’ All-SEC Second Team
• (2017)Phil Steele All-SEC Second Team
• (2017)Maxwell Award Watch List
• (2017)Doak Walker Award Watch List
• (2016)Football Writers Association of America (FWAA) Freshman All-American
• (2016)True Freshman All-American by ESPN and 247Sports
• (2016)Freshman All-SEC by the league coaches and Athlon Sports
• (2016)Second-team All-SEC pick by ProFootballFocus.com
• (2016)Two-time SEC Freshman of the Week
• (2016)Leading freshman scorer in the SEC with 78 points

Injuries and workload:

• (2017) Rib injury - returned to the game
• (2017) Rib - Day to day, played that week
• (2017) Ejected for making contact (swatted his hand away when he went to help him up) with Ref after a controversial call (Music City Bowl)
• (2018) Calf Strain - DNP in Practice
• (2018) Ankle - v. Georgia, missed some time in the first half

Snell has been remarkably healthy for his career workload, not missing a game during his 3 years at Kentucky. Naturally, he ended up with some dings and bruises but, that is to be expected since he totaled over 750 touches during his career, which may be of slight concern going forward. Never rushing for less than 1000 yards or 10 TDs, consistently out-producing his prior season, and became more involved in the passing game season over season.

Pros:

Best:

• Play Strength
• Toughness and Competitive Drive
• Falling Forward

Athletically, he has great upper body strength, great contact strength and balance, good lower body strength, good balance out of cuts, good acceleration in space, solid acceleration out of cuts and solid agility. He displays good consistency against all opponents and good ability to execute vs all assignments. Good at knowing where the hole will be before the play. Displays good patience, good ability to press the hole and move defenders this way, solid ability to find the “home run” play, and solid ability to create blocks with vision. Good at finding daylight on Inside Zone and Inside Gap runs in addition to being good at finding cutback lanes on these runs. Solid at finding daylight on Outside Gap runs. Good at creating something out of broken plays and getting more than what’s blocked. He has a solid jumpcut. He is good at separating from the hole on inside runs when there is no one in the hole, solid on outside runs. He has an elite mentality to embrace contact, great aggression, and physicality with the ball and at POA, doesn’t stop feet for anyone in the hole, great fight for extra yardage, and a good motor. He is good at running through or breaking arm tackles high, middle, and low. When face with defenders, he is great at finishing with strength, good at finishing with balance, and solid at forcing defenders to change pursuit angles using juke, stiff arm, truck, shrug, and hesi moves. He is elite at falling forward in against 1 or 2 defenders and good at falling forward in packs of 3+. As for ball security, he has good pad level, a good mentality to keep the ball high and tight, good hand strength, and solid consistency to ensure 2 hands are on the ball in traffic. As a receiver, he consistently uses his hands not his body to catch the ball, has a good catch radius, good processing to sit down in zones, solid ability to display himself as a target, solid ability to set up cuts, solid ability to box out defenders, and solid ability to turn upfield. Within the UK offense, he ran swing, curl, check and release, flat, and screen route from the backfield. As a blocker, he displayed solid “want to”, good anchor, solid technique, solid ability to ID blitz, and solid consistency to keep his head up. He is a good chip blocker, effectively taking rushing ends off of their path.

Cons:

Worst:

• Change of Direction
• Vision on Outside runs
• Inconsistent hands

Athletically, he has adequate acceleration off of the snap and adequate change of direction. He has a solid frame but, could continue to fill out his lower half for added strength. On outside runs, he has adequate ability to find daylight on Outside zone and adequate ability to find cutback lanes on outside runs. When forced to evade or outspeed defenders in his way, he is adequate. Lacks hip mobility to effectively use juke or spin moves going to the next level. Does not consistently keep the ball away from contact or switch hands. As a receiver, he has adequate, inconsistent hands that lack softness, adequate ability to burn or pull away from the players guarding him, LB or DB. Was not lined up out wide at all at UK. As a blocker, he is an adequate ability to cut block.

Conclusion:

He can be a Power Scheme "bell cow", can be a lead man but, likely needs a change of pace guy behind him. He is great at short yardage conversions, great in the clutch and good at finding the goal line. He is solid at overall ball security. He was consistently and constantly depended on as a wildcat rusher, especially to close games (see: Georgia 2016). He is the hammer and not the nail on almost every snap/circumstance. If he is able to develop as a receiver, he could easily become a lone-starter back although, he likely would be best when paired with a speedier/change of pace guy.

Projection:

Year 1: Win with leading power scheme runner

Year 3: Win with All-Around back

Comparable Player(s): Carlos Hyde, James Connor

Grades:

AA: 4, P.Speed: 3, P.Str: 6, Mental Processing: 4, Toughness: 6, Vision: 5, Burst: 4, Finishing: 5, Receiving: 3, Blocking: 4, Ball Security: 4

As always, what do you think about Snell? Who is your RB1? Why am I wrong about your favorite player? What games didn’t I catch that I should watch of his? Which do you prefer, Zone or Gap scheme rushers?

Submitted February 01, 2019 at 09:55PM by AlfredoSchefter http://bit.ly/2BfxeES