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Week 6 NFL Practice Squad Power Rankings 2020 Kalen Ballage escapes Adam Gases power-sapping presence
Submitted by seestyle » Fri 08-Nov-2024, 13:36Subject Area: GeneralKeywords: Week 6 NFL Practice Squad Power Ran, Week 6 NFL Practice Squad Power Ran, Week 6 NFL Practice Squad Power Ran, Week 6 NFL Practice Squad Power Ran, Week 6 NFL Practice Squad Power Ran, Week 6 NFL Practice Squad Power Ran, Week 6 NFL Practice Squad Power Ran | 0 member ratings |
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It seems one of the worst things that can happen to you as an NFL player is being on a team coached by Adam Gase. But it comes with a silver lining. If you happen to leave that team coached by Gase, you instantaneously morph into the superhero version of yourself.The list of player evidence to back that claim is quite long: , , , , , and . Oh and it works if Gase leaves you too. Ask or.And now there's a uniquely talented, 6-foot-1, 230-ish pound back who has escaped Gase's power-sapping presence. He finds himself on an AFC West team with a young, former first-round quarterback capable of incredible downfield to ses, majestic throw-on-the-run strikes, and athletic scrambles to move the sticks on critical third downs. is now playing with on the .OK, so Ballage isn't as good as . We know. But he's an esteemed member of the Practice Squad Power Rankings after beginning his career with Gase in Miami, then playing in three games with him as a member of the Jets this season.Actually, Ballage was strong enough to withstand Gase's black hole of negative energy for his rookie year in 2018. On 36 carries, Ballage averaged 5.3 yards per rush, and he also caught nine pa ses for 76 yards, which begs the question to Gase -- why didn't Ballage get more touches? I digre s, because it's a lost cause.Last year, Ballage became a punching bag for an unfathomably low 1.8 yards-per-carry average on a Dolphins team that had as its leading rusher. (That's probably my favorite Fitzpatrick stat after the fact that he's beaten the with six different teams.) Anyway, Gase's voodoo took a year to seep into Ballage's pores, apparently. Then, after Gase tried to actually trade a draft pick for Ballage yet saw the deal fall through after a failed physical, he was signed 10 days later.And, against all Laws of Gase, Ballage was actually pretty darn good. He had three carries for 13 yards and caught nine of 10 targets for 67 yards. Then, for some reason, the waived him. Things are a little discombobulated in Florham Park, New Jersey.Of the 64 backs with at least five receptions to date, Ballage currently ranks 13th with 9.9 yards after the catch per reception. Context? In his "range" of receptions, that YAC figure is better than (11 catches), (10 catches), and Chargers back (seven catches).And Ballage has forced three mi sed Mark Letestu Men Jersey tackles on those nine grabs. That means every three catches he forces a mi sed tackle, which ranks right behind for the 18th-best rate among 52 runners who've reeled in at least five catches and have been credited with at least one forced mi sed tackle in the 2020 season.Do not misconstrue what you see below as anything resembling an insinuation from me that I believe Ballage is in Bell's stratosphere as a player. It's simply to show you what type of size and athleticism specimen he is. Oh, and it's pronounced buh-lawj, not bail-idge, which makes him infinitely more cool than that yards-per-attempt average in 2019. Zac Dalpe Kids Jersey Height / Weight40-Yard DashVerticalBroadThree-ConeKalen Ballage 2018 combine6-1 1/2 / 2284.4633 1/2"122"6.91Le'Veon Bell 2013 combine6-1 / 2304.631 1/2"118"6.75I will say, the backs in Los Angeles have played well during Ekeler's absence, so I'm not expecting Ballage to get the call right away. But a big, athletic, pa s-catching specialist with plenty of juice is calmly sitting there on the Chargers practice squad if he's ever needed.Entering Week 6, the PSPR tracker reads nine call-ups from six different players.For those who mi sed it in the PSPR's 2020 debut, I'm only including practice squadders who are rookies, second-year players, or third-year players. That's it. And it aligns perfectly with my niche area of expertise, because the 2018 draft cla s is the first I fully evaluated as CBS Sports' NFL Draft analyst.And as you'll see below, I couldn't resist ranking more players, given the increase in practice squad sizes this season. To run parallel with the league's figure, I hope to write about 16 individuals every Friday, 10 officially in the rankings and six honorable mentions.1. , WR, EaglesBurnett was one of my first draft crushes, someone who finished as a second-round talent on my first Big Board at CBS Sports in 2018. At USC, he often was first read. In 2017, he caught 86 pa ses for 1,114 yards with nine touchdowns. He's a small but sudden slot wideout who can separate underneath and at the intermediate level. Why did I like him so much more than your average inside receiver? Burnett played bigger than his nearly 6-0, 186-pound frame. No pa s was seemingly too far out in front of him. Burnett has played sparingly through two seasons, but later in his rookie season, he was elevated to the Jets active roster and demonstrated he still had a connection with Darnold. He had a four-catch, 61-yard effort in late October and a five-grab, 73-yard performance against the to end the year. Burnett proved in Week 3 he can get open and make catches in this league. In Week 4, he was elevated to the 53-man roster but only ran 10 routes and was not targeted by .2. , WR,Foster's an enigma. Barely produces at Alabama, but runs 4.41 at nearly 6-2 and 198 pounds. Makes the' roster as an undrafted free agent but hardly plays in his first two months of his rookie season in 2018. Then? He registers 25 catches for 511 yards (20.4 yards per) with three scores in the NFL and looks like the future No. 1 in Buffalo. In his sophomore campaign, injuries keep him off the field, as they doand. Foster had three catches for 64 yards last season. Three catches. That's it! Withand rookie, who pieced together an awesome summer, the Bills released Foster, and the Packers grabbed him off waivers. If healthy, Foster has the size and pure speed to be a deep-play specialist with.3. Antoine Brooks, S,Brooks looks the part of a trendy safety-linebacker hybrid at 5-11 and 220 pounds. He's not fast -- he ran 4.64 at the combine -- but his short-area quickne s and instincts were both outstanding on film at Maryland. Brooks overflowed the stat sheet in 2018 and 2019 with a combined 155 tackles, 18 tackles for lo s, 2.5 sacks, two picks, and eight pa s breakups. He's often the first to (correctly) react to where the offense plans to go with the football, will make plays in coverage at the short-to-intermediate level. And he is a sure tackler. He has the athleticism to sift through the traffic to get the ball carrier too.4. , DL,Jones popped at the Senior Bowl, and I remember being impre sed watching him on the flight down to Mobile, Alabama. He finished as my No. 198 overall prospect in the 2020 cla s -- ironically one spot ahead of PSPR alum -- but went undrafted. At 6-1 and 316 pounds with a poor combine performance on his resume, Jones doesn't look like he'd fit in today's NFL. But there is plenty of power in his hands, and some first-step quickne s to threaten through one of the middle gaps. Even after the Josh Anderson Women Jersey throttling of San Francisco, Miami's defense is still 26th in .5. , OT,Early in the 2020 pre-draft proce s, there was an early-round buzz for Wanogho. Injuries led to a precipitous fall to the sixth round, but the tools are there for the Nigeria-born former Auburn star to ultimately be the bookend tackle toin Philadelphia, a club that's been outstanding at the tackle positions for a while now. Wanogho plays with requisite knee bend, so he's not easily fork-lifted by smaller rushers, and he's explosive off the snap and in the screen game. With better punch timing and added weight, he can be a consistent pa s-protecting tackle in the NFL. This season, he'd mostly be useful getting to the second level in the run game.6., WR,I just can't quit Jennings, even though I doubt we see him on the field for
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