'Why Jerry Jeudy?'
After a successful collegiate career at Alabama, there is anticipation that Jeudy will become an immediate primary option on an NFL offense.
What are the qualities he possesses that can lead to that type of role?
1 - Variation of pace & tempo
The first thing that stands out when watching Jerry Jeudy is how well, and how dramatically he varies pace & tempo.
Love how he is always changing angle width, length and speed to throw off incoming defenders.
Jeudy is one of the most unique movers of this generation, and is unbelievably gifted in how well he can create these shifts.
Jeudy is an elastic, and sudden athlete who is an undeniably quick processor.
In a crowd, Jeudy has a unique element of calmness to his game and consistently picks apart defenders with pinpoint timing and drastic changes in tempo.
What I truly appreciate about Jeudy is the subtly he displays as a mover that leads to on-field success.
Notice how he briefly delays acceleration after the spin to pause pursuit.
His unique movement solutions lead to unchartered territory for defenders.
2 - Movement toolbox
Yes, he was out of bounds.
However, the dramatic deceleration combined with the sudden change of direction are movement tools that are extremely effective.
Jeudy has a rare toolbox as a mover.
Stringing together moves in succession is an area where Jeudy excels.
Creating space by moving the second defender with an 'outside flash' is something you do not see often from a collegiate receiver.
It always feels like Jeudy has defenders on a string when he is in the open field.
An underrated aspect of Jeudy with the ball in his hands how well he perceives potential outcomes.
From a pure perceptual-cognitive perspective there is no better player in this class at anticipating the ever-changing environment that is a football field.
3 - Creating immediate separation
It all starts at the line of scrimmage.
Jeudy is adept at using a skip step to ‘pause’ the defender.
He seals this by keeping his eyes towards #24 then quickly snapping back towards the middle of the field.
Jeudy is VERY difficult to bracket.
Jeudy’s able to get immediate separation through a variety of releases.
He is a technician at mixing up tempo & head fakes while combining those with well-timed periods of acceleration that make him tough to match at the line of scrimmage.
4 - Disguising route concepts
On outside breaking routes Jeudy is nearly impossible to cover in man to man.
Even though Jeudy jumps inside, he’s able to use those created angles as an acceleration aid rather than a hinderance (deceleration) through his break.
Jeudy is in the slot, top of the screen.
What makes elite route runners ‘elite’ is the ability to make ‘Route A look like Route B’
Jeudy disguises route concepts well and has the movement skills to abruptly snap out of his breaks.
Jeudy is the lone receiver, top of the screen.
Watch what Jeudy does to the corner shadowing him here.
What happens to the corners' angles?
His shin angles point inside when Jeudy initially snaps towards the hash meaning that's where he believes the 'opportunity' will be.
Right when the corner commits inside Jeudy breaks off his route towards then sideline (out) then again once he gets there (up)
Being a threat without the ball, makes you an even bigger threat with the ball.
5 - Play speed
Zedrick Woods (#39) is the one giving chase.
Woods ran a 4.29 40 yard dash at the 2020 NFL Combine.
Jeudy only ran a 4.45 in comparison.
Play speed > timed speed.
There are not many wide receivers faster than Jeudy in the 2020 class.
Good luck catching him.
Obviously, you have to have the physical capabilities to play fast, but the other part of it is having an advanced understanding of the game of football & your responsibilities as a player.
Make no mistake, Jeudy is extremely 'football smart' and this showed every Saturday because of how efficiently Jeudy was able to get his spots.
Why was Jerry Rice faster than everyone on the field?
The quicker you process information, the quicker you can react.
#30 is Daxton Hill. Hill is a 99th percentile Sparq athlete coming out of high school.
He ran a 4.30 40 & jumped nearly 44 inches in the vertical at the Nike's 'The Opening' in 2018.
Jeudy doesn’t get nearly enough credit for the type of ‘athlete’ that he is.
6 - Ball tracking & making in-flight adjustments
An underrated aspect of Jeudy's game is how seamlessly he makes adjustments when the ball is in flight.
This is a difficult adjustment that Jeudy makes look routine.
Make no mistake, he does a nice job adjusting to an underthrown ball by Hurts, but Jeudy wins this rep at the line of scrimmage.
The element of his game that is most translatable to the NFL is how he uses his seemingly endless list of releases.
7 - Concentration drops
To me, the only controllable issue with Jeudy is drops. He had 7 in 2019.
Like former Alabama receiver, Amari Cooper, the drops may be a problem during Jeudy’s early career.
However, with Jeudy’s level of talent, NFL teams should be willing to take the good with the bad.
8 - Landing spot: Denver Broncos
Jeudy to the Broncos makes a ton of sense from a football perspective, but will undoubtedly be frustrating for fantasy owners in his early career. Drew Lock is a bit of a question mark as a franchise quarterback, but weapons like Jeudy, Sutton, Fant, Lindsay, Gordon II, Hamler will help.
This is also a reason why we may see some inconsistency from Jeudy. The talent from him is there, but we will have to see how targets shape up in the early going.
9 - 'Who is Jerry Jeudy?'
My comparison to the type of player Jerry Jeudy is from a stylistic perspective is none other than one of the best route runners of all time, Chad Johnson aka 'Ochocinco'. While Jeudy has a much more quiet demeanor, the way they play the game with such a nuanced and calculated approach bridges together similarities. Jeudy had an impressive collegiate campaign, scoring 24 touchdowns in his last two seasons while winning the Biletnikoff award in 2018.
Ceiling wise, Jeudy has an opportunity to be one of the greatest route runners to ever put on a pair of cleats. He's nearly unguardable if you leave him in single coverage. That combined with a suddenness in the open field is unpredictable and effective. I don't like saying this word, but Jeudy has a chance to be special and has future All-pro written all over him.
From a fantasy perspective, he can be a WR3 in 2020 with upside for more in a good ecosystem. In 2020 and beyond, we may be looking at near-elite WR1 production based on talent alone.
Best quality:
Translatable movement skills
Worst quality:
Catch concentration/Drops