Is Bryce Young too small for the NFL?
When I first started writing in the known blogosphere (as opposed to personal sites virtually no one but my friends knew anything about) I used the pen name “Nickel Rover” over at barkingcarnival.com.
Everyone had pen names there and so I did likewise, never really pausing to consider whether an aspiring writer should work anonymously. Nickel Rover sounded like a good name for someone who was “roving” around offering extra coverage on Texas football news. It was also a decent name for a position which was beginning to dominate the game, that of the Roy Williams-type nickel who wasn’t a package player but a featured weapon for defenses countering spread offenses.
All that to say, I was a big fan of “the honey badger” Tyrann Mathieu as he was dominating SEC games from his nickel position in 2011. I found it totally ridiculous when people like Bill Barnwell argued that a 5-foot-9, 176 pound athlete would be too small for the NFL.
Is the NFL filled with ridiculously large people? Yes. Was Tyrann Mathieu shockingly south of “ridiculously large?” Yes. Had he just played for a National Championship as part of an LSU team who competed in the SEC West? Also yes.
Isn’t the SEC West more or less the closest you can get to the NFL in terms of size and speed? If size was going to be a limiting factor, why didn’t it limit him there?
The argument is essentially that in the NFL you’re selecting for the furthest extremes on the bell curve in terms of distribution of size and speed amongst the human population. Everyone who gets that far is exceptional in some regard. How far down the extremes do you have to get before a limiting trait starts to matter?
Barnwell was right that Mathieu’s ability to force fumbles may not translate against NFL ballcarriers, but he was very wrong that his lack of size would mean the end of his playmaking. Nowadays we recognize that small, feisty, heady players can thrive in the modern game which is tilted a bit away from physicality in a scrum toward decisiveness and agility in space. Mathieu’s playmaking manifested in other areas of the game and not just stripping undisciplined offensive players because it wasn’t based on his swiping strength but his mind for the game.
So what about at quarterback? We’ve seen 6-foot-0 quarterbacks win the Super Bowl during this transition for the game such as Russell Wilson (worked outside of the pocket a lot) and Drew Brees (worked inside the pocket). Can Bryce Young give away two more inches and still find similar success? Or do those last two inches make the difference between competing in the SEC West vs the NFL?
I have no idea how you’d determine that. I do know this, smart players who understand what to do with the football can find a way. So let’s use the Boyd Grok score instead to try and evaluate whether Young can be a winning field general at the next level.
What sort of offense is he being asked to run?
Who are his key teammates that need to get the ball for them to win?
How well does the quarterback set up those teammates?
How do opponents try to stop the quarterback and his teammates?
Can the quarterback counter those attempts?
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