ExtremeRavens Posted October 9 Posted October 9 ASHBURN, Va. — Who inside the Washington Commanders’ practice facility can replicate the size and skill of the Ravens’ 30-year-old All-Pro running back, who stands 6 feet 3, 247 pounds and treats oncoming NFL defenders like pesky school children? “Nobody,” coach Dan Quinn said, “to put it very bluntly.” Much of Sunday’s pageantry, when the Ravens (3-2) and Commanders (4-1) kick off at 1 p.m. in Baltimore, will spotlight the quarterback battle of reigning NFL Most Valuable Player Lamar Jackson and rookie standout Jayden Daniels. But the Commanders, who are on a four-game winning streak, are fully aware of the challenge Derrick Henry presents. Through five weeks, Henry leads the league in rushing yards (572), is tied with the Los Angeles Rams’ Kyren Williams for the most rushing touchdowns (six) and has the second most carries (95). His 318 yards after contact also rank second. Each week’s performance has somehow outdone the previous one. According to Next Gen Stats, Henry has two of this season’s top-10 remarkable rushes — a statistic quantifying when a ball carrier greatly defies expectations using tracking data to predict how many yards a rush should gain at the moment of handoff. His 87-yard opener against Buffalo tops the list, and his 51-yard closer at Cincinnati is No. 9. The combined expected rushing yards of those two plays was only 12 yards. “Going through the scout team and going through the week and evaluating tape, how do you drill it? Is it the same as playing live? Hell no,” Quinn said. “There’s no one on our team that can simulate him for practice. But you can work the technique, and that’s what you have to do.” What makes Henry a unique case, in Quinn’s eyes, is the trifecta of ways he can knock defenders onto their backs, out of their shoes or leave them in his rearview mirror. Nearly a decade into his career, Henry can still stiff-arm tacklers into the grass (like when he open-palm thumped a Raiders defender in Week 2), bulldoze at the goal line (like his first-quarter score versus the Bengals) and use his jab step can drop a defender out of position (like his 87-yard burst). “When you’re thinking, ‘Hey, I’m going to go take my shot at him,’ he puts a foot in the ground to make you miss,” Quinn said. “And so that’s to me what makes part of his superpower. … You better have a really good tackling plan.” Commanders defensive lineman Daron Payne said what separates Henry is his use of speed and size in getting to the outside. If they can funnel him between the tackles, “that’s how we’re gonna contain him.” Cardinals running back James Conner is tackled by Commanders linebacker Bobby Wagner, defensive tackle Daron Payne and others on Sunday in Glendale, Arizona. (Ross D. Franklin/AP) Bobby Wagner has had his fair share of run-ins with Henry when the former was in Seattle and the latter was with the Tennessee Titans. The preparation for Henry, according to the nine-time Pro Bowl middle linebacker, is different than any other running back in the league. He quipped that just watching film of all those stiff arms is how he’s preparing. Fellow linebacker Frankie Luvu added, “I feel like you just gotta pack all of your tools.” “He’s one-of-one,” said Wagner, Washington’s leading tackler. “He can do it all.” The Commanders’ defense ranks in the bottom half of the league through five weeks. Pro Football Focus graded their run defense a 60.3 so far this season, which ranks 19th out of 32 teams. Before suffocating Cleveland on Sunday, they were the worst in the NFL in opponent third-down conversion rate. They had eight sacks over four games. Then against the middling Browns, the Commanders sacked quarterback Deshaun Watson seven times and forced Cleveland to punt on seven of 13 possessions, with a fumble and turnover on downs mixed in. “We knew we had some things we wanted to get exactly right,” Quinn said. “Tackling was right up at the top of the list for me. The best teams, defensively, you hear ’em before you see ’em. And I think communication has certainly ramped up. … We got a long way to go but in terms of them playing together and knowing the energy that we’re looking for and the physicality that we want, we’re definitely taking steps. We’re just getting warmed up. And we got a lot of work to do.” Games like Sunday’s come down to tackling and ball hawking, according to Quinn. Slowing down Henry will require every bit of that. Have a news tip? Contact Sam Cohn at scohn@baltsun.com, 410-332-6200 and x.com/samdcohn. View the full article Quote
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