What Latavius Murray needs to do to go from good to great
The Oakland Raiders have to be happy about grabbing Latavius Murray in the sixth round of the NFL Draft and seeing him in the Pro Bowl a few short years later. But while that should certainly make the Raiders happy, anyone who has watched Murray knows he could be a lot better if he just cleaned up a few aspects of his game. This is the first in a series of pieces that will look at the younger players on the Raiders roster, guys who have already excelled in the NFL but need to improve just a little more in order to become elite and how they can make that happen.
With Murray, two concepts come to mind, both of which are related in a way. If you’ve followed much coverage of Murray over the past year, you’ve probably heard many people say he needs to run smaller, fall forward and keep churning his legs.
Both of those seem almost funny. Run smaller? The guy is 6’3. Fall forward? Can we just not fall? Keep churning his legs? What is he, a butter maker? And duh, he’s a running back, of course he’s going to move his legs.
But when you dig into the meaning behind these footballisms, you will see that adjusting these three issues could lead to Murray becoming one of the best runningbacks in the NFL. So, what exactly does Murray have to do?
Run Smaller
Yeah, it’s not like Murray can magically shrink himself, but in a way he can. When running with the ball, Murray tends to stand up straight. This is a great way to take a big time shot from defenders and also a reason why Murray often fails to fall forward, but we will get to that. By developing a more compact running style, it will make it harder for defenders to deliver big time hits and will also improve Murray’s ability to break tackles, something that he does not do very well or at all right now.
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Fall Forward
When you watch Murray, one of the things that can be frustrating is that for a big guy, he doesn’t run like it. You never see Murray trucking defenders and rarely do you see him breaking tackles. More often than not, the first defender to square him up will bring him down fairly easily. Good backs can dramatically increase their production by simply learning to take hits and fall forward with the ball because getting an extra yard or two on any given play can be the difference between a punt and a first down. Murray has the size to play with more physicality and needs to make that happen.
Churn His Legs
This one is tied pretty closely to falling forward. As was noted above, Murray often goes down pretty easily. In part, it’s because as soon as he’s hit, he just stops. Murray needs to learn to get low and keep pumping his legs, even if he isn’t moving forward. The effort alone makes him that much harder to tackle and makes it that much more likely he can fall forward for another couple of yards before hitting the ground.
Overall, Latavius Murray relies too much on his speed and not enough on his physical stature. Unlike in college, he can’t simply break to the outside and use his speed on every play. Murray needs to learn how to run with more aggression and physicality. If he can do that, he can develop into one of the better running backs in the league.
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