Alabama Football’s Kenyan Drake Can Still Fly

A career backup to TJ Yeldon and Derrick Henry at Alabama, Kenyan Drake, a high school wide receiver, managed to overcome the position switch, depth chart logjam, 30-lb increase in body weight, and a horrifically broken leg to become a 3rd round draft pick in the NFL.

After some occasional flashes around mountains of misuses from the Dolphins, Drake really made news on the NFL scene with this nutty game-winner against the Patriots:

Miami really began to use him as a 3rd year guy in 2018, and he broke 1000 yards on his combined rushing and receiving stats.

In 2019, the Dolphins were all in on the #TankforTua campaign, and his production suffered as they traded away all their good players to plan for a major draft rebuild.

Drake was traded halfway through the season to the Arizona Cardinals for a couple of peanuts and a used bottle cap, and he immediately fit in with the new offensive scheme to rack up a whole bunch of yards in the final stretch of the season. He was tagged for a 5th year this offseason, making him a nice $8mil and preparing him for a huge season in 2020 to earn even bigger money.

If you have the 12 minutes free today, this video from Samuel Gold (a talented writer and film breakdown guy that I’ve followed for a few years since he started at FieldGulls.com) is absolutely worth giving a watch. He talks about the differences in the Dolphins and Cardinals’ schemes, Drake’s strengths and weaknesses, and his potential to be a top-5 fantasy running back in 2021.

Seriously, watch this video. It’s phenomenal.

Finally, I will absolutely never pass up the chance to post this highlight: