STRENGTHS
Royce reminds me a lot of former Colts running back Frank Gore. He has the same style of running, kind of like he’s on skates. This skating type gate, allows him to make quick and subtle moves that surprise his opponent when they go to tackle him making them off balance and allowing Royce to break a lot of arm tackles. Royce seems to always fall forward gaining goal line yards and moving the chains on third and short yardage. He has good speed and solid leg drive and has excellent mental toughness to take the pounding his style of running back has to be able to take and not wind up in the medical tent. Royce shows on film good hands to catch the ball out of the backfield on swing routes and check downs. He is the type of back that just seems to efficiently gain yardage and score touchdowns the more you give him the ball.

CONCERNS
If Royce wants to be a starting running back at the next level he will have to prove that he can make yardage in a style of offense that doesn’t have running lanes the width of a double wide trailer. He also has to “want” to block in pass protection for his quarterback. He has the size and strength and there is no reason he isn’t more accomplished at this skill.

BOTTOM LINE
The fact that Royce doesn’t want to block or give the effort to block for his quarterback is disturbing. If he is such a great teammate and leader you would think that he would be an excellent blocker. Add to that the fact that Royce has running lanes as wide as a double wide trailer and it’s impossible to understand from his film how well he will do at the next level unless he has an offensive line that is great at run blocking. Royce has potential because of his workouts numbers and production but unless you’re going to run the same wide-open running lanes style of offense that Oregon runs, who knows if Royce has the vision and true lateral agility to be anything more that an average running back. Royce looks like the type of running back who can be very good and can be a starting running back and can be as good and have as long of a career very much like Frank Gore has had. But unless he decides to be a better blocker he won’t get on the field enough to show it. Royce needs the ball about 20 or 30 times a game to SHOW his production. That means he has to stay on the field for all three downs and that means he better start learning how to read defenses and BLOCK. Royce has been a very productive back in college and deserves to be considered as a top running back in this draft. Nevertheless Royce is not the type of back that can make his own yardage once the offensive line blocking breaks down. Add that to the fact that he “chooses” not to block for his quarterback in passing situations and those issues are the red flags to him becoming the same productive back that he showed at the college level. It simple, good run blocking offensive line and Royce will be productive, bad offensive line and Royce will struggle to impact and his poor blocking will be magnified.

Drew Boylhart   APR.2018