Broncos Film Room: Breaking down Booker’s breakout

 

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With their backs against the wall, the Denver Broncos found a way to re-establish their running game Monday Night against the Houston Texans. As the team rushed for nearly 200 yards against the Texans, it was a rookie, not starter C.J. Anderson who shouldered the largest load.

Denver’s fourth-round pick Devontae Booker delivered 83 yards and a touchdown on 17 carries on the night. The 83 yards didn’t just help the Denver attack to 190 on the day, but also allowed C.J. Anderson to get rest, something that paid off in a major way as Anderson was able to hit the century mark while only carrying the ball 16 times.

As both backs ran with efficiency, the passing game was able to compliment the run and even the Broncos red-zone troubles seemed to vanish in the contest.

In all of this, the Broncos young back was key, and now it looks as if Denver will have to trust the young rookie to carry more of the load with Anderson likely missing significant time.

Here’s what we saw from Booker when going back to watch the tape.

Running style

Ironically, Booker’s first two runs went for positive yardage, even converting a 3rd-and-3, but both were called back due to penalties on the offensive line. The youngster runs hard and welcomes contact, probably his best trait and the quality that stands out the most on tape. He puts his head down and tried to run defenders over, especially when getting to the second level.

No. 23 has shown himself to be a decisive one-cut runner, he’ll get downhill in a hurry. This is exactly what’s needed for the zone-blocking scheme. Booker has begun to show the ability to break off consistent gainers and didn’t have a single negative play against the Texans.

With the game still in the balance and the play calling being more even, the rookie—at one point—had 62 yards on eight carries for an average of 7.7 yards per carry. As the game wore on and the Broncos began to run out the clock, his average diminished, but throughout the first three quarters, the Denver tailback was cutting up the Houston defense.

If there’s an area in which the rookie is still developing it’s his vision, particularly being able to see those openings on the back side (another zone block staple). He’s been very reliable following his lineman in motion and fullback while sticking to the play, but as soon as he’s able to see those extra lanes open up he could become a truly special back.

Make no mistake, in the Pac-12 the Broncos running back showed nice vision, some superb creativity in the open field and surprising wiggle. As soon as he’s able to break off that long run and find himself in the open field, you can expect to see that more from Booker as a pro. This skill also showed significantly in the passing game, an area in which his role should continue to grow steadily with the Broncos.

Booker’s running style and physical traits are very reminiscent of Arian Foster back with the Houston Texans, not coincidently one of Gary Kubiak’s most productive performers at the position in this offense. Much like Foster, Booker might not be the most explosive, nor will he break off many home runs, but with sound vision, following his blocks and running with power, Foster was able to devastate defenses by consistently gaining six to eight yards at a time—that’s the potential the former fourth-rounder has in this offense.

Impacting the passing game

Booker was on the field for 35 snaps on Monday, 55 percent of the team’s offensive plays; he ran the ball 17 times and was targeted in the passing game twice. The rest of the time, he was asked to pass protect. The rookie wasn’t asked to be on the field often in obvious passing situations but he definitely showed some promise in this area.

Pass protection can be a big problem for up-and-coming backs but the former Ute shows well in this area, something he did as a collegiate back as well. Early on in Denver’s first scoring drive, he picked up a blitz coming through the A-gap, allowing for a first down pick up on 2nd-and-9. Trevor Siemian had extra time to go through his progressions and find Emmanuel Sanders. Booker’s block was crucial early on in getting the offensive momentum going. Later on, he had another nice cornerback blitz pickup.

As a receiver, Devontae has shown major talent in his collegiate days but he has yet to show that impact on the field with Denver. His only reception was a dump off into the flats that went for four yards and he exclusively ran lateral check down routes.

Particularly in the screen game, Booker did some of his best work at Utah, look for his role to grow significantly as a pass-catcher with increased playing time.

Taking over

The promising youngster was particularly essential on the second touchdown drive, a drive in which he basically initiated the offense.

Booker got going downhill and with him so did the offensive line. This was a perfect example of decisive North-South running while muscling out some extra yards at the end of each run. The rookie did a great job of picking his lanes, making a cut and hitting the hole with bad intentions.

 

The young Denver back is becoming a real spark plug for this team’s attack.

With a greater role, things won’t be easy for the running back who was slowly getting the hang of the NFL game. In his limited time, though, he’s shown all the traits you want in a high-level three-down back, it’ll be interesting to see how he performs with a significantly increased workload the next few weeks.