Pats Pulpit
TreVeyon Henderson’s first career touch in the preseason ended 100 yards later in the other end zone.
The kick return touchdown wasn’t a surprise after the rookie made a handful of big plays on the practice field early in the summer — and continued to do so throughout training camp.
But as the calendar flipped to September, Henderson has learned the hard way just how different the regular season feels.
“When you’re playing a lot in the preseason, you’re not playing against the same vets that you’re playing against [now],” running backs coach Tony Dews said Thursday.
“Just as he keeps going, and sees more looks — in the preseason, everything is pretty vanilla. Then all of a sudden you get into the season and the game-planning part of it, and now people are game-planning us based on what they see and what they’ve seen us do. So looks change. Things change.”
In his first six games, Henderson has totaled just 148 rushing yards on 41 attempts (3.6 yards per attempt). The game has often looked fast for the speedster, as the rookie ranks dead last among 41 qualified running backs in rushing yards over expected per attempt (-1.2).
And despite entering the league with a strong reputation for his work in pass protection from his time at Ohio State, Henderson has been flagged three times for holding.
But as a strong blitz pickup that helped lead to a touchdown in New Orleans last week showed, things are trending in the right direction with more and more experience.
“He’s progressing. He’s getting better each day, each week. It’s not a learning curve, because he understands exactly what he’s doing,” Dews said. “It’ll come. We all want the explosive plays, the big plays, and you don’t chase them. You let them come to you.
“I think he’s taking a stride, he’s playing within the offense, he’s doing what we ask him to do, and as long as he does that, in my opinion, the other stuff will come as we continue to play. I mean, we’re six weeks in, we still got a lot of football left to play. So, I’m excited to see how it continues to progress and what it looks like at the end of the season.”
Rookie running backs easing into things is nothing new under offensive coordinator Josh McDaniels. James White played just 31 offensive snaps his rookie season. Shane Vereen tallied 161.
While the staff is not ready to make direct comparisons, Henderson — who was already played 142 snaps after being selected in the second-round — is appearing to take similar steps in his progression.
“Sometimes when I talk to Josh [McDaniels] and ask about the guys that were here in the past [at running back], it sounds like from Josh he’s very much on par with some of the other guys that played early as rookies,” said Dews. “He feels like he’s in that same world, where they were at this point in...
