Advertisement

NFL draft: Will Ezekiel Elliott's postgame comments hurt his stock?

Eric Edholm

It was a more eventful postgame for Ohio State running back Ezekiel Elliott than it was a game last Saturday.

After being held under 100 yards rushing for the first time in 16 games, Elliott fired a few salvos in the direction of the Buckeyes' coaching staff and then announced his plans to turn pro right after that. Quite the turn of events in the loss to Michigan State, putting a serious dent in the Buckeyes' chances of winning back-to-back titles.

“We weren’t put in position to win this game,” Elliott said after his 12-carry, 33-yard game. “I deserve more than [12] carries, I really do. I can’t speak for the play-caller. I don’t know what was going on.”

[Yahoo Daily Fantasy: $10 could win you $50K in our $350K contest for Week 12]

The play caller is Ed Warriner, but Ohio State head coach Urban Meyer said he had a say on which plays were called. After the upset, Meyer said, “I couldn’t disagree with his comments.” Still, Meyer added that the timing of Elliott's comments were an issue. “That’s not the place, and he knows that,” Meyer said.

Would this have any bearing on Elliott's draft stock? Shutdown Corner heard from three NFL talent evaluators on the matter. All three didn't seem too concerned overall, especially after Elliott issued an apology on social media the following day.

"Yeah, I read it," one AFC college scouting director said by phone. "It was fine. He wasn't wrong [after the game] as Urban said. But he's got to know how to handle that better. I've not been through there, but our [scouts] say he's not a bad kid. Passionate, yes. Bad? No, I don't think so. Just had a little moment there.

"We're grading the football player here."

An NFC scout added:

"If he tries that as a rookie, it's a different story. Kid wanted the ball, I get that. [There's a] time and a place and all that. We'll ask him about it in Indy [at the scouting combine], or if we go back through there [in Columbus]. You want to hear him say it again. But I doubt it's a big deal."

Time has a way of diffusing these sorts of stories. The combine is three months away, and though it will be dug back up there that quickly will fade. The draft is two months after that.

"He's a team guy," the AFC scout said. "The coaches told me that themselves this season."

Fact: The Buckeyes don't win a championship last season without the late-season running of Elliott, who was in the Heisman Trophy discussion this year prior to the loss. He has shown bell-cow ability in NFL evaluators' eyes and following the immediate success of the St. Louis Rams' Todd Gurley, Elliott could end up a mid-first-round pick.

"Not on Gurley's level but has the vision, the leg drive, the prouduction to be very good in our league," the NFC scout said.

The third scout we spoke with, also from the NFC, said he felt the biggest issues with Elliott could come with his contributions to the passing game.

"I'm not all there on him yet on the pass game. Needs work as a receiver. His protections looked fairly basic; still needs technique there," he said. "Not sure he'll get dinged a lot for the coaches comments, but then again we have a bit of an old-school coach who likes to [have us] shine a light on these guys and get real close and ask them uncomfortable stuff.

"We tend to make it bigger than it really is. I guess I wasn't all that worked up by it."

Example: Would you picture the Dallas Cowboys, having enabled Greg Hardy amid a season of turmoil, turning down the chance to take Elliott in Round 1 if he's there? When it comes down to it, more than 150 days' worth of news cycles will have passed since Elliott make a few correct judgments of his college coaches, and there will be far bigger character red flags to break down as the draft approaches.

- - - - - - -

Eric Edholm is a writer for Shutdown Corner on Yahoo Sports. Have a tip? Email him at edholm@yahoo-inc.com or follow him on Twitter!