Raiders’ Jalen Richard provides more than depth for Oakland

The Oakland Raiders hope Jalen Richard will be able to make a valuable contribution out of the backfield as a rookie.

Oakland ranked 28th in rushing a year ago but the Raiders clawed their way out of holes in many games last season via the right arm of quarterback Derek Carr. To relieve some stress off of Carr, Oakland strived this offseason to add ample depth and talent to the backfield. One of these additions included Jalen Richard’s, an undrafted free agent out of Southern Mississippi.

Richard’s turned heads throughout the Raiders offseason programs, including OTA’s and training camp, but suffered a minor knee injury that has kept him off the practice field for the past two weeks. He’s also missed both of Oakland’s preseason games.

“For a while he was doing something spectacular each and every day in practice,” Raiders offensive coordinator Bill Musgrave said on Richard per the East Bay Times. “It’s good to have him back out there.”

With Richard’s returning this week to practice, head coach Jack Del Rio made it clear they’re anxious to get their first glimpse of him during a live game.

“He had a good week. Anticipate him being able to play, so yeah. We’ve been excited to see him. Obviously, he had the minor setback, but he’s done great. Had a good week of practice and we’re excited to get a look at him,” said Del Rio per Raiders.com.

During these next two preseason games against the Titans and Seahawks, Richard’s should get a generous amount of carries. At Southern Miss, Richard’s rushed for over 2,000 total yards, 19 touchdowns, and averaged 5.3 yards per carry. He was the starter in his senior year rushing for 1,098 yards on 185 carries. He also scored 14 touchdowns on the ground. Playing in a lesser known conference in Conference USA, along with just one full season starting hurt his draft stock. But nonetheless, he should be a viable option for Oakland.

While he’s no guarantee to make the 53 man roster, if he turns in two pleasing performances in these next two games, it’ll be hard to keep him off; especially noting his offseason success. Let’s take a look in the film room to see just what he offers Oakland.

Vision

One his biggest attributes are his eyes. Richard uses his eyes to scan vacant holes and bursts through them. At just 5’8″ he can fit into smaller holes and is a good runner in limited space.

Here he shows off some razzle dazzle and vision. The run is intended to go outside to the left side of the formation, with the linemen all blocking down to the left. But he quickly realizes the hole outside to right and bounces to the weak side and picks up a big gain.

This is another example of his downhill vision. He takes the handoff in the shotgun, takes a few stutter steps and cuts right up the field in a hurry. The hole isn’t a gaping one but he squeezes his way through for a big gain.

Power

You wouldn’t expect Richard’s to be a bulldozer, but he did show off enough authority inside the five-yard line to impress the Raiders.

Here on a designed outside pitch, he pounds his way through a defender for the few extra yards. Instead of juking around him avoiding contact, he plows right through him. He’s truly not shy of contact despite his size.

While this is just a small sample size, we will get a much better feel of how productive he can be at the NFL level in these next two games.

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Latavius Murray is the only running back on this roster with his role assured. It’ll be interesting to see how the depth chart plays out at running back within the next few weeks and how high Richard will be able to climb.