Don’t tell De’Von Achane that he can’t do something.
If it’s on a football field, he’ll do it. Texas A&M coach Jimbo Fisher learned that quickly about Achane when the coach would tease the running back: There’s no way. No way, no how.
“He would just kind of look at you and roll his eyes like, ‘Are you crazy? You know you’re crazy,'” Fisher said with a chuckle in an interview with FOX Sports.
At 5-foot-9 and 185 pounds, Achane appeared to have limitations as NFL teams evaluated his pro prospects. That’s part of how he landed in the third round to the Miami Dolphins after putting up 1,102 rushing yards and eight touchdowns at 5.4 yards per carry with 36 catches for three more touchdowns last year. And while Achane would never roll his eyes at draft evaluators — Fisher repeatedly said Achane is “a very confident guy, not an arrogant guy” — he surely didn’t like hearing what he couldn’t do during the pre-draft process.
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“It gets brought up a lot,” Achane said during Dolphins OTAs when asked about his size. “Everybody’s got their opinion on me. I don’t be worrying about what everybody’s got to say because I know what I can do and I know what I’m capable of, so my size to me doesn’t matter. But it does get brought up.”
You’ll hear it a million times: Achane plays big. And he needs to. His speed is special — he posted the fastest 40-yard dash time among running backs in 2023 (4.32 seconds). But that’s not enough to beat out his new teammates.
Size matters in the NFL. Achane’s Miami position mates include the power back in Jeff Wilson (6-foot, 215 pounds) and the speedster in Raheem Mostert (5-foot-10, 205 pounds). Mostert ran a 4.34-second 40-yard dash during the pre-draft process in 2015.
It’s possible, too, that the Dolphins land free-agent running back Dalvin Cook, who would quickly slot into the RB1 role as a full-time workhorse. But for now, Achane will fight with the current group for touches. It’s likely he’ll start in a timeshare. But between Mostert and Wilson’s 11 aggregate seasons, the two backs have played a complete season just once. (Mostert played all 16 games in 2019.) So it’s possible — and maybe even likely — that Achane will see a big workload.
Free agent RB Dalvin Cook may wait until mid-July to sign
“For a little guy, you’d think, ‘Well you can only give it to him so many times.’ When you look at our LSU game, he carried it 30-something times for 200-something yards,” Fisher said. “So he has a very durable body that can get through things, and he plays a lot more physical than he’s given credit for.”
Achane did, indeed, get it done for A&M against the Tigers. He finished with 38 carries, 215 yards (5.7 yards per carry) and two touchdowns. Achane’s performance helped power the Aggies to a 38-23 upset of the sixth-ranked team in the nation.
“If you look at his body, he’s very compact and powerful. And the other thing is he’s gonna be even bigger in pro ball. I think he’s gonna be about 195 or bigger,” Fisher said. “Very rarely does he ever gets squared up [for a tackle]. … You don’t ever catch those good clean shots on him.”
There is a slippery quality to Achane’s game. He is so fast that he weaves through defenses and forces defenders to take bad lines — sometimes using a simple step of misdirection. He doesn’t completely run anyone over, but he wiggles away from arm tackles and falls forward. He proved he can work between the tackles, often breaking tackles at the college level.
In the NFL, Achane’s versatility will likely prove most valuable. He told reporters he’s learning the playbook expecting to be used at receiver and on special teams as well as in the backfield.
“He’s willing to do whatever he has to do to be successful in all phases, whether he’s a student, whether he’s a person or whether he’s a player,” Fisher said. “He’s got phenomenal hands. Yeah, he’s got underneath route-running and can run the route tree. But here’s the thing you got to watch as you watch him play: For a track guy that’s that fast, he never plays out of control.”
From 2021 to 2022, Achane’s yards per reception dipped from 10.9 to 5.6. That was, according to Fisher, because defenses began to key on him aggressively as a checkdown option. Teams had seen enough of Achane breaking free for big plays out of the backfield. They played him tighter in the flat.
That’s a good thing for a Miami offense that will want to take downfield pressure off of receivers Tyreek Hill and Jaylen Waddle, who accounted for most of the team’s offense last year. Hill and Waddle had 3,066 of the team’s 4,765 passing yards (64.3%). They also had 3,132 of the team’s 6.451 total yards (48.4%).
They could use some help.
In a sense, Achane could serve as the Darren Sproles for Mike McDaniel’s offense.
“I know who he is,” Achane said of the former NFL back nicknamed “Lightning Bug.” “So I feel like, like I said, everybody talks about my size, but I know what I’m capable of and I’m good at the size that I am right now.”
Achane’s role will evolve in the coming months — and, likely, years. But he seems to have the right skills to get on the field immediately as a third-down back and returner. Achane compared himself to Christian McCaffrey in an interview with Fins District. McDaniel isn’t likely to give Achane a McCaffrey-sized role in 2023, but there will be ways to give the rookie a chance to emulate McCaffrey as an explosive running and pass-catching threat in the offense.
“Stay tuned, man. He’s going to be one to watch,” said Waddle, who has known Achane since high school. “I’m definitely excited to watch him at this next level.”
It’s not going to be easy for Achane in Miami’s crowded backfield. Cook’s arrival would only complicate things further. Perhaps that’s why Wilson gave Achane a clear piece of advice upon the rookie’s arrival in the Dolphins’ locker room: It’ll be a grind.
Achane’s response?
“I came prepared for that.”
Prior to joining FOX Sports as the AFC East reporter, Henry McKenna spent seven years covering the Patriots for USA TODAY Sports Media Group and Boston Globe Media. Follow him on Twitter at @henrycmckenna.
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