Leonard Fournette is a man and a rare breed like Jim Brown, Herschel Walker, Jadeveon Clowney and Adrian Peterson to name a few.
Fournette probably was ready to be a professional hours after his senior prom, but NCAA rules prohibit a student athlete playing football from turning pro until three years after his high school graduation date.
After racking up an average of 210.3 rushing yards per game and eight touchdowns, there have been suggestions he sit out his junior season in college to ensure he enters the NFL injury-free.
Fournette is screaming hell no—not even needing anytime to think about it.
I will never jump ship... I'm drowning with my brothers
— 7⃣ (@_fournette) September 30, 2015
Clowney was given similar advice before his junior season, but Rams great and NFL Hall of Famer Marshall Faulk believes Fournette should stay on Clowney’s three-year path by playing it out.
“I’m telling you, sitting out, it takes a while to get you back into the speed of things,” Faulk said. “Just watch. Adrian Peterson, he sat out last year, he’s going to have good game-bad game, good game-bad game. You saw him put the ball on the turf a couple times Sunday. You need the reps. I hope that LSU is smart about how they use him. He pretty much has no quarterback. He has no quarterback in the sense of a guy that can really throw the ball down the field to take some of the pressure off of him. I see that they’re kind of shrinking his carries, but he’s a workhorse, bell-cow kind of guy. He will be the first running back or the first player taken when he does come out, though.”
I agree with Faulk and Fournette. Play it out, because these will be some of the best years of his life.
Short of totally blowing his knee out, there’s no injury that prevent Fournette from a productive NFL career.
By Glenn Erby
