Here’s my thesis. 5 lbs. can make a difference to a running back’s mentality. There’s something about that number, 225.

I remember 40 years ago when Earl Campbell came on the scene. “What!?!? He’s 225 lbs!! That’s huge!” And back then the lightest weight to qualify as a linebacker was 225.

So, that 225 number—for whatever reason—is the magic number where football players think, “I’m a big guy.”

Now it doesn’t translate that if you’re a big guy, that you’ll be feirce when you run the ball up the gut of the defense. If you remember Nick Bell out of Iowa who played for the LA Raiders, he was 6’2”, 250, and ran the ball like he was a scat back.

But running the ball effectively up the gut of the defense is what gets you on the map when it comes to stacking up big yardage stats.

And if your mentality is that “I’m not one of the big guys (I don’t weigh more than 225)”, then you’re going to have to gain your yards off tackle and on the edge.

Don’t get me wrong. Plenty of non-big guy backs who could run up the gut—Emmit Smith, Barry Sanders.

But I think 225 lbs. a mentality thing that gives backs’ confidence to work the entire field and not just the edge.

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We Not Me