Donnel Pumphrey addresses his NFL struggles from year one

Despite being injured, Donnel Pumphrey spent his rookie season struggling mentally and physically.

The NFL is not easy for a running back. Especially if you are five-foot-nine and well under 200-pounds. For Philadelphia Eagles second-year running back Donnel Pumphrey, none of that mattered. At first, anyway. Pumphrey came into the Eagles organization as a fourth-round pick in 2017. He left San Diego State University as the NCAA Division I FBS career rushing leader with 6,405 yards during his four-year tenure.

Pumphrey didn’t expect to blow up in the NFL immediately. But he also didn’t expect to struggle as much as he did, either. Around this time last year, Pumphrey was becoming one of the more intriguing young prospects from the 2017 NFL Draft class. He put on a stellar show at rookie minicamp and was even turning heads during OTAs with the rest of the veterans on the team.

Training camp and the preseason was a different story, though. The Eagles issued Pumphrey plenty of prime opportunities in the preseason. But he definitely did not live up to the hype that he garnered with just shorts and helmets on. Off of 26 game time carries, Pumphrey totaled for 49-yards averaging 1.9 yards-per-carry. Being in a crowded backfield, it was doubtful that the Eagles would keep Pumphrey. Especially with the emergence of the undrafted rookie, Corey Clement.

Tough Love for Pumphrey?

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Donnel Pumphrey somehow squeezed his way onto the final 53-man roster after the preseason concluded. Although he made the team, he did not suit up for game one against the Washington Redskins. And it didn’t take long before the Eagles downgraded him to a spot on the IR with a chance for a return midway through the season.

Once that time came for the Eagles to activate Pumphrey, it didn’t even matter. Clement was the man in town, and Pumphrey would spend the rest of the season in street clothes. As Pumphrey’s situation on the sidelines remained a mystery, he finally confirmed that his running back’s coach Duce Staley simply wasn’t interested in implementing Pumphrey into the offense at all last season.

As Coach Staley continued to single Pumphrey out, the rookie running back didn’t quite know how to respond to the harsh criticism coming his way. The Philadelphia Inquirers Marcus Hayes spoke with the second-year back shortly after Pumphrey concluded the first day of his second season. Here’s what he had to say about his first year in Philly.

"“Last year, me and [Duce] weren’t as good as we are now,” Pumphrey said Tuesday after the Eagles’ first OTA session. “I was taking a lot of criticism from him, I needed to look myself in the mirror, and just learn from him.”“I felt like, last year, I didn’t really have that same chip on my shoulder I had in college. It showed, once I look back at the film,”“Taking care of your body, and taking advantage of all those opportunities. Really, in all of those preseason [games], I didn’t show up, whatsoever. And I have to play better,” he said. “Or my job will not be here.”"

What does the future hold for Pumphrey?

Pumphrey enters into 2017 with a lot more mental experience than most second-year veterans. In his first year in an NFL locker room, he witnessed a team build a Super Bowl winning culture. Although he was hardly a part of that, Pumphrey knows that he is going to have to do a lot better than last year in the summertime if he wants to remain on the roster.

As the Eagles backfield remains crowded, mistakes will not be tolerated this offseason. As we all know, Duce Staley wants nothing less than perfection from his ball carriers. With Jay Ajayi, Corey Clement, and Darren Sproles all being locks to make the roster, Pumphrey’s chances of making an impact on the team reduce with each and every mistake he makes this offseason.

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So far, Pumphrey has turned heads at OTAs, but that’s no reason to get excited just yet. We still have to see the speedster translate his highly-touted skills on the field against a live defense. Pumphrey will get his first-second chance on August 9th, when the Eagles take on the Pittsburgh Steelers for the first game of the preseason.

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