Prospect Profile: Damien Harris

DAMIEN HARRIS -- RB, ALABAMA

Photo uncredited via saturdaydownsouth.com

Physical Measurables & Athletic Profile

At 5'10 and 216 pounds, former Alabama runner Damien Harris is almost the exact physical average of all RBs in our database (70.8 inches, 216.6 pounds), and that traditional body type makes him a fine fit for a heavy volume role in the NFL. He certainly meets minimum thresholds for what a workhorse back looks like: of the 70 backs in our database who've averaged at least 10 carries per game for their careers, 53 of them weigh at least 210 pounds and carry at least 3.00 pounds per inch on their frames. He's not a next generation, Saquon Barkley-level superhuman prototype, but when NFL scouts and GMs go to the create-a-player screen, the default size sliders are calibrated to spit out a guy who looks a lot like Harris. 

Harris is pretty close to the create-a-player defaults for athleticism as well. His 55th-percentile 40-yard dash time of 4.57 is ok, and while his 16-rep performance on the bench wasn't great, he did show out well in the jumps, producing a 77th-percentile Burst Score (percentile marks per playerprofiler.com). He did not perform in the agility drills at either the Combine or his pro day. His burst and bench numbers combined with his size and build combine to generate a Power Score (the best non-draft capital indicator of professional workload I've found) of 51.7, itself a 55th-percentile mark. Harris is suited well for sizable volume, and while he's not an incredible athlete, possessing one upper-percentile trait (in his case, explosiveness) on top of a baseline of average ability is often enough to be a successful NFL player. 

Production Profile

Damien Harris was part of a crowded Crimson Tide backfield throughout his college career, and as a result never hit age-adjusted rushing yards market share thresholds for success (based on RBs with at least one RB2-level fantasy season on their resumé):

Tool from @theDude_Z with data courtesy of @pahowdy

His counting stats (two straight 1,000-yard rushing seasons) look pretty good, but Harris was never a particularly dominant part of the Alabama offense. Much of that is due to his having shared touches with other NFL-caliber players in classmate Josh Jacobs as well as Bo Scarbrough and Najee Harris, but it still matters. Mark Ingram played at the same time as Eddie Lacy and Trent Richardson and still put up upper-percentile Dominator Rating seasons. It's worth contextualizing Harris' seasonal Dominator Ratings (which never even reached the 25th percentile) because he did play at the premier college football program in the country with other high-quality players, but it's irresponsible to completely wave away his lack of production. 

No waving away needs to be done in regards to Harris' production as a receiver, especially when adjusting for overall offensive involvement. During his three seasons as a meaningful contributor for the Tide, Harris posted reception totals of 14, 12, and 22, with Satellite Scores of 36.8, 26.0, and 49.6, respectively. Those Scores bottomed out at the 38th percentile, but the 36.8 mark is above the database average of 32.3 and Harris' final season Score of 49.6 is a 90th-percentile figure that compares favorably to those of quality receiving backs like Elijah McGuire, DeMarco Murray, Giovani Bernard, and Joe Mixon. Harris was a good pass-catcher throughout his time at Alabama, and that ability coupled with his size means he has three-down potential in the NFL.

note: target data from 2016 is not available (as far as I know -- I'd love to see it if it is), so target share is estimated using 2016 reception total and 2017-18 catch rates

Rushing Efficiency

Damien Harris was an efficient runner throughout his college career. He was able to consistently churn out positive yards in each of the last three seasons, finishing with upper-percentile rates in True YPC (which limits long runs to a maximum of 10 yards) and Loss Rate in all of them. His team-adjusted numbers aren't quite as good, as while he ripped off breakaway runs (20+ yards) at a 1.44% higher clip than the rest of his teammates, his rate of chunk runs (10+ yards) was lower than his combined teammates' rate in his final two seasons, and during his last three years overall.

Pro Football Focus does not have Harris charted as a particularly good tackle-breaker. His rate of Missed Tackles Forced per Attempt is outside the top-50 in the class, and he only has one season on his college resumé in which over 55% of his rushing yards came after contact. These metrics, coupled with the fact that he underperformed his teammates in Chunk Rate during most of his career, brings into question whether Harris was more a product of a well-oiled machine than he was a self-made yardage gainer. His raw yards per carry marks in each of the past three seasons are higher than Alabama's team averages, and a Harris carry had a higher chance of going for a big gain than any given carry from a non-Harris Tide runner, so I'm not sure it's completely fair to say that he was just a random guy on a good team. He wasn't spectacular though, and as a guy who doesn't create a lot on his own, Harris' success as an NFL rusher could be fairly landing spot-dependent.

Similarity Scores & Overall Profile

Damien Harris' low level of production makes him a long shot to be a strong overall comp to successful NFL backs, but several of them make appearances in the more skillset-based comparison categories:

While it does matter that Harris was not a prolific and dominant college producer, finding a close and relevant production match is a bit like finding an apple that compares well to an orange, considering the context behind Harris' college statistics. His closest Production match, Spencer Ware, also happens to be a decent comp when taking context into account; Ware played at LSU which, while not quite Alabama, is an upper-tier college football program in the SEC, and shared a backfield with NFL-caliber players in Stevan Ridley, Jeremy Hill, and Alfred Blue.

On the field, Harris is a good skillset comp to workhorse-sized runners with quality receiving chops, with the previously mentioned Murray, McGuire, and Mixon all as at least 93.0% 3-Down Profile matches (a comparison that takes into account size, receiving ability, and power to predict a player's role in the NFL). He has quality athletic comps as well, as his middle-of-the-road physical profile matches well to explosive players like Aaron Jones as well as marginal athletic talents like Kareem Hunt and Jordan Howard.

Overall, I view Damien Harris as a very well-rounded prospect who is good in all areas without being exceptional in any one. I do see him as a smaller, faster version of his closest Path to Success comp (which limits the player pool to guys who've posted at least one RB2-quality fantasy season) in Ware, a guy who is adequate as a starting back and very good as a primary change-of-pace runner or the 1B-half of a committee backfield. I think the possibilities for Harris' deployment in an NFL offense are varied; he's big enough to fill an inside-running, early-down role, he's skilled enough in the passing game to be a pumped up satellite back, and he's enough of a jack-of-all-trades to wear every hat as an all-purpose lead runner. He's a borderline top-5 back in this class to me, and even if he isn't immediately pegged to be a team's starting RB, having a guy like Damien Harris on your bench in dynasty is valuable considering the war of attrition that is an NFL season. Ballcarriers drop like flies every year, and Harris is the blood Type O of RBs as a player capable of operating in nearly any capacity in an NFL backfield. Pending landing spot, he's an excellent selection as early as the mid-second round of a dynasty rookie draft.

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