Can he return to form? When all of the conjecture is stripped away, when the workout video stops looping, when the Hard Knocks cameras stop rolling, there’s really only one core question remaining. Can Dallas Cowboys running back Ezekiel Elliott return to the form that won him the title of game’s most productive back three years in a row to start his career? 2018 feels like a long time ago, but for three consecutive years Elliott averaged more yards per game than every other back in the league.
He’d have won three straight rushing championships if the league’s hadn’t decided they were going to use him to punish owner Jerry Jones in 2017, stripping him of six games from his schedule. And although Elliott had a strong year in 2019, his numbers have been in decline each of the last two seasons, culminating in the worst year of his career in 2020.
The 2020 season started out rough for all of the NFL, with the offseason cancelled due to the coronavirus pandemic. Elliott caught Covid-19 in the summer and it did impact him, causing him to suspend his workout routine. He disclosed that it did cause him to experience shortness of breath and while he has never confirmed it publicly, for many people who experience that symptom, a return to normal breathing ability can take months to happen.
Whether or not that played a role, Elliott certainly wasn’t himself in the early going, fumbling twice in a ball game for the first time since Week 2 of his rookie season. Then he did it again a month later, totaling five fumbles in the first six games. Perhaps he was trying to carry too much of the burden with an injury-ravaged offensive line in front of him and the worst defensive performance in recent memory putting the offense behind the eight ball.
When QB Dak Prescott went down in Week 5, the defensive attention focused squarely on him, only there was no help from the decimated line. He gained just 387 over seven games from Week 3 through Week 9, a total he’s surpassed over three games four different times in his career. Hamstring and calf issues followed, causing him to miss his first ever game due to injury.
The end result was a 979-yard, six-touchdown season Elliott would like to wipe from his memory.
So he went about that this past offseason. He worked on losing weight, shedding 10 pounds and being in phenomenal condition by the time training camp rolled around. He started working with RB guru Josh Hicks to quicken his footsteps and looked to regain some of the phone-booth and breakaway quickness he may have lost.
And now? The regular season awaits and his chance to restore the luster. Our player profile countdown series continues with No. 21, RB Ezekiel Elliott.