Over the past week I’ve been breaking down the skill sets of some of the top wide receivers in this draft class. Previously I looked at Chris Olave, Garrett Wilson and Drake London, but today it’s time to look at Arkansas receiver Treylon Burks. Burks had an outstanding season for Arkansas and was a fantastically versatile weapon with the ability to be a home run threat from anywhere on the field. However, he’s fallen out of favor in the last few weeks after a below par showing at the scouting combine. He measured in at 6-foot-2, 225 pounds, which gives him a big frame to work with, but disappointed with a 4.55 second 40-yard dash time and wasn’t necessarily as explosive as expected in other drills.
Those numbers are only disappointing because when you watch Burks on the field, he plays a lot faster than what those numbers suggest. He played against some of the best competition in college football and not many defenders managed to catch him in the open field. His speed was certainly an asset.
On this play, Burks aligns outside to the right at the top of a stacked set. The receiver behind him motions across the formation, leaving Burks on his own to run a go route down the sideline. Off the snap, Burks uses a stutter step before taking an outside release to burst by the defender. He runs by him down the sideline and does a great job adjusting his path to work back inside and give his quarterback a margin for error to the sideline. The throw is a good one though and Burks tracks it well as it drops over his shoulder allowing him to continue running in stride. Burks does nearly stumble but manages to recover and maintain his speed as he runs away from the corner on his way to the end zone for a touchdown.
But Burks has more than just speed to his game. He doesn’t always run by corners, but his size and ball skills enable him to still be a threat vertically.
This clip has two plays of Burks winning back-shoulder fades against Alabama. On the first play, Burks aligns to the right of the formation and runs his fade down the sideline. The corner stays on top of the route the whole way but as Burks fades towards the sideline, the corner shifts his body position to face Burks instead of eyeing the quarterback. That allows the quarterback to pull the trigger on a back-shoulder ball, trusting Burks to make a play while the defender isn;t looking for the ball. Burks does exactly that, tracking the ball well and adjusting his body in air to open himself up and secure the pass before the corner can do anything about it.
On the second play of the clip, Arkansas faced a third down situation. In all of the games I watched, Arkansas liked to show this look in these third down situations where they would work out of an empty backfield with four eligible receivers stacked up to one side of the field and Burks isolated to the other side. They could then run a screen to the four receiver side, have the quarterback keep the ball on a run play or attack the isolation matchup with Burks, which was often the primary option. They go to Burks in this situation, despite the fact he gets jammed off the line and stumbles into his route. Because the corner plays with eyes on him again, the quarterback knows he can throw to his back shoulder. Burks again makes the adjustment to come back to the ball and makes the catch before then turning on the jets and accelerating from the rest of the defense on his way to the end zone.
Burks has terrific explosiveness which means he can create big plays any time he touches the ball. Arkansas often found different ways to manufacture touches for him, getting the ball out quickly to let him try and create in space.
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