What DE KJ Henry brings to the Washington Commanders
Taking a closer look at the Commanders’ fifth round pick.
The Washington Commanders used their fifth round pick on Clemson defensive end KJ Henry. Henry measured in at the combine at 6-foot-4, 251 pounds with 33-inch arms. He tested pretty well athletically, though he’s not on par with the athletic freaks the team already has at defensive end in guys like Chase Young and Montez Sweat.
The pick may appear like an odd one at first given Washington has good depth at defensive end with Efe Obada, Casey Toohill and James Smith-Williams behind Young and Sweat. However, look ahead to 2024 and you’ll notice that not one of those players is under contract. In fact, the only defensive end the Commanders have under contract beyond this season as of writing this article is Shaka Toney, who is currently on indefinite suspension due to violating the league’s policy regarding gambling.
Adding some more depth on a cheap rookie contract makes plenty of sense in that regard and Henry is someone that I think should be a solid contributor for a number of years. His pass rush still needs some work, and I’ll get to that later in this piece, but he’s a very well rounded player that can contribute in a lot of ways.
The first way he can contribute is in the run game. Despite being slightly undersized for a 4-3 defensive end, Henry is stout against the run and is willing to take on blockers much bigger than him. He’s also fantastic at taking on tight ends in the run game.
Here, Notre Dame aligns multiple tight ends towards Henry’s side of the field. Two of them look to work in combination to try and block him. However, off the snap Henry does a great job penetrating the combo block by using his burst and getting skinny to break through between the two blockers. He then gets his eyes on the running back and works down the line to chase down the back and make the tackle.
Henry is also effective in run game stunts. Many defenses will often use stunts in the run game to mess with blocking schemes. One of the more common stunts is known as a pirate stunt which is used to help disrupt zone runs.
On this play, Henry aligns on the outside shoulder of the right tackle on a zone run play to the right side of the offensive line. Typically, this alignment would lead to Henry getting blocked by the right tackle and tight end, while the right guard climbs up to the second level to block the linebacker. However, Clemson calls a pirate stunt to try and disrupt that scheme. This requires Henry and the defensive tackle inside of him to stunt inside a gap, while the linebacker scrapes over the top to the edge.
As a result, Henry stunts inside and forces the right guard to delay working up to the linebacker. The guard has to stay close to help the right tackle recover from Henry stunting inside. With Henry emerging inside, the running back is also forced to bounce his run to the edge, which is exactly what the defense wants to happen. This allows the linebacker to run away from the right guard and roam freely to the running back to make the tackle.
Henry is a solid run defender but he’s also a lot more than that. He’s a very smart player that sniffs out danger and understands how he can counter it. On things like play-action fakes, Henry does a good job diagnosing them early and then adjusting his assignment to try and help the defense the best he can.
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