Reviewing the Redshirts is an off-season project meant to resurrect discussion about the 2022 Notre Dame freshmen who retained a year of eligibility and discuss their possible impact in 2023 and beyond. The Fighting Irish were able to redshirt 17 players this past season while 1 player medically retired (Joey Tanona) and another player has transferred already to Syracuse (Jayden Bellamy).
Today we’ll take a look at a running back who flashed big-play potential in the spring before suffering an unfortunate torn Achilles.
RB Jadarian Price
Hometown: Denison, Texas
Height: 5-10 3/8
Weight: 197
247Sports Composite Ranking: 4-star, No. 17 RB, No. 32 TX, No. 201 National, 0.9207 score
18 Stripes Grade: 90.3
Murtaugh’s Blurb from the Class Grade:
He doesn’t waste time getting up-field which I love. Price is really good at getting skinny through the hole with good pad level to allow him to open up his speed to the second level. Really nice muscular and lean frame. He should stay under 200 pounds with good speed. Not a ton of wiggle to his game but makes defenders miss with speed and a quick stiff arm. I’m interested to see his speed at the collegiate level. I think he has to be a homerun type of runner to be great in college.
Price was an early enrollee last spring and has been on campus for a full year now. He ended up tearing his Achilles in June 2022 about 6 weeks prior to the start of fall camp. I wouldn’t think he’d be healthy enough to participate in spring practice this year and his status heading into August should be a big off-season storyline for the Irish.
Need at Position: Low-to-Medium
This will be fascinating to see Price’s bounce back from his injury against a depth chart where there isn’t any room for carries that aren’t 100% earned. The reports from spring were promising though and by most accounts Price was flashing really good explosiveness and speed in a role that didn’t end up being filled by Chris Tyree for the second straight season.
Will Notre Dame look to Price to fill that speed role in 2023?
Expected Spot on the 2023 Depth Chart: 4th String
I originally had Price in as 3rd string but ultimately changed that prediction. I keep going back to that Achilles injury which is one of the most difficult setbacks to come back from in football, especially for a skill player dependent so much on cutting and explosive speed.
The last time we saw Price in action he ripped off this long touchdown catch:
Zooom.
That’s fun to watch as he’s reading the blocking for about 12 yards and then turns it on at the 40-yard line. You can really see the next gear found as he out-runs safety Ramon Henderson to the pylon for the touchdown.
At times, we were really hearing some extremely positive reports about Price during the spring and summer. I swear there was even talk of him seriously challenging for some starting reps. However, it’s important to remember the media only saw 1(!) full practice in the spring and Tyree was out with an injury that day which allowed Price some more reps than usual.
Clearly, Price was doing enough to turn some heads in that limited amount of action and he also caught plenty of attention in the spring game with 104 yards on 8 receptions with the above touchdown, too.
Still, Price also ran for just 12 yards on 9 carries in the Blue-Gold Game, and was a non-factor actually carrying the ball. Coming off his injury I would expect him to remain solidly behind the 3 other running backs for 2023. Rehabilitating his Achilles and then getting back into playing shape while then impacting a pretty deep depth chart would be one of the more miraculous off-seasons in recent Notre Dame memory. I think you’d always want to leave the door open to someone who flashed such dynamic burst to pull that off, but it’s not something I’m expecting.
Things could change if Chris Tyree is no longer a running back and/or decides to transfer. To my knowledge Tyree hasn’t formally declared his intent to return or leave, and as a true junior really wouldn’t be expected to either. I would imagine with Price’s still lingering health questions, Notre Dame is still very interested in Tyree sticking around even at running back.
I assume you have Estime, Diggs, and Tyree ahead of him?
Yup.
Funny, I assumed a healthy Payne above him when I read it.
Would have been interesting to see how much of a role or playing time Price would have had in 2022. The two top guys did so well that it probably wouldn’t have been too much.
And, who knows, Estime was dinged up for a bit and Diggs has had injuries in his past too. Overall for as much as they ran it, Notre Dame had good luck in 2022 with RB injuries. Might not be so fortunate in 2023, which could open up more opportunity for Price.
Nice to be deep in that position. I’ve heard some say RB is almost as fickle as QB when it comes to transferring, 2023 seems fine but I wonder what the ND depth chart will actually look like in 2024. All of Estime-Diggs-Tyree have eligibility, but will even two of them be back? Might be a changing of the guard at that point for one of them + Price and Love, but who knows what could change in ~20 months.
He might have gotten some time when Estime when through his case of fumble-itis
Very good update on Price. The story line has been, wow, he’s flashed… this puts everything in a more realistic context. Speaking of which — what’s the anecdotal take on Achilles injuries and their impact on speed merchants? Are there examples of coming back with the same explosive burst?
The severity of the injury surely comes into play but, this can be a very serious injury and can often be career ending. Looking on line has made me less optimistic for Price’s recovery.
“Another study in 2017 in the same journal by Trofa and colleagues looked at 86 athletes with Achilles ruptures in the NBA, NFL and MLB. 30% never returned to play. For the athletes who returned, game participation averaged 75% in Year 1 and 82% in Year 2 of their pre-injury levels and performance statistics were significantly worse at one and two years after the injury. For clarification, Achilles tendon rupture and tear are the same thing.
Thanks for this, tlndma. That kind of matches my vague impressions accentuated by this from Eric above:
I keep going back to that Achilles injury which is one of the most difficult setbacks to come back from in football, especially for a skill player dependent so much on cutting and explosive speed.
Really hope his rehab goes well, both physically and morale-wise. A tough road for a young man. At least he’s in a school that cares for him, and I have to think, a head coach as well.
Also, off topic, but Kyle Hamilton is back this semester to complete his degree. Love to see that!
Yeah, very interesting to learn about.
Also, I don’t know if it’s coincidental or confirmation bias on my part, but it seems like in the last ~10ish years there have been way more Achilles’ tears on athletes than the previous 10 years. Not sure if training techniques or maybe shoes or why that could be (or if I’m just completely incorrect in this observation) but it sure seems and feels like unfortunately that recently these injuries have become more prevalent lately.
I think it is combination of things. Tendons and ligaments are hard to strengthen, but muscles aren’t. I think the extra strength makes tears more likely. They are only able to take so much torque and pressure.
I also think the fake turf has something to do with it. Better traction increases the torque too.
Last but not least, once torn, the tendon is tighter and more likely to tear again.
Interesting info, thank you for sharing!
Concur! I am sure the conditioning staff is acutely aware of all of this.
I see Max Pacioretty (Carolina NHL) re-injured his achilles a night or two ago. He had surgery back in August after tearing it. So 6 months to get back and then a non contact re-injury. It didn’t look good and made me think of Price.