It's official, I have a man-crush on Toby Gerhart...
walterfootball is okay in some of their scouting and they give good numbers, but their mocks are far-fetched.
Most internet mocks are biased in some form or fashion - that's the problem.
I love that video too, but even it doesn't do him justice. Watching him wear down that notre dame defense and USC defense in '09 was poetry in motion - or more of a chess match. He is a special - special player. If he is used right in the NFL, he will be a pro bowler.
its got Notre Dame and the USC game on there too (it mainly follows the schedule of Stanford, with the games earilier in the season first and the later ones last) but its got more of his career for those who say "of course its going to look good, its highlights" and for posters who seem to think he only he did great against Notre Dame. The 3 games before ND he had a total of 575 yards averaging
6.1 ypc and 10 touchdowns. his ypc went up as the season went along,
all 3 were ranked teams at the time. So the last 4 games of the regular season, 813 total yards and 13 touchdowns 6.4 ypc, which is why he came so close to getting the Heisman, he didn't just run against Notre Dame. He did win the Doak Walker award for nations best halfback. IMO he should have won the Heisman but im kind of glad he didn't, im superstitious, and now he wont have the Heisman curse.
It also has him against USC in 08, when they only allowed 1 other 100 yard rusher and had 8 defenders drafted, 2 that went to the pro bowl and 1 that was considered for the droy, and another that will be drafted high this year in Taylor Mays. It also has the bowl game against Oklahoma where everyone insisted he was going to get killed by their dline, that he had never faced a great defensive line like OU had. He did and still did well, with Andrew Luck out and Tavita Pritchard playing who couldn't complete a pass to save his life. They actually had Toby running some wildcat plays, thats how bad Pritchard is, Toby had a better passer rating than him.
So 2 of his toughest battles came against USC in 08, where he did well with no passing attack, and the bowl game against Oklahoma, where Andrew Luck was not playing and they had no passing attack, both games he did great in and are both on that tape. So no, he doesn't have to play Notre Dame to do well.
and yes Stanford had a good blocking line. What back can do well without blocking besides Barry Sanders? They were good but not great. They weren't athletic enough to get to the second level consistently, just good enough to provide a quick hole. He often had multiple unblocked guys he had to get by after the initial los. The back up runningback ran behind the same line against the same teams, and he is supposed to be a pretty good back, had 12 carries for 35 yards averaging 2.9 ypc against a Notre Dame defense that was supposed to be poor against the run (well they were similar to Auburn in terms of defending the run), compared to Toby's 200 yards 7.1 ypc 3 tds against the same team.
I think he would do best in a ZBS which is what was used at Stanford, I know we used elements of a ZBS throughout the year, but not sure how often we used it. Anyone know the answer?