After the 2016 season ended for the Louisiana Ragin Cajuns season, it seemed like running back Eli McGuire’s draft stock took a nosedive. Injuries plagued his senior season, but it seems like he has gotten a second chance at furthering his football career.
Over the last week, Elijah McGuire was getting ready for the East-West Shrine Game and during practice he surprised a lot of the NFL scouts with his speed and vision. Then came Saturday afternoon in the Shrine game and he was able to make a big impact in the game, making the only touchdown in the game and earned the Offensive MVP.
The stock in McGuire has gone up significantly and that hard work from last week paid off as he received an invite on Monday to the Senior Bowl. If he would accept it, a good performance could turn his fortunes around.
So where could he fall in the NFL draft? Here’s a potential ceiling and floor for Elijah McGuire.
What Is Eli’s Ceiling?
If we look at the body of work he has before all the pro days and combines coming up, there’s a lot of positivity about the Houma native when you search his name on Twitter. His speed is definitely garnering the attention of NFL scouts as he is looking more and more like a scat back that could be used like the Saints used Tim Hightower for much of this past season. He looked like he could’ve been drafted at around the same time as Louisiana Tech’s Kenneth Dixon if he had decided to forgo his senior season. However, the depth at the running back position in this year’s draft makes it a little more difficult for him to get towards the end of the second day.
The ceiling that McGuire has isn’t incredibly high, but I’d put it at around the middle of the fourth round.
What Is Eli’s Floor?
Again, the depth at his position is pretty stacked with Leonard Fournette, Donnel Pumphrey, Dalvin Cook, and several other players above the Ragin Cajun. Earlier in the article, I mentioned his injuries hindering the team as well as his draft stock. That could come back to haunt him despite that performance he had in the Shrine Game. However, a good combine could really help the Cajuns running back in terms of the confidence scouts have in him being a good player for them going forward.
If everything that happens in the coming weeks is what they’re expecting, I’d say that his floor is late seventh round or undrafted free agent. It seems like a copout to include UDFA, but it seems like he could be on either side of that depending on what certain teams will need at that point of the draft.
-Clint Domingue