New England Patriots: LeGarrette Blount enjoying career year

It’s been an interesting road for New England Patriots running back LeGarrette Blount, but he’s now enjoying the best season of his career…

The New England Patriots are typically a team that doesn’t have much stability at the running back position, but they seem to find production from a number of players. This season, it’s been the LeGarrette Blount show, and he’s showing no signs of slowing down.

Blount has taken handoffs from three different Patriots quarterbacks this season, but the result has been the same — he’s been hard to stop.

So far this season, Blount has carried the ball 143 times for 566 yards and eight touchdowns. Those eight touchdown runs are already a career-high, and he’s on pace to break New England’s single-season record of 14.

It seems hard to believe, but Blount is already 29 and has been in the league for seven years now. It feels like his infamous incident at Oregon after a game against Boise State wasn’t that long ago, but Blount has come a long way.

Like many others before him, he’s bought into the culture of the New England Patriots, and has become the most consistent contributor to the offense this season with players like Rob Gronkowski and Tom Brady out for varying reasons.

Blount’s career-high rushing yardage total is 1,007 back in his rookie year with the Tampa Bay Buccaneers. He’s well on his way to surpassing that total if he can stay healthy, and the Patriots are making him a featured piece of the offense.

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In recent years, it’s been a RBBC (running back by committee) format in New England, and Blount was part of that. He played 54 percent of the team’s snaps offensively last season, but with players like Shane Vereen gone and Dion Lewis out of the picture (at least for now), the Patriots sort of ditched that approach and have just turned to Blount.

His 143 carries are first on the team by a mile. James White is second on the team with 24 carries, and after him is rookie quarterback Jacoby Brissett at 16.

Blount is such an interesting specimen. He’s listed at 6-0, 250 pounds but he is always one of the quickest and most athletic players on the field. His ability to maintain that size hasn’t forced him to give up on foot quickness.

One thing that I’ve always admired about Blount on the field is his ability to break off big runs. He’s not busting one out every week by any means, but he’s certainly got the ability to do it and break the back of a defense at any time.

One thing seems certain, and it’s that Blount is enjoying the prime year of his career. He’s working hard and erasing memories of some questionable off-field character situations while helping New England to a 6-1 start.

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