New York Giants: Don’t give up on Paul Perkins just yet

After struggling to gain yards and losing his starting job in 2017, New York Giants fans are ready to run Paul Perkins out of town. But don’t give up on him just yet.

Remember this time last year? The New York Giants had just lost to the Green Bay Packers in the Wild Card round. All of the attention/blame was on the group of wide receivers who went on the Miami boat trip. But there was hope for the 2017 season because of a top-notch defense and a promising young running back.

That running back was Paul Perkins. Fans were so excited to be moving on from veteran Rashad Jennings and have a young runner in Perkins.

Perkins averaged 4.1 yards per carry as a rookie in 2016. In his only start of the season in Week 17 against the Washington Redskins, Perkins turned 21 carries into 102 yards. On the season, he had 112 carries for 456 yards and added 15 catches for 162 yards in the receiving game.

The rookie out of UCLA failed to record a touchdown in his first season but few were concerned about that. He was the future. Jerry Reese had finally hit on a late-round draft pick (Perkins was a fifth-round pick in 2016).

Then, the 2017 season started…

Perkins started the first four games of the regular season. Week 1, he had seven carries for 16 yards (2.3 avg). He followed that up in Week 2 with seven carries for 10 yards (1.4 avg). In Weeks 3 and 4, Perkins got nine carries each game and turned them into 22 (2.4 avg) and 13 yards (1.4 avg), respectively. He also added seven catches for 35 yards through the first quarter of the season.

Perkins then missed Weeks 5-7 with a rib injury before the Giants’ bye in Week 8. Perkins hit the halfway point with 32 carries for just 61 yards (1.9 yards per carry).

Unfortunately, the second half of the season did not get better for the young running back. Perkins became almost exclusively a special teams player after the bye week. He didn’t even see a special teams snap in Week 11 against the Kansas City Chiefs.

Perkins saw three carries a piece in the games against the Oakland Raiders (Week 13), Arizona Cardinals (Week 16), and Washington Redskins (Week 17). His rushing totals in those three games were 12, 10, and seven yards, respectively.

Once believed to be the future running back of the New York Giants, Paul Perkins finished his second NFL season with 41 carries for 90 yards (2.2 yards per carry). He still has yet to find the end zone in his pro career.

While Perkins was struggling, Orleans Darkwa and Wayne Gallman were making their cases to be the future running backs of the New York Giants.

After taking over for Perkins, Darkwa turned 11 starts into 171 carries for 751 yards and five touchdowns. Darkwa had 21 carries for 117 yards in Week 6 against the Denver Broncos, the NFL’s top run defense at the time. He also turned 20 carries into a career-high 154 yards and a touchdown in Week 17 against the Redskins.

The New York Giants were 3-0 in 2017 when Darkwa got 20+ carries and 0-13 when he didn’t.

Through 246 career carries, Orleans Darkwa has averaged 4.2 yards per carry.

For the second year in a row, the Giants had a promising rookie running back to be excited about. After Perkins gave fans hope in 2016, Wayne Gallman did the same in 2017.

Gallman was not active until Week 4 but didn’t waste any time getting familiar with the NFL game. He received 11 carries in his debut and ran for 42 yards. The rookie followed that up with another 11 carries in Week 5 for 57 yards. In two weeks, Gallman topped Perkins’ season total in rushing yards in half the carries.

Gallman even saved his best performance for last, taking 15 carries for a career-high 89 yards in Week 17.

On the season, the rookie finished with 111 carries for 476 yards and failed to find the end zone (eerily similar numbers to Perkins’ rookie campaign). Gallman also hauled in 34 passes for 193 yards and did score a touchdown through the air.

So if Darkwa and Gallman were so much better than Perkins in 2017, why shouldn’t we give up on Perkins?

Because of the offensive lines they were running behind, and no, they weren’t the same.

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Darkwa and Gallman get all the credit for the improved Giants running game but an offensive line switch also had a lot to do with it.

Inserting D.J. Fluker at right guard, moving John Jerry to left guard, and Brett Jones filling in at center turned a non-existent running game into a respectable one.

Paul Perkins, however, never got to run behind that interior offensive line.

Jones didn’t start at center until Week 5 when Weston Richburg was out with a concussion. That was the same week Perkins was out with his rib injury.

Fluker didn’t start at right guard until Week 4 and Jerry didn’t shift to left guard until then as well. Perkins got one week of that improved guard combination but by the time they really started to gel, Perkins was buried down the depth chart.

Perkins is 23 years old and just one year removed from being the future running back of the New York Giants. And it’s time to give up on him? I don’t think so.

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The best thing to have in the NFL is depth and competition. The Giants should re-sign Darkwa and maybe draft another young running back. New York should then allow Perkins, Darkwa, Gallman, and the rookie to compete for reps throughout training camp and the preseason.

The Giants will likely spend most of this offseason improving the offensive line and every running back on the roster deserves an opportunity to run behind it, especially Paul Perkins.

If Perkins had been given more carries in the middle of the season when the offensive line was at its best, run blocking wise, perhaps he could’ve followed up his rookie season with another solid campaign and fans would still consider him part of the future.

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We need to think of Paul Perkins as part of the future regardless. It’s still too early in his career to give up on him. He’s a talented player and should get the chance to show it behind respectable blocking.

I’m not saying he’s going to win the starting job in 2018, but don’t give up on Paul Perkins just yet.