Elijah Holyfield

Elijah Holyfield, RB, UGA: Holyfield currently has an ADP in the early 30s. Meaning in a standard league he is getting taken in the beginning of the 3rd round of a startup devy draft or, if you are in a current devy league that allows more than 1 round of devy players, there is a good chance he is going much earlier than the third round. In a recent startup, that allowed 2 copies of each player, I selected Holyfield at the top of the second round at 2.02 and the second copy of Holyfield went at 2.09. I am slightly higher on Holyfield than his ADP in the early 30s. Holyfield has been slowly creeping up the draft board this summer. In July, on DLF, he went undrafted in one of their ADP devy drafts, which is about 50 picks. So his perceived value has definitely increased and I think it's going to skyrocket sooner rather than later for several reasons. This may be your only time to buy Holyfield at a decent price before he catapults to the top of the devy rankings.

The University of Georgia has begun to build a track record for running a backs in the NFL in recent years: Knowshon Moreno, Todd Gurley, Keith Marshall and they still have Nick Chubb and Sony Michel who are most likely going to get their chance in the NFL in the next year or two. This type of NFL pipeline is the type of things devy owners look for. It is one strategy that occurs more often than not in bigger devy drafts. Once you are outside of the group of well known names, devy owners then begin to take the future Alabama starting running back, starting wide out and if it's IDP devy you might as well throw in the Alabama linebacker. This trend happens for other colleges as well such as Oregon, Ohio State, Clemson, etc. for various positions. The Georgia running back is going to take this same path. Devy owners are going to link the starting running back position at Georgia to a top 5 fantasy rookie draft pick because that's where Gurley went and in all likelihood that is where Chubb will end up as well.

On top of this, Holyfield has a chance to shine this season as a freshman. Chubb and Michel have been hurt and the latter is going to miss time early in the season. Thus, giving Holyfield a chance for significant playing time when otherwise he probably wouldn't have played much. Chubb probably will be back in time for the season opener but will most likely be worked back into a full workload. Georgia actually has a pretty tough schedule out of the gate. I could see a scenario if the outcome of the game is determined then Holyfield will take over for Chubb. Also, week 2 Georgia plays Nicholls State?? So, Holyfield will probably play in that game. If Holyfield has a couple decent games before his injured teammates fully return to where they were last season than his price in the devy community will jump because he would have shown the ability to be the guy for Georgia next season. Plus, if he plays well I'm sure the Georgia coaching staff will find a way to give him the ball.

For those who haven't heard of or seen Holyfield play yet he is a physical downhill runner. He also is a good pass catcher out of the backfield. These two traits mixed together typically mean a running back who isn't going to come off of the field. I have seen Holyfield being compared to a couple of Christine Michael and Marshawn Lynch. Here are some high school highlights on Elijah. http://youtu.be/4z1VyV8UoYs Holyfield also has great vision and feet. There are a couple videos floating around on Twitter of Chubb and Holyfield working out at Georgia practices and you can see Holyfield #13 participate in drills right next to Chubb for comparison.

Holyfield is my top running back for the 2019 draft class.