From TE to Tackle Ja'wuan James' Journey

[gafin]

Growing up, James modeled himself after former Falcons tight end Alge Crumpler and pursued the dream of playing the position all through 8th, 9th, and 10th grade. However, entering his junior year, James began to realize that didn’t have the speed or the hands to play the tight end position, as did his coach, and that’s when the two decided to try something different.

“Just watching Ja’Wuan in practice it was apparent that anything that he really wanted to be, he would have been good at it,” said Allen. ”Being a gigantor like he is, we didn’t really close our tight end much, so watching him move around there and seeing him play in space we thought lets try him out at tackle and see how good he is. After about two days of that it was apparent that JJ could play the tackle position and could really excel at it.”

“We used to put him out in screens a lot, and I guess it was the second day we threw a little wide receiver screen at him and I told him to set and go block the corner,” said Allen. ”Just watching him move out there, it was very natural to him. He has great feet, he has great body balance, and it doesn’t surprise me that he’s really, really good at setting up on linebackers and secondary players.”

http://www.thefinsiders.com/blog/2014/jawuan-james-journey-to-tackle

 

[royalshank]

The TE to T thing usually scares me off -good to read this transition was in HS and not like junior year of college.

 

[Dolfan Dave]

The TE to T thing usually scares me off -good to read this transition was in HS and not like junior year of college.

So you must be really scared about Tannehill

 

[royalshank]

No it just seems the guys who go from TE to T late in their college careers, or even as they enter the NFL are a bit too undersized to really "make it" at the new position.