Emanuel Hall tries not to read many media reports about the Missouri football team, but he couldn’t help but notice the one criticism of his game that kept surfacing during the past two seasons. Hall kept hearing that he was a one-dimensional receiver, that all he can do is run deep.
The senior understands why he developed that reputation. He admitted that under former offensive coordinator Josh Heupel, he “literally only went into the game” to run post and go routes. But he believes he is capable of executing a variety of short and intermediate routes as well. He is eager to show fans that this season in Derek Dooley’s more complex offensive scheme.
“I’m really excited for this year to kind of show people what I can do as a full receiver and what I can really do ability wise,” Hall said Friday, after the Tigers’ first practice of preseason camp.
During his freshman season, Hall said he ran more than just deep routes. But due to his straight-line speed, the coaches quickly realized going long was his best attribute. When Heupel took over as offensive coordinator, he asked Hall to focus all of his attention on that one skill. As Hall said Friday, the coaches last season “were telling me to just run deep, and I was like, if I can run deep and beat somebody, why would I run a slant?”
This offseason, however, the team needed Hall to expand his route-running ability for two reasons. J’Mon Moore, the Tigers’ leading receiver each of the past two years, graduated, and Missouri lacks an obvious replacement. Only three returning wideouts tallied 100 yards on the season last year. Plus, Dooley is seeking to make the offense more methodical and less predictable.
For example, last year, Hall began almost every play on the right side of the formation, split out almost all the way to the sideline. This year, he’s prepared to line up in a variety of spots, depending on the formation.
“We’re all over the place,” Hall said of the wide receivers. “There’s no set spot where you are. … I think we’re really diverse in what we’re doing right now, so it’s not really one set thing, it’s a lot of different things.”
When he first began running shorter routes this offseason, Hall said he was rusty. His hips weren’t used to the sharp changes of direction, so he felt off-balance. He said it took about a month to get comfortable with the entire route tree. He’ll face another adjustment once the games begin: consistently catching the ball in traffic when he runs across the middle of the field. Hall said his rapport with quarterback Drew Lock will make doing so easier.
“You have to trust where you’re quarterback’s putting it,” Hall said. “At the end of the day, it’s football — you’re going to get hit, so you might as well catch it.”
Hall will likely still run plenty of deep routes this season. It’s clearly his strong suit, as throwing downfield is for Lock. But he’s excited for the opportunity to do things he hasn’t done on a football field since high school. He has one specific thing in mind.
“I really want to take a slant like 70 yards,” Hall said. “That’s one of my big goals this year.”
“Honestly, if you catch it across the middle and you take it all the way, it’s probably one of the best plays you can do in football.”
