Sun Sentinel Palm Beach Edition
No fantasy
Receiver puts injuries behind him, shows a new dedication
Receiver Parker sets sights on 1,000-yard season.
OXNARD, Calif. — DeVante Parker’s eyes started rolling the minute he heard the words “fantasy football.”
A member of the media was asking the Miami Dolphins’ receiver how much he’d heard from fans expecting him to have a breakthrough season, and requested stat projections, and Parker issued one warning.
“Don’t draft me,” Parker said when discussing the stats-driven game that engulfs the NFL and its fans.
Parker, a 2014 first-round pick who caught 56 passes for 744 yards and scored four touchdowns last season, isn’t saying he doesn’t intend to be a major contributor in Miami’s offense. And he doesn’t that new quarterback Jay Cutler seems to favor him because of Cutler’s preference for bigger targets.
In fact, Parker openly admitted he’s set his sights on producing his first 1,000-yard season since high school. The best he managed in his four seasons at Louisville was 855 yards on 55 catches as a junior. His senior season, he was on an eyeopening pace, producing 855 redeny
ceiving yards on 43 catches, but that production was only from six games because a foot injury cut his final college season short.
How achievable is getting to that 1,000-yard threshold?
“I think it’s very achievable with the quarterback we have. He slings it,” Parker said, referring to Jay Cutler, who replaced Ryan Tannehill as Miami’s starter a month ago after Tannehill opted to have season-ending ACL surgery last month. “He throws it to anyone. He likes to identify people down the field. If you have a 1-on-1 matchup he’s going to throw it to you.”
Parker openly admits that injuries have held him back in his first two NFL seasons, but he views concerns about his health — fragile history — as a thing of the past.
“In the past I waited too long to start working out again. This year I had in my mind I’d go home for a couple weeks and then come back and start right back at it,” said Parker, who began his offseason training at the facility in January.
Miami’s coaches point out he was the first player back in the team’s facility.
As a byproduct, this is Parker’s first offseason where an injury hasn’t slowed his development, or hindered the chemistry he was developing with the quarterbacks. That’s why Miami’s coaches and players expect big things from their 6-foot-3, 212-pound receiver, who spent a week learning from former Lions great Calvin Johnson during training camp.
Johnson taught Parker the finer points of coming in and out of his breaks, which should help Parker get open against press coverage. However, it doesn’t seem like his new quarterback plans to shy away from throwing to a covered Parker.
“As long as there’s just one [defender], the ball’s going up to him,” Cutler predicted of Parker, whom he labeled a faster Alshon Jeffrey, referring to the talented receiver he played numerous seasons with in Chicago. “He’s got a lot of range, back shoulder and over the top. He’s got great hands. Then, he can burn you up if you’re flatfooted.”
If there’s one player Adam Gase has been critical of during his tenure as the Dolphins’ head coach, it has been Parker.
Last season Gase routinely questioned Parker’s professionalism. Everything got discussed, from his sleeping habits, to his hydration levels.
Gase said he saw a similar growth process with Denver’s Pro Bowl receiver Demaryius Thomas during their early years together with the Broncos, and hoped Parker would eventually “get it.”
The goal was always to help the first-round pick become the player he had the potential to be, which is an alpha receiver, a playmaker like Thomas, who could be the driving force behind Miami’s aerial attack.
Parker’s position coach, Shawn Jefferson, challenged Parker to run better routes, which is why he encouraged Johnson, whom he coached in Detroit, to spend a week with the Dolphins during training camp.
Jefferson, who played for four NFL teams over 13 seasons, also taught Parker how to play through pain. He’s responded favorably, and now Jefferson’s predicting “a monster” season for this third-year pro.
A monster season the Dolphins hope will produce a ton of real points, not just fantasy ones.
“I think it’s very achievable with the quarterback we have. He slings it.” DeVante Parker ,onQB Jay Cutler, and Parker’s goal for a 1,000-yard season