Sun Sentinel Palm Beach Edition
Grant’s signature — fast
Receiver blazes from outside now, not the slot
DAVIE — Life is a curiosity. The best player of this Dolphins decade, Cameron Wake, wasn’t drafted. The most productive runner of this NFL generation, Frank Gore, came close to never playing professionally due to injury.
And the smallest player in the NFL was once the tallest in his class.
“I was taller than everyone starting middle school,’’ 5-foot-6 Jakeem Grant said.
Grant, the fastest Dolphin, wasn’t even fast at that point in his life.
“I woke up one day in high school, and suddenly I was fast,’’ Grant said. “It was like magic. I went from not being all that fast to being the fastest runner in Texas [high schools]. I didn’t get a growth spurt in height, but God gave me one in speed.
He chuckles. “I’m OK with that.’’
All this is to say what they never say in sports: You never know how things turn out. Sometimes they just cross their fingers and hope for the best. A year ago, Dolphins coach Adam
Gase told receiver Grant he was no longer an inside, slot receiver anymore.
He’d line up outside.
“OK, coach, great,’’ Grant said.
But now the truth can be told. Grant was worried. He’d never played outside receiver. He’d been a slot receiver all his football life, going back through college and high school, and the two positions are similar like the French and Spanish languages are similar.
“I didn’t really know how this was going to turn out,’’ he said.
It’s turned out fine. Grant began proving it at the end of last season and has kept proving it through the start of this one. He’s not just a return specialist, the way it appeared when he was drafted in the sixth round two years ago.
He’s got a hint of danger to him, too. You don’t have to ask him. Ask the cornerbacks opposite him. Look at how they’re playing six, eight, 10 yards off him at the line of scrimmage in respect of him running deep on them.
“I like when they come down and play in my face sometimes, just for fun, just to let them know I could go over the top,’’ he said. “But that isn’t happening a lot. Just once or twice against the Jets.”
Speed and versatility are the signatures of this Dolphins offense. Grant has seven catches for 65 yards through two games. That’s right in line with the rest of the receivers. As telling, Grant and Albert Wilson have an deal where anyone tackled in the open field has to throw $100 in a fine box.
Neither has paid anything yet. Wilson even juked by Jets cornerback Buster Skrine in the open field, so by Grant’s figuring, “He’s one up on me.”
It was interesting Gase decided to keep 6-3 DeVante Parker sitting an extra week even when healthy. He said there enough playmakers out there. This offense needs to put up more points — needs to create more, rather than just take what their defense has set up for them.
But you want to talk speed? Kenny Stills is one of the league’s proven deep threats. Kenyan Drake has a rare gear for a running back. Wilson was out-racing kids five years older than him
growing up. And then there’s Grant.
“I’m definitely the fastest,’’ he said. “There’s some good competition. But let’s be real. I’m the fastest.
Kenny, Albert, Kenyan — they can race and when they’re done, the winner can come and get beat by me.”
The pre-draft times don’t decide everything. Grant and Stills had equal 4.38-second times in the 40. Wilson was at 4.43 and Drake at 4.45. But the point stands about the Dolphins being built on speed.
So does the one about life being a curiosity. Grant only started in football because he was a stand-out at in-line skating. He raced for the Texas Flyers, who had black skates with lime rollers. After practice, they’d play a game of keep-away, and no one could catch Grant.
“My mom saw that one day and said I should play football,’’ he said. “She went and signed me up.”
That’s when he was big. And before he got fast. And long before he moved from being an inside, slot receiver to outside with the Dolphins.