You can just see how much Jon Gruden loves watching Taysom Hill play. Two football guys. pic.twitter.com/IW7IcMaMeV
— Field Yates (@FieldYates) September 19, 2020
Las Vegas Raiders coach Jon Gruden just loves football, man. When previewing his team’s Week 2 matchup, Gruden waxed poetic on New Orleans Saints backup quarterback Taysom Hill as the epitome of a position-less “football player” who puts as much enthusiasm into the game as Gruden feels himself.
“I don’t remember a quarterback who can throw and run read options, and then line up at tight end,” Gruden said, grinning. “This guy’s a weapon, he’s a special teams demon, he can be the personal protector on the punt team. He’s a great football player.”
Hill lined up at ten different spots in 2019 (up from nine positions in 2018) and caught the first pass thrown in the 2020 season for a 14-yard gain. And Gruden is right to point out Hill’s proficiency in the kicking game, even if his snaps count fell to just 12 plays after he averaged 23 special teams snaps per game in 2019 (not counting the games Drew Brees missed to injury, totaling 31 snaps in those five contests).
Beyond his own stats on returning kickoffs (with a career average of 24.0 yards per return, and a personal-best of 47 yards), Hill has blocked a pair of punts against the division-rival Tampa Bay Buccaneers (in 2018) and Atlanta Falcons (in 2019) while collecting 13 combined tackles in the kicking game. He’s a force, and the Saints clearly want to keep him in positions to thrive. And that’s keeping Gruden’s attention.
“You know a lot of guys call it, ‘He’s a football player?'” Gruden continued, pantomiming quotation marks. “This guy’s a ‘football player.’ He can play anywhere on the ‘football’ field. And you gotta be aware of No. 7, because he can ruin the game. And they have a great package to keep us off his scent. You know you just can’t prepare for him, [you have to prepare] for anything. He’s just a ‘football player.'”
We’ll see what sort of heroics Hill has in store for Gruden’s Raiders very soon. In Week 1, he ran three times to pick up 13 yards on the ground and connected with Alvin Kamara on a 38-yard completion, in addition to his opening-drive 14-yard reception. He’s already padding out his impressive highlight reel, and from the sound of it, Gruden is as eager to see the finished product as anyone else.
