Coachspeak: White on Boston College’s Dillon
GREEN BAY, Wis. – A few numbers about A.J. Dillon stick out like the sore thumb (and sore abdominals and sore shoulders and, well, sore everything) he inflicted on opponents during three hard-charging seasons at Boston College.
From 2017 through 2019, he topped 1,100-plus rushing yards in each season.
In 2019, he recorded career highs of 1,685 rushing yards and 15 total touchdowns.
He did that despite running into loaded boxes 44 percent of the time, according to Sports Info Solutions. Of the five backs drafted before Dillon, Georgia’s D’Andre Swift was a distant second at 21 percent.
Here’s another number that stands out about the Green Bay Packers’ second-round pick: In 35 career games, Dillon averaged 24.1 carries per game. How did he do it? How did he miss only two games due to injury in his career despite the heavy workload? How did he keep himself ready week after week after week?
“He understands that he’s going to have to keep his weight where it needs to be. He’s very conscious of that,” said Brian White, his running backs coach at Boston College and now the running backs coach at Colorado State. “He had 5 percent body fat, so I’d say he knows how to take care of his body really well. It was incredible. He came in lean at 10 or 11 percent and worked with our strength and conditioning coaches to get down to 5 percent, which is just insane.”
