Joe Lepsis often found himself doing quite a lot of convincing. It infuriated him. These college coaches should be convincing him, convincing his star running back, Eno Benjamin, that their school offers more than all others around the country.
Instead, Lepsis repeatedly pleaded with recruiters who journeyed to Wylie East High School, insisting they shouldn’t harp over Benjamin’s height and 40-time. At the next level, he told them, it wouldn’t matter.
Lepsis words often fell on deaf ears. No matter, he spun it into a a lesson for his gifted tailback.
“He wasn’t going to be 6-2, 220(-pounds) and run a 10.4(-second) 100(-meter dash) in high school,” Lepsis, Benjamin’s coach at Wylie East, said. “We used to talk about that and say, ‘What are the things you can do to be special?’ A lot of that was blocking, pass-catching and understanding blocking schemes.”
In other words, the little things.
Ah, the little things. The minute details of the position that don’t matter when you have three inches and 30 pounds on everyone trying to tackle you. That aren’t necessary when you can outrun a cheetah at 18. Or lift a truck before you can drive.
Benjamin, however, wasn’t privy to a genetic boost that allows kids to dominate youth and high school sports. But he still wanted to dominate, to be the best, to eventually reach the NFL.
“He always knew this is what he wanted to do and he’s prepared himself since he was young to be where he’s at and, I think, where he’s going,” Lepsis said.
Benjamin set goals at an early age. But they weren’t goals, it was more of a plan. Goals are things people want to obtain -- they get a piece of paper and write down, I want to play DI college football, I want to play in the NFL, etc.
He always had perspective. Writing something down wasn't going to make it come true. He wasn’t going to grow to over 6-feet, or run a 4.3-40. He wasn’t going to be an NFL star by trying to be an NFL star the way everyone else did.
He needed to separate himself by doing all the little things to perfection. He wasn’t going to be the biggest, strongest or fasting running back. But he could be the smartest.
“That’s one thing I take pride in,” Benjamin said. “(In the NFL), everyone's the same. If you’re there and you’re getting paid, you’re a baller. When it gets to that point, it’s going to be the little things like watching film day in and day out.”
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Lepsis brother, Matt, was a tackle for the Denver Broncos for a decade, blocking for five different, and seven total, 1,000-yard rushers in his career. Lepsis couldn’t believe it. It seemed like the Broncos could pull someone from the stands and get 1,000 yards out of them.
One day, he asked his brother who the Broncos’ running backs coach was. Matt chuckled.
“Our O-line coach,” he said, referring to former Broncos’ O-line coach Alex Gibbs, who became renowned for popularizing the zone blocking scheme.
“I said, ‘What do you mean?’” Lepsis recalled. “And he said, ‘Well, our running backs, they’re in meetings with us.’ I said, ‘Really?’ He’s said, ‘Yeah, that’s a whole nother level of being a running back is knowing exactly what that offensive scheme. Nobody knows where the running back is supposed to hit in that blocking scheme than the O-line coach.’”
Lepsis evolved his team around his new-found principle. He made his running backs coach an extension of the offensive line coach and made sure his tailbacks, like Benjamin, were sitting in on O-line meetings, just as they did in Denver.
Most did just that, though. They sat, tuned out and confused -- as if they were learning French in a Spanish class. Benjamin took it as a new edge over everyone else, a way past his perceived limitations. And, being curious as he is, he asked questions, in constant communication with Wylie East’s running backs coach Matt Tietjen.
“I had to find another advantage to get ahead of my opponents,” Benjamin said. “(The first time I went into the O-line room) it was like, ‘What is happening?’ Now, I feel like I’ve come a long way. Now, I can see it on the field and be like, ‘Cohl (Cabral) and Alex (Losoya), Let’s do this.’”
Since arriving in Tempe in 2017, Benjamin’s grasp of the offensive line and blocking schemes have drastically ascended, catapulting him to the Arizona State single-season rushing record after a 1,642-yard sophomore season.
Months before his historic campaign began, during spring practices, then-running backs coach John Simon knew Benjamin didn’t need to hear about the Devils’ base concepts for the hundredth time. So he sent the Texas native to the adjacent room to learn from the offensive linemen.
“If you understand what they’re doing, then and only then can you be successful,” Simon said in October. “The first part was for him to learn what they’re doing. Now he knows the assignments, now he’s looking at how they do it and how his track helps them.”
Then Simon pointed out why Benjamin is different than just about every other running back, even those who do venture into film sessions with their blockers.
“A lot of running backs are just so naturally gifted … that they don’t feel like they have to study and learn all the little things,” Simon, a two-year NFL vet who is now coaching at Memphis said. “At some point, your talent only takes you so far and then it’s your details and your character and your focus and your determination that will determine how successful you are in the end.”
Earlier than most, Benjamin became aware of that. And because of that, his future is brighter than most.
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Shaun Aguano wasn’t exactly sure what to expect. Sure, he watched Benjamin’s record-setting season from afar while the coach of Chandler High School. But now he was coaching him, inheriting the junior after replacing Simon.
What surprised him the most about Benjamin?
“He’s a student of the game,” Aguano said. “The ability to attack the week based upon his knowledge of the game and then he takes every advantage of sitting in on films. That makes him more dangerous than ever. He gives himself an advantage.”
It shows. Benjamin developed such a tight rapport with his offensive line and coaches over his first two seasons that now, he’s making reads on the field, talking with the offensive line pre-snap and able to adjust with them mid-game.
At first, it was a one-way conversation. Benjamin would ask his linemen a question, then another, then five more. He was inquisitive, eager to grasp the group’s concepts. Fast forward to his junior year, he has such a hold over what’s happening, his linemen will turn to him for questions.
“Instead of coming in and asking questions, now he’s coming in and being able to diagnose it with us,” Cabral said. “He’s getting the full breakdown of what we’re doing and when he takes that into the (running backs) room, he can go back and look at his notes from our meeting … and put it all together.”
Aguano called Benjamin, who just today was named of the team's five captains, “the leader of the offensive line.” Again, he’s a running back. But just as Lepsis preached to him years ago, the running back is just an extension of the offensive line. Now he didn’t say leader but, hey, Benjamin always wants to go further.
“He’s definitely way above the curve on that,” ASU offensive coordinator Rob Likens said. “If you ever see me and Eno talking (on the practice field), it’s usually something about the defensive structure, how we’re blocking a particular play, what he sees. He’s really good at making adjustments.”
Though he has a knack for making linebackers look like their feet got stuck in glue or spinning around a safety as if someone in the stands is pressing the “B” button on their voodoo video-game controller, so much of Benjamin’s success is predicated on his notes and film session and general curiosity to know everything.
For all his heroics against the defense’s second and third level, there was a breakthrough the line to start it all. And Benjamin has a lot of breaks, so many that it often seems he was given the answers to the test.
Or, perhaps, he just wasn’t cramming at the last second.
“He studies his exit points. He studies (where to put his) shoulder and what his slip move is going to be. Those are not by accident. Those are planned.
“I think, from a coaching standpoint, I sit back and am amazed by how he prepares himself.”
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