Rashaad Penny Pushes for NFL Rushing Record in SI’s ‘100 Bold Predictions’

A big-time performance incoming from Carolina Panthers RB Rashaad Penny?

Kyle Terada-USA TODAY Sports

Chuba Hubbard enters the 2024 season as the favorite to be the lead back in Carolina, but head coach Dave Canales has made it clear that they're going to utilize all five of their running backs assuming they're healthy.

Hubbard and Sanders will carry the load until rookie Jonathon Brooks makes his way completely back from rehabbing his knee. Raheem Blackshear will have a small role in the offense, but will likely be utilized on special teams as a returner. And then you have Rashaad Penny, the latest addition to the RB room. He's a big, physical back that can be a short-yardage specialist.

Could he be more than just a third down back, though? Absolutely. He's battled through numerous injuries in his career but when he was healthy in Seattle, he averaged 5.6 yards per carry. In Conor Orr's annual 100 bold predictions piece on Sports Illustrated, he sees Penny coming close to setting an NFL rushing record.

"I remember vividly a season-ending 2003 Browns game in which Lee Suggs had an incredibly random 186 yards and two touchdowns—only to be upstaged in ’09 by Jerome Harrison, who had an equally random 286-yard game toward the end of the season (he actually rushed for 561 yards and five touchdowns over the course of three weeks). This year, our random incredible rushing performance is going to come from Panthers rotational back Rashaad Penny, who will eclipse Jamaal Charles’s 259-yard performance against the Broncos in ’10 and place himself eighth all time onthe single-game rushing record list."

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