Dominique Dafney
- Thread starter Gary-Waterloo
- Start date
Why? Him leaving, playing at Indiana State has lead to him being signed by Green Bay practice squad, then activated to the roster, and now seeing time on the field as a receiver for Aaron Rodgers. Things happen for a reason.
There used to be a poster or I guess I should say lurker on here named Dafney. They'd only like certain things, never post.
What are you saying? Great athlete, great attitude, great special teams player, but we wouldn't give him a WR opportunity or even a scholarship. So he left. It makes us look like idiots.
What a road for Dafney. Recruited as WR at Iowa, only impact was special teams.
Transferred to Indiana State, became all-MVFC at Fullback.
Gets into camp with the Colts at TE, then makes the Packers practice squad in October, catches a TD pass from HOFer Aaron Rodgers in January.
Congrats to Dominique! He earned it.
Transferred to Indiana State, became all-MVFC at Fullback.
Gets into camp with the Colts at TE, then makes the Packers practice squad in October, catches a TD pass from HOFer Aaron Rodgers in January.
Congrats to Dominique! He earned it.
Were the staff at Iowa Western where he was a backup seldom used WR before walking on at Iowa also “idiots”? Good for DD but I don’t understand how him transferring, packing on another 20-30 pounds to play fullback at Indiana State then making an NFL roster as a TE makes “us” look like idiots. Are you saying this is proof he should have seen the field at WR during his time at Iowa? Sure, I wish he would have stayed at Iowa and continue to do what he did, go from a 200 pound WR to a 245 FB. Congrats to him.
Watched him throughout his career as a WR at WDM Valley. Was a great HS player. Very happy for him that he has found success at the highest level. Great example of hard work and persistence paying off.
Agree that it wasn't exactly like Willies or countless others, but in many ways it was even more horrendous. We can say he didn't get a WR opportunity because of others, but let's remember that the WR room was extremely weak during most of his time at Iowa.
But the additional travesty is that while being a walk-on for several years, he was an outstanding special teams player and teammate. And then, for his last year, as a reward for his dedication and success, we flat refused to give him a scholarship. So he left. He was treated pathetically and stupidly.
I’m happy for the kid, but when you go back to the scholarship thing, there are only 85. Who got one that should have gone to Dafney? It’s always a tough call on those. He wasn’t the only senior walk-on not given a scholly.
Or he wasn’t good enough to see the field at the time, but he didn’t let that discourage him, and he kept working until he earned himself a spot with the right team.
He left to become a fullback at Indiana state to see the field. Maybe Iowa told him to do certain things and he didn’t, a la Derby. Played there for two years then didn’t get drafted. Signed and released by Indianapolis then Green Bay signed him fall, 2020 to their practice team. Got activated late in the season as a tight end and saw action the last two games. Iowa has 85 scholarships to hand out to players at certain positions. He wasn’t in the mix for one of those. But continue to say Iowa is the stupid idiot for not giving him one. I’ll reserve my judgment for who the idiot is.
Saying he was a fullback at Indiana State is a bit misleading. I believe he continued as a WR but about half way through the year they made him a wildcat running QB and ended up second on the team in rushing.
Yet from another post, he didn't "make it" elsewhere as a WR (fullback at IndSt and TE tryout for Colts). I guess I'd back off a bit, you're not making your point
I went to UNI game when they played Indy State and DD was running the wild cat offense when Indy State got into that formation. He is a big dude.
No, he apparently wasn't in the mix for one of those. And that's my point. Why not ? He had proven himself at Iowa as a "player" and a high level contributor. If WR wasn't the right position, why was he not switched as 2 other teams have done?
The 85 limit can't used as an excuse to not do the right thing, both for the kid and the program. Good roster management finds a way. I challenge you to name even one walk-on player during the KF regime
who had contributed as much prior to his last year but wasn't given even a 1 year scholarship.
Regarding scholarship players in general, there hasn't been a roster, including the current one, where 6-8
awards could have been pre-identified as poor choices. In fact the year Dafney left, there were 2 fifth- year scholarship players who weren't good enough to get on the field in their final game.
Dude, I would recommend not getting upset about stuff like this, makes life more fun. He wasn't treated pathetically. This is more of a story about the perseverance of a player than Iowa staff being idiots. Iowa has lots of examples of lightly recruited and/or walk ons undergoing position changes who end up making it in the NFL. No one forecast Daffney ever being in the NFL. He took the long, hard road. All the credit goes to him. It's a great story, just celebrate it.
Dafney knocking the Bears KR on his butt looks like something I've seen at Kinnick.
He has one TD catch and has been activated for 2 games. Great for him, but it's not like he's stuck in the league yet
And MUCH bigger than he was while at Iowa. Pretty amazing how he has transformed his body. It's not very often that you see a WR get that much bigger and convert to TE -- and excel in the NFL. I actually didn't believe it was him at first because he was so huge. Wondered if it might have been someone else by the same last name. Then saw his face and it was obviously him. But dude's body doesn't even resemble the way he looked as a WR. Impressive transformation, and it allowed him to find a roster spot. Good for him.
I’m not a football player anymore (was mediocre in HS), but across life in general, some of my most valuable life lessons have come from events that didn’t work out the way I wanted them to. In some cases, I didn’t work hard enough or wasn’t good enough for what it was I wanted. In other cases, I had to respond to feedback from others, even if I disagreed.
A personal example - my oldest got cut from his HS JV baseball team freshman year. He was really disappointed, but he used the sting of rejection + the free time by not being on the team in-season to hit the weight room and continue to throw and he added 45 pounds in a year and 10 mph to his fastball. He then made it as a sophomore - not because they were idiots and treated him poorly as a freshman, but because he made himself better.
This is what’s lost when I hear complaints about players who were great, but didn’t play as early as some people would have preferred. I’m sure if you got with coaches over a beer, they’d point back to some mistakes, but the successful guys you see are not always the same guys they were a year prior when they were smaller, lighter, less experienced. Sometimes you put a guy in at the right time.
Add in some guys are late bloomers, grow up, and fill out at a different time line than other players that come in and are already developed to the max.
Basically what I am seeing is Aaron Rodger is throwing to....
- An UDFA player who was a WR turned FB turned TE from the Missouri Valley
- Another UDFA TE from the Missouri Valley
- And yet another UDFA WR from a crappy school who don't even know their school colors
It certainly can’t be because Rodgers is an all-timer. It has to be because Iowa underutilized Dafney.
BirdistheWord
HR Heisman
Kind of an anomaly as a switch to TE would have been a dead end as he would have been behind George Kittle and Noah Fant, plus THock was en route.
Sometimes you have to change organizations to find more upward mobility.
Sometimes you have to change organizations to find more upward mobility.
Here's an article from the Packer's website about Dafney.
www.packers.com
Dominique Dafney’s emergence embodies ‘the beauty of this game’
Undrafted rookie has come out of nowhere to play key spot in Packers’ offense
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