The 2016 season is going to be the final year of Chargers wide receiver Keenan Allen’s rookie contract. The good news for Bolts fans is it will not be his final year in a San Diego uniform.
Allen and the Chargers have agreed to a 4-year contract extension that will run through the 2020 season. The deal is reportedly worth an average of $11 million a year. It is unknown how much money is guaranteed.
For the first half of the 2015 NFL season Chargers wide receiver Keenan Allen was borderline unstoppable. He has 67 catches for 725 yards and four touchdowns in less than eight games but Allen’s season was cut short by an injury on a touchdown grab against the Ravens on November 1 in Baltimore. He has been participating in Organized Team Activities and says the lacerated kidney he suffered is fully healed.
Allen was a 3rd round pick of the Chargers in 2013 and was arguably the best rookie in the NFL, rolling up 1,046 receiving yards with eight touchdown catches.
In 2014 Allen was a known commodity and opposing defensive coordinators started game-planning to shut him down and his numbers dropped. Allen had just 783 yards and four scores as a sophomore and admitted he needed to change the way he prepared for playing football.
Keenan made dietary alterations and doubled his efforts and the results were immediate. He was on a pace to challenge the NFL’s record for receptions in a season before the injury. If he stays healthy his quarterback is among the guys who think Allen can be one of the best wideouts in the game.
“Everything comes easy for him,” said Philip Rivers. “He doesn’t need to study. All the stuff, I tell him one time and I never have to tell him again. Two years ago I think he realized; Wait a minute, the corners in the league are going to be following me around? I’m not just going to line up and get the right corner or the left corner. It’s going to take an even added commitment to do it. Not that he was slacking, but I think he’s figuring that out.”
Allen will have Rivers throwing him the ball for at least three more years, and now he has the defense stretching ability of Travis Benjamin on the other side of the field and Offensive Coordinator Ken Whisenhunt back calling plays (Coach Whis was the coordinator for Allen’s rookie year).
All those factors together could mean another record-setting season, only this time one he’ll actually get to finish.
