As a follow-up to my article on the fantasy prospects of RBs of a certain age and draft position, I’ve taken the data in that article’s charts and cross-referenced it with this year’s RB picks. My piece was a follow-up on Russell Clay’s interesting article on running back and wide receiver draft position and the “probability” of fantasy success. He defined RB “success” as over 1000 yards from scrimmage (YFS). I’ve stuck with that success metric.
Here’s the chart for this year’s RB draft class:
The first four columns are the basic data about the player: name; the team that drafted him; what round he was taken, and his “draft age”.1
The next nine columns are the number of seasons RBs in the previous study gained 1000+ YFS. The percentages in those columns tell us how frequently RBs of the same age and draft round from 2000-2018 met the 1000+ YFS criteria. For example, Josh Jacobs is compared to all 1st rounders with a draft age of 21: 84.2% of all those comparables drafted in that period had at least one 1000 YFS season; 63.2% had at least two such years, etc.
The “Zero” row is the percentage of backs at a given draft age who NEVER (or not yet, for RBs taken recently), gained 1000 YFS in a season. Logically, you could figure this out by subtracting the “1” column percentage from 100%, but I think it’s more telling to actually see the percentage broken out separately.
The chart is sorted by the percentages in the “1 Season” column, then draft round and actual draft pick.
The table includes players like Cullen Gillaspia and Chandler Cox who were drafted as fullbacks and therefore even less likely to get to 1000 YFS than the table gives them credit for. And due to the quirks of how draft age is calculated, Darrell Henderson is considered 22-years-old while Alexander Mattison is 21, but Henderson is only just three weeks older. His birthday just falls on the wrong side of the September 1st cut off while Mattison has a September DOB and therefore “looks” younger.
Note that NO backs taken this draft have more than a 50% “chance” of even getting ONE year of 1000+ YFS EXCEPT Jacobs. Jacobs, if we only consider his draft round and age, is more “likely” to gain 1000+ YFS in THREE seasons than any other RB is to meet that threshold in just one year.
Of course, Jacobs is no lock to be a successful NFL RB. I have reservations about his athleticism (for obvious reasons he’s compared to Marshawn Lynch – Lynch’s 40-time was 4.48 seconds at the Combine vs. Jacobs’ 4.60 at his Pro Day, which probably inflates it). But as a first round pick, Jacobs is almost certain to get enough opportunity (Carries and Targets) to break 1000+ YFS at least once. So did Trent Richardson.
Which is to say that this table doesn’t reflect true “probabilities.” I’d use it to create a crude ranking based on some objective data, which themselves have some statistical limitations, and then look at more subjective criteria. Damien Harris is in a notably hard environment to predict RB success. Justice Hill is in an offense that looks to have a lot of RB carries again. Tony Pollard is behind Ezekiel Elliott with Dak Prescott in a Jason Garrett offense; Darwin Thompson is behind Damien Williams with Patrick Mahomes in an Andy Reid offense. And if you own James Connor in a dynasty league, you’d probably want to get Benny Snell sooner than Devin Singletary.
But the other side of the coin is this: don’t lose your head over a rookie RB, especially after Jacobs on the chart (and despite my reservations, I’d still take him over any other rookie RB if I had to pick a rookie RB). Most drafted backs don’t succeed, even third round picks. Not to mention RBs like Philip Lindsay and Arian Foster, who emerge from the undrafted ranks to outperform drafted RBs.
1 “Draft age” in this study is the age the player was at the start of the season (September 1st) in the year he was drafted. I’m following the Pro Football Reference convention here, which was also my source for the draft picks and rounds taken. It’s surprisingly hard to find out the age of these RBs. Of the 25 backs drafted this year, Pro Football Reference’s Draft Finder only lists the draft age for seven of them. I had to dig up the other 18 from various sources, including ROTOWORLD, PlayerProfiler.com and other sources. For Ryquell Armstead, I inferred from this article he’ll be 22 this September. Sources conflict on whether Rodney is 22 or 23. So there may be an error or two in the chart.
