Tracking the 2017 Rookie Running Back Class: A Recap
This article is the recap of a series in which I use my Observational Rushing Numbers (ORNs) to shed light on just how good the 2017 rookie running backs were at carrying the ball. You can find each previous article about these numbers on the series’s hub.
Two months ago, I began writing up my findings after recording and analyzing every 2017 rookie running back’s (with at least 75 carries in 2017) Observational Rushing Numbers. With the conclusion of Tarik Cohen’s profile, the individual segment of this series is over. Now, let’s recap. Quickly, keep in mind that these stats are entirely predicated on a back’s rushing ability, and have nothing to do with the receiving game.
(I’ve taken these tracking stats from Weeks 1-14 for each rookie running back with at least 75 carries. If you’re wondering what any of the stats mean in a fuller sense, check the series glossary.)
Overall rankings, measured by RB Composite
Kareem Hunt and Dalvin Cook were on another level, compared to the rest of the class. Meanwhile, Elijah McGuire and Matt Breida were also in a tier of their own — but for the wrong reasons.
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Marlon Mack, Tarik Cohen, and Aaron Jones all turned in surprisingly nice final scores. The first two did so with excellent open-field play, while Jones was more well-rounded. On the other hand, Christian McCaffrey and Joe Mixon’s numbers were pretty bad, but there’s good reason to believe they’ll improve in 2018 and beyond.
Vision and Hole-hitting rankings, measured by Success Rate
Now we start to see why Mixon and McCaffrey’s stats looked so poor! The Bengal struggled both at hitting holes and at identifying them, while the Panther only had vision issues — but they were quite bad. As I highlighted in his profile, however, I feel good about McCaffrey turning that around in 2018 (and to a lesser extent, Mixon doing the same).
Mack is the next lowest finisher, with a Success Rate artificially deflated by his LeSean McCoy-esque running style. At the top now, we have Hunt, who (simply put) was good at everything.
Space running rankings, measured by Hit Generated Yards per Carry
Goodness, did Mack blow the rest of the class out of the water… but that comically high finish can also be attributed in part to a small-ish sample size. Similarly, Hunt was pretty nice, albeit with a misleadingly high mark, since his big plays happened to be much bigger than most backs’. McCaffrey’s low finish seems conspicuous, as well, but he’s sort of the opposite case to Hunt: His big plays were much smaller than those of the other backs, more due to luck than anything else.
Crowded running rankings, measured by Stuff Generated Yards per Carry
McCaffrey near the top of the class in running without space? Is that a typo? No, he just does the little things quite well. Fellow small running back Elijah McGuire didn’t do the small things quite as well. And while it’d be easy to write off 5’6” Tarik Cohen after a poor SGY/C finish himself, there are some background numbers to suggest he could actually be passable in this segment of the running game. Finally, Leonard Fournette’s below-average finish is pretty disappointing and surprising, but perhaps he gets a pass after shouldering such a taxing workload in 2017.
Run blocking rankings, measured by OL Composite
It is hard to overstate how good the Saints were at blocking for Kamara in 2017, especially in comparison to the rest of the rookie class. On the other end of the spectrum is Indianapolis, who thankfully, have taken steps to address that porous unit for the upcoming season.
As far as the teams in between go, I want to direct your attention to the team with the second-highest OL Composite. Turns out Saquon Barkley might be in for a fun rushing year! The same goes for Jones, Cook, and Hunt — the former had a nice line in 2017, while the other two units should see improvement from average performances last year.
Takeaways, ordered by RB Composite
- Kareem Hunt: The Toledo man began his 2017 campaign with the hottest of hot starts, but trailed off a bit deeper into the season. That was due in part to regression to the mean in his own play, and in part to a slumping offensive line — the slump caused primarily by the loss of Laurent Duvernay-Tardif. Looking ahead, LDT should hopefully start the 2018 season healthy. In conjunction with Pat Mahomes’s arrival, that means Hunt could enjoy an even better collective sophomore year.
- Dalvin Cook: Cook saw his rookie season cut disappointingly short by injury. In that quick span, he put up awesome stats in a smaller sample size… but those numbers were entirely sustainable, and his supplementary stats (which are less prone to small samples) back that up. The offensive line could quite possibly take a step forward, and Kirk Cousins should open that offense up a bit more, so let’s just cross our fingers that Cook stays on the field this season.
- Marlon Mack: The poster boy of this series, Mack put up terrific observational numbers despite an inconsistent workload and a horrendous offensive line. He is one of few NFL backs capable of making the tradeoff from consistency to greediness (in the form of bouncing carries and reversing fields) a net positive. Of course, his numbers should come down to Earth with a (hopefully) bigger set of carries in 2018, but it’d take a pretty (unrealistically) long fall for him to not be a force this season. Now, the offensive line is all that’s left to figure out.
- Alvin Kamara: The offensive line deserves the majority of the credit for an incredible 6.1 yards per carry mark in 2017 — but I said “the majority”, not “all” of it… it takes both a great OL and a great back to produce that well. Expect more of the same this season.
- Aaron Jones: If he gets a fair shake after suspension, Jones is the Packers running back to own. The “RB of modesty”, as I like to call him, does everything you could ask of a back. Perhaps Ty Montgomery rebounds in 2018 to his 2016 levels, but I’m not sure that’ll happen — the tracking stats from the last time he took the field weren’t great. In that case, Jones is easily the best guy toting the rock in the Green Bay backfield.
- Tarik Cohen: Amazingly enough, he can make stuff happen with space. He also has awesome vision, both at the line of scrimmage and in space. The last, and trickiest, piece of the puzzle for Cohen will be generating yardage without space. Write him off as a 5’6” back if you’d like, but I expect him to be legitimately good enough in that department in the future.
- Leonard Fournette: It’s hard to call a middling finish for a top-five NFL draft pick anything but disappointing. And, while you can chalk part of that up to fatigue from touching the ball almost 300 times in 13 games, that isn’t the entire cause of the considerable gap between him and the likes of Cook and Hunt. However, looking at things from a fantasy perspective, you should be seeing some improvement in his efficiency if his volume falls. If it doesn’t? You could get another season of over 100 yards from scrimmage per game. Not bad either way.
- Samaje Perine: Caught in the middle of Washington’s 2018 RB circus is Perine, a player I loved heading into the 2017 Draft, who put up quite the erratic first season. The flashes of both good and bad were plentiful, but the consistency wasn’t. He could be a legitimate plus as a running back if he puts everything together, but there’s no guarantee that he will — or that he’ll even be given much of a chance to prove himself either way.
- Wayne Gallman: Another one of my 2017 favorites, but I don’t have much hope left. Gallman couldn’t do anything in space; despite decent numbers, he didn’t really do anything without space either. Those two factors are 80% of the RB side of the rushing equation. That’s not good. Also, Saquon Barkley is now in that backfield… I don’t think any of this section matters anymore.
- Joe Mixon: I’ve hinted that at times, some guys got lucky or unlucky to wind up with their overall tracking numbers. But, Mixon got basically exactly what he had coming to him. So, unlike the next guy on this list, it will take a genuine progression in Mixon’s game in order for him to improve his tracking stats. Of course, he looked uncharacteristically bad in his 2017 tape (since when was his balance so poor?), so there is plenty of reason to expect him to step his game up. Will he? I don’t know. I do know that that offensive line doesn’t look great, but I also know that it’s quite hard for young backs with lots of perceived skill to lose value. He’s probably a solid hold at this point.
- Christian McCaffrey: If you asked me, of this entire group, what back would see his numbers rise the most in 2018, I’d choose McCaffrey. First, his vision was terrible in the beginning 2017 while adjusting to the NFL game, but spotless in the second half of his games after that period, resulting in a collectively bad Success Rate that should shoot up in 2018 (since he’s got that area figured out now). Second, assuming that he doesn’t get the short end of the stick again on big plays, his overall space numbers (HGY/C) should also rise from “not great” to “just fine”. Finally, he generated yardage as well as almost any back in crowded spaces (SGY/C), and despite what the #narratives will say, he is a totally legitimate back in that area. In other words, all the signs point to strong rushing performance in 2018. In the meantime, don’t let anyone tell you he’s not a real running back.
- D’Onta Foreman: His numbers were fine in 2017, but like Gallman, I’m not sure they matter that much heading forward. He ruptured his Achilles, which might be the single worst injury to be returning from, and thus means these numbers probably aren’t very representative of how he runs, post-injury, either. Even then, Lamar Miller is still there, and it’s hard to see Foreman’s previously-middling rushing talent overtaking Miller.
- Jamaal Williams: The best thing that can be said about Williams is that he didn’t have a single bottom-tier stat in his entire profile. Instead of having a couple terrible weaknesses, he was about the same level of “pretty weak” everywhere. Probably the last back on this list that can be put on the field without bleeding efficiency too much, Williams is only valuable in the case that Aaron Jones isn’t getting touches — either because he gets hurt or because he doesn’t get to reestablish himself.
- Elijah McGuire: McGuire was elite at shaking tacklers and finding holes, average at creating in space and taking what his offensive line gave him, and utterly terrible at everything else. On the surface, “average” in two of the three overarching rushing categories could be fine, in aggregate… but not when that third category was so bad. Look back at that SGY/C graph to see what I’m talking about.
- Matt Breida: Of the nine stats I place on a running back’s skill radar, here are those that Breida finished at least average in: Identification Rate (how often he found holes that the OL opened for him, which measures vision). That’s the end of the list. That’s one half of 20% (read: 10%) of the RB’s side of the overall rushing equation. Now, a couple caveats: This has nothing to do with the receiving game, which he could be just fine in, and it also doesn’t include Weeks 16 and 17, which were apparently two of his best. Still, in at least 14 of his 16 games, he offered virtually zero upside, and if he was better in those other two, one of them was against backups. I feel pretty confident in calling Matt Breida a bottom-tier ballcarrier.
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