Should You Be Concerned About Alvin Kamara’s Dynasty Value?
Alvin Kamara might not exactly be the best running back in the NFL, but he’s the most impossible to tackle, offering a level of dominance after contact you’d expect from a tight end like Rob Gronkowski. He’s been one of the New Orleans Saints’ more critical pieces during their last three seasons, which seems like a rarity for a position as replaceable as running backs have become.
In 2019, Kamara got off to a hot start in his first six games before leg injuries forced him to miss the next three. After then, his per-game total from yards from scrimmage declined, as he clearly wasn’t the same player in the second half of the year (that, of course, is natural when dealing with these kinds of injuries). Still, it was enough to help him make his third consecutive Pro Bowl, making him the only running back drafted in the 2010s to do that in each of his first three seasons.
Despite the injury, Kamara still had a successful year in fantasy, putting up 797 yards and five touchdowns on the ground while adding 81 receptions for 533 receiving yards and a touchdown in the air. This allowed him to collect 167.52 fantasy points on the FantasyData metrics, 56th among all players and 16th most among all running backs. It’s difficult to imagine his totals wouldn’t be way higher if he was playing healthier, and he was on pace for at least 1,500 yards from scrimmage (something he had accomplished in both of his first two seasons).
Not that you were, but if you’re concerned about Kamara’s dynasty value going forward, you shouldn’t be. I’ll acknowledge that there’s always a goldmine of productive running backs so it’s easy for teams to move on from the ones they have after their rookie contracts go up in smoke, but even then Kamara should see a big role in the Saints offense or on another team in the near future. I don’t expect teams to let him sit and wait in free agency.
But that’s for another conversation. Ultimately, let’s go through the best of a “down year” for Kamara, illustrating what makes him so enticing to watch and go after in dynasty leagues; his tackle-breaking ability.
At the start of this piece, I mentioned that I feel that Alvin Kamara is the Rob Gronkowski of running backs. He’s a unique player at the position in how he’s able to shed tackles, bounce off them, and constantly churn and create loads of yardage after contact. He’s not exactly the fastest back in the NFL, but the level of power and the pad level he runs on has helped out a Saints offense that uses him in all sorts of clever ways.
Here, he’s merely used as a dump-off option for Drew Brees on a first and 17, bouncing off a tackler behind the line of scrimmage before running into a pile at the line. He uses this vantage point to lure Bobby Wagner (#54) before cutting back outside, creating room down the sideline. He slides through Wagner’s tackling efforts and picks up an improbable first down on one of his finest plays of the season, if not his career.
Beyond this, Kamara has been employed as a wideout quite frequently in Sean Payton’s offense. Last year, Rotowire had him as a wideout on 58 snaps and in the slot on 46 of those plays despite receiving more limited snaps as he was nursing wounds in the second half of 2019. In comparison, a guy like Christian McCaffrey was a wideout for 38 snaps and in the slot for 58 snaps in 2019, and that was when he was fully healthy for 16 games.
Either way, he’s a juggernaut that just knows how to break tackles. Pro Football Reference had him with 29 broken tackles on runs in 2019, tied for third-most in the league. Plus, he also had ten broken tackles as a receiver, tied for the fifth-most among all players in the air.
Kamara’s rate of broken tackles is so impressive that despite playing in fewer games and starts, he finished with eight more broken tackles on the ground in 2019 than he did in 2018, and three more in the air. And like previous seasons he was doing so by running through gaps and defenders in ways you could not imagine from most players at the position.
Kamara also runs at a pretty consistent pace, with not much in terms of an increase of acceleration or sparing usage of it. But that’s perfectly fine because he also has excellent vision and is essentially flubber to defenses, so that evens the playing field out.
For such a tank at the position, Kamara is also shifty and elusive, as shown on plays like this. He runs against the Cowboys like he’s impatiently waiting in line at the DMV, and without anyone having the convenience of stopping him too! He plays at such a pad level and at such power where there’s no way you could bring him down upon first impact. It’s gonna take way more than that.
On an offense where Michael Thomas won Offensive Player of the Year in 2019, Alvin Kamara stands as one of the more impactful running backs in the NFL (if that’s even such a thing anymore). His combined usage as a wideout and in the slot with his sheer dominance in the backfield on the ground and in the air makes him among the more versatile backs in the league. Time is running out for the Saints’ Super Bowl window with Drew Brees in his twilight years, but with Kamara, he turns 25 this year, with several strong years left in his wheelhouse.
Regardless if you’re looking to get him or already have him, I wouldn’t trade him and I also wouldn’t hesitate to draft him. Even if we end up having to cancel or delay the start of the 2020 NFL season, you shouldn’t delay an investment in Alvin Kamara. His footwork, strength, and versatility are easily worth the price of admission.
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