The TRUTH About Fantasy RBs in 2018, Part 1

led running backs and scrimmage yards with over 2,000, third most all time for a rookie only behind Eric Dickerson and Edger and James. This was everything you would have kind of hoped for and printed in the template for Sequin to be the next, you know, Ezekiel Elliott out of the draft. And what's impressive to me about a season with over 1,300 rushing yards, 11 touchdowns, 91 receptions. Yeah, that's nice. Was just.

how much they could lean on him, how durable he proved to be, and then how bad his team was. Terrible offensive line, amazing player. That is where the needle is still pointing up. The truth about Saquan Barclay is he overcame a bad offensive line. He overcame a bad quarterback for at least half the season. He overcame. No, Odell Beckham Jr. at times. Being on a bad team, I mean, especially the first half of the year. You watch the New York Giants and you thought they are in running.

to get the number one pick next year. And, you know, Saquan overcoming all of that, you know, the Giants are drafted six, I expect that they make some improvements up the offensive line. And the point is really there's nowhere the truth about Saquan Barclay is even though he finished as the number two running back was led the league in scrimmage yards, I feel like he's still got room to go up, which is.

kind of insane because when you've got that much, I mean, that many yardage, what happens if the giants end up becoming a good offense? How, and his touchdown opportunity. You have room to go up in the touchdown scored. Right. And that's the same can turn it around. I mean, 11 rushing touchdowns is still great. But I think that that number can add.

That can fluctuate and that can go down. I mean, the yard is just fantastic. He's going to be safe. But I don't think that he's going to go up necessarily from here. And at least for a few years while they figure things out. And on top of that, bring up the splits. What do you make of his, his splits? Because he trashed bottom 16 defenses and to the tune of almost 26 points a game.

but dropped nearly 10 points if he was facing a top 16 defense. Now, in those games, of course, he's still giving you 16 points, but when we're talking about the elite of the elite, why would you talk someone into Sequan Barkley, who's got these kinds of numbers where you have Todd Gurley, who's invincible against any opponent? I wouldn't. I wouldn't try to make that conversation between the two myself, but I would say this. 16.39 points per game against top defenses with the bad offensive line is still impressive.

What you saw, what Jason said, room to go up, you saw it against the bottom 16 defenses. You saw 26 points a game when the offensive line could do enough against the bad defense to give him any opportunity to be what he is. I'm guessing that the bad... Yes, and I'm guessing that the bad defense is coincide with the games that they were actually able to win and be in a leading position. And, you know, that's what I'm talking about with Sequin is like...

But Mike's right. It could take years. It could take a couple of years to build that. Yeah, it could. Any of us taking him over, Gurley? No, not over-goorley. I'm not. Yeah, I'm not as well. All right. In the meantime, you said, were you going to close out a little sequence? I'm saying in the meantime, even if it takes years for the Giants to get much better. In the meantime, we're fine with how he was this year. Yeah, the 91 receptions. It keeps things on track. All right.

Here's a player with 100% of his games qualified as good games. Number one in consistency. Number one most consistent running back. Christian McCaffrey. To be fair, we removed Week 17 from his rankings because it's not really fair to judge that against him. The guy came in for...

four snaps or whatever was. Yeah, he was, he was a 99% snap player on the season. He played 10% of the snaps that week. And going into the week, we all knew that. Like, you were a 99% snap player? This was a little bit hyperbolic. But if you look at his actual snaps that he missed, he had a, he had a stretch of like four or five games in a row where he literally did not miss a snap. Yeah, our editor, the Borgogan. Unbelievable. Kyle brought this in and said he.

When he was actually playing, you know, not week 16, wake 17 nonsense, but missed 30 snaps on the season. That's insane. Yes. For a running back, it's unheard of. I mean, that's nonsense. You can't do that to him. If he's out there that often, I bet he ends up with about 107 receptions. Yeah. And 867 yards, six touchdowns on 124 targets. 219 rushing attempts. I think that is.

I mean, before the season began, that's almost exactly where we had him. That's where I had him. As far as rushing. I had him, 220 rushing attempts before the season. When you say you can't do that to him, I think you can do it to him because he has 220 rushing attempts. Being active in the passing game, we never look at that with Julian Edelman or Jarvis Lander or something and say they can't be on the field. He's a receiver who lines up in the backfield, 107 receptions to 219 carries.

That's how you have to look at it. And he was used that way in college. I mean, you might talk about he doesn't have the weight to withstand that, but I agree. I'm just saying the human body. I'm not talking about next year. I'm just talking about if you have this electric superstar running back, I think using him this much is definitely a disservice to your team over the long term. Next year. 22 years old. You could be right. 22 years old.

What do we expect from him next year? Again, he was somebody who took advantage of bottom defenses as well. About seven points a game better against him. Very similar numbers to what Sequin did. Sure. I expect better, actually, from Christian McCaffrey, because I expect Cam Newton to be better. He was playing with a bum arm for half the season. By the end, it looked like he could barely throw the ball 30 yards. So I expect... The good news... I expect an improvement. The good news for Christian McCaffrey, while I don't necessarily expect an improvement, nor do I need it.

as in some scoring formats, PPR certainly, I believe he was the number one running back through the fantasy season, up through week 16. But the coaching staff has, you know, has stayed the same. And that was the worry. Norve matters. Norv matters. Norve and Marv. You see? If Norve Turner was not the offensive coordinator, I would be. I believe you mean Marv Turner? I would be freaking out about Christian McCaffrey's.

utilization and his ability to be on the field for all of the snaps. But with Norv, he's safe next year. Well, and that's what you called before the season. You said, Norv, you know, with all the CJ Anderson hype, who you love CJ Anderson. I did. And you loved his ability. And he was there. And yet you knew with Norv, he just has one guy. Well, they've got now a 27-year history of Norv Turner. I mean, ask yourself, listener.

Are you 27 years old? I mean, there's a good chunk here that aren't. We have that many years of him as a head coach or an offensive coordinator. And there's like two or three seasons where he didn't have a workhorse back. And that's because Adrian Peters got injured. Which brings you to the coaching changes episode. They kind of matter. It changed Christian McCaffrey from a bottom level running back one to a top three guy. Yep.

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That's the number two, three and me.com slash footballers, 23amme.com slash footballers. All right, let's move on to number four on our list. Oh! It's Alvin Kamara. Super Camario. I don't know if there's a player that I've seen more mixed feelings about. Now, for a guy who finished number four overall, who played in, you know, 7% of his games, he busted. So that was basically one game. And then he was good for the rest.

Great in 47%, which was the second most. The problem with Alvin Camara is his great games, the vast majority of them were those first four weeks when Mark Ingram was gone. And when you drafted him, you went, holy crap, I have the best running back in fantasy football. I'm going right to the championship week. I mean, four games. That's 25% of your season. You're feeling real good. 38, 15.

2739. You're feeling really, really good about what you got. And then Markingham comes back and you have a very good fantasy running back. You don't have the player you thought you did. Yeah. I mean, it's exactly right. And that's what we need to discuss in the truth series is, is Alvin Camara really the number one type of running back? Because over those first four weeks when Mark Ingram wasn't there,

Alvin Camara was the number one running back, and he wasn't slightly the number one. Number two was Todd Gurley, five points fewer per game. That's ridiculous. Alvin Camara was averaging 28.7 fantasy points during that stretch. That's just unbelievable. After that, if you look at weeks five through the rest of the year, when Mark Ingram was back, he went from 28.7 points per game.

to 17.6, which is good. Yes. He was the number five running back over that stretch. Do you have those numbers going to week seven? Like not starting until week seven? Yeah, not starting week five because I get it. What happened week five, if you don't recall, that was the week that Mark Ingram came back. Alvin Camero was on the injury report and the team gave everything to Mark Ingram. So I'm okay taking that one away. Taking that one away. So if you start in week seven, he was.

18.8 fantasy points of game. It goes up. It's, I mean, here's the thing. We can't talk too bad about him. During that stretch, 18.8, that's the third running back in fantasy. Let's break down, you know, because I don't think any of us would take Camara over Zeke next year, for example, who's lower on the list. No. But.

Mark Ingram for all intents of purposes, I don't expect him back in New Orleans. When you listen to him talk about it, he's an unrestricted free agent, first of all. He's 29 years old, entering the age in which you're getting close to- He needs to take a payday. Yeah, and his payday is still going to be, like, whatever it is, he's got to take it. And so when you hear him talk about it, he says, you know, I hope we win a Super Bowl. I hope everything works out. It's a business. I hope everything works out. Yeah, but, I mean, he said that in the context of how much he wants to be back.

He said, I met my wife here. My children were born here. Very rarely does anybody get to spend their entire career in one place? I love New Orleans. That's the point, though. He also said, I'm not just looking to leave New Orleans with a contract. He's not just looking to get out. I think he's back. Oh, I do not. I mean, I think he's back, too. That's the cool thing. The only way that he's back is if he gives no offers elsewhere. No, New Orleans is not going to offer him something that prioritizes too much of the cap space to the running back position, knowing that Alvin Camara is so much younger.

so much more explosive, so much more versatile. I mean, you've got kind of a situation where you get to pay Devante Freeman, you're going to pay Tavern Coleman? I think that the way I'm looking at it is he'll get like an Isaiah Crowell level of contract, which is enough to keep him in town. Oh, man, I do not think so. I'm willing to take a very, very early. All right, very, very good. Waterbed. He's been, and it's not been good. I mean, you guys got to remember.

This is not been... Oh, no, I remember that Sean Payton hated Mark Ingram for a very long time. This relationship between them has not been very good. So you guys, you know, you can buy me lunch. And now, the one thing to say, after week one, my biggest player in Grants, we just talked about, he didn't have Mark Ingram there. But nothing can be said negative about Alvin Camara talent-wise, on the field-wise, film-wise. He was also...

Pretty good. One of, if not the best running back out there. You can't tackle him easily. His vision's great. His ability in the receiving game. So, I mean, he is absolutely among the elite. It's just a matter of how much work does he get. We know that Peyton would like to use, even if it's not Ingram. That was the point I was trying to get to. I figured you guys would concede that he was probably out of town. You didn't. But even if he wasn't. Because you're wrong. Right. There's that part of it, Mike. I'm not going to concede when you're wrong.