In defense of stud RB (1 Viewer)

[Gawain]

(At least in my league/scoring system)

Many people are making a big deal of the failure of many of the top-10 RBs to meet their expectations. Some are arguing that it makes more sense to wait to pick one.

The problem is you never come to a "safe" group of RB to pick from. All you can really do is try to mitigate the risk.

Just going off some random FBG cheatsheet I found:

RB 1-5:

Peterson, Martin, Richardson, Spiller, Charles

40% hit rate, 60% bust rate

RB 6-10:

McCoy, Rice, Morris, Foster, Lynch

40% hit rate, 40% bust rate and an arguable Morris

RB 11-15:

Forte, CJ, Wilson, MJD, S-Jax

40% hit rate, 60% bust rate

RB 16-20:

Bush, Gore, Ridley, Murray, L. Miller

60% hit rate, 40% bust rate

RB 21-25:

Lacy, McFadden, Mathews , Sproles, D-Williams

40% hit rate, 40% bust rate and the arguable Williams

RB 26-30:

Bernard, Richardson, Bradshaw, Mendenhall, Ivory

20% hit rate, 80% bust rate.

I had defined hits/busts as guys who met or exceeded their draft position.

But, we really want top 12 guys, so if you look at the groupings for just the top 12 RB (Charles, McCoy, Forte, Moreno, Lynch, Peterson, Murray, Johnson, Lacy, Bush, Gore, F-Jax in my league), you get:

RB 1-5: 2 (Charles, Peterson)

RB 6-10: 2 (Lynch, McCoy)

RB 11-15: 2 (Forte, CJ1.5K)

RB 16-20: 3 (Bush, Gore, Murray)

RB 21-25: 1 (Lacy)

RB 36-40: 1 (F-Jax)

RB 56-60: 1 (Moreno)

For PPG, Bell and Stacy kick out Gore and Moreno. Bell was 51-55 and Stacy was 56-60.

So, you had about a 40% chance of getting a helpful back if you drafted a top 25 back (probably through round 5 or so in a 12-team league.)

For the next 25 backs, your odds plummeted to somewhere to between 8-16%, depending on if you want to be generous and grant Vereen and J. Bell "helpful" status (remember I didn't count Morris who finished better than both of them.

Only useful guys not listed are Stacy, Bell, Woodhead and Jennings. So out of the great trash heap of 51+ running backs, 5 gave you value.

If you wanted to have two, your best bet was to take three running backs in the first five rounds.

The other major problem is that when you do land a top RB, it's a difference most other people can't make up.

There were 5 other running backs within 100 points of #1 RB Charles. There were 21 other wide receivers within 100 points of #1 WR Gordon. There will be many wide receivers that score close to the top 12. There are few running backs that can score close to the top 12.

 

[jeaton6]

This is good analysis. One thing to note is the top WRs tend to me more consistent than top RBs. Churn in the high end is much lower at WR. I think a solid strategy is to take a top flight WR in PPR (particularly if drafting at end of round 1) and continue to load up at WR and then once the RB pecking order is reasonably established you may very well be able to trade that top WR for a top RB or 2 for 1, rather than trying to "hit" at the RB position.