What's new
Fantasy Football - Footballguys Forums

This is a sample guest message. Register a free account today to become a member! Once signed in, you'll be able to participate on this site by adding your own topics and posts, as well as connect with other members through your own private inbox!

RB Kaleb Johnson, PIT (1 Viewer)

Ceiling - Derrick Henry
Floor - David Montgomery
Most likely - Le'Veon Bell

I firmly believe he will be fantasy viable for a few years and if you got him late in the 1st round or early 2nd, then good for you.​

Pretty high floor and extremely high ceiling there. I like his chances but am not as confident in those ranges.
Using ceiling, floor and most likely, who would you insert?
Ceiling: Mike Anderson
Floor: My UPS driver
Most Likely: Benny Snell
 
Ceiling - Derrick Henry
Floor - David Montgomery
Most likely - Le'Veon Bell

I firmly believe he will be fantasy viable for a few years and if you got him late in the 1st round or early 2nd, then good for you.​

Pretty high floor and extremely high ceiling there. I like his chances but am not as confident in those ranges.
Using ceiling, floor and most likely, who would you insert?
Ceiling: Mike Anderson
Floor: My UPS driver
Most Likely: Benny Snell
You funny guy
 
Ceiling - Derrick Henry
Floor - David Montgomery
Most likely - Le'Veon Bell

I firmly believe he will be fantasy viable for a few years and if you got him late in the 1st round or early 2nd, then good for you.​

Pretty high floor and extremely high ceiling there. I like his chances but am not as confident in those ranges.
Using ceiling, floor and most likely, who would you insert?
Ceiling: Mike Anderson
Floor: My UPS driver
Most Likely: Benny Snell
You funny guy
I'm mostly serious. I honestly thought (think?) you were joking. You were, right?

You put a two time all pro who averaged 130 y/g over five seasons with Pittsburgh as his most likely outcome.

Your floor option averages just under 1,400 yards and 11 TDs over his career.
 
Ceiling - Derrick Henry
Floor - David Montgomery
Most likely - Le'Veon Bell

I firmly believe he will be fantasy viable for a few years and if you got him late in the 1st round or early 2nd, then good for you.​

Pretty high floor and extremely high ceiling there. I like his chances but am not as confident in those ranges.
Using ceiling, floor and most likely, who would you insert?
Ceiling: Mike Anderson
Floor: My UPS driver
Most Likely: Benny Snell
You funny guy
I'm mostly serious. I honestly thought (think?) you were joking. You were, right?

You put a two time all pro who averaged 130 y/g over five seasons with Pittsburgh as his most likely outcome.

Your floor option averages just under 1,400 yards and 11 TDs over his career.
I could have replaced the floor with Najee Harris. Having nothing to do with Harris being a former Steeler.
 
More than likely he is just an equal replacement for Najee Harris. A good back but not great. Anything above that is good for a late round FF first round pick .
 
Ceiling - Derrick Henry
Floor - David Montgomery
Most likely - Le'Veon Bell

I firmly believe he will be fantasy viable for a few years and if you got him late in the 1st round or early 2nd, then good for you.​

Pretty high floor and extremely high ceiling there. I like his chances but am not as confident in those ranges.
Using ceiling, floor and most likely, who would you insert?
Ceiling: Mike Anderson
Floor: My UPS driver
Most Likely: Benny Snell
You funny guy
I'm mostly serious. I honestly thought (think?) you were joking. You were, right?

You put a two time all pro who averaged 130 y/g over five seasons with Pittsburgh as his most likely outcome.

Your floor option averages just under 1,400 yards and 11 TDs over his career.
I think something like

floor: Tyler Algeir/Jordan Howard
ceiling: Lev Bell/Todd Gurley
mid range: Joe Mixon

I'm sure some Mixon-stans might view that as a too high of a mid range/most likely outcome; but I've always thought Mixon benefited greatly from a high snap and touch count with limited backfield competition, along with a good chunk of his career in a very RB friendly offense. If you plugged Kaleb into the Bengals, Mixon's steady low end RB1 numbers would be a very realistic bar for him to clear. But really the comp is more about who I see Mixon is as a player with his skill set and comping it to Kaleb. Similar size, similar lacklust athletic numbers, and known for excelling in a wide zone scheme. Mixon was a bit higher on receiving profile, but I still think KJ gets discounted on his receiving skills because Iowa's offense just doesn't pass to the RBs much (and was just a terrible passing offense overall). Looking at his limited opportunities, he excelled there though. Had great hands and was catching poorly thrown passes often outside his frame and off his route rhythm. Also forced missed tackles on 50+% of his 22 receptions in 2024.

If you're that hung up on Mixon because of the actual numbers rather than the style of play and talent level; you could probably sub DeMarco Murray as another mid range/likely comp. I just think his profile aligns closer with Mixon than Murray.
 
Ceiling - Derrick Henry
Floor - David Montgomery
Most likely - Le'Veon Bell

I firmly believe he will be fantasy viable for a few years and if you got him late in the 1st round or early 2nd, then good for you.​

Pretty high floor and extremely high ceiling there. I like his chances but am not as confident in those ranges.
Using ceiling, floor and most likely, who would you insert?
Ceiling: Mike Anderson
Floor: My UPS driver
Most Likely: Benny Snell
You funny guy
I'm mostly serious. I honestly thought (think?) you were joking. You were, right?

You put a two time all pro who averaged 130 y/g over five seasons with Pittsburgh as his most likely outcome.

Your floor option averages just under 1,400 yards and 11 TDs over his career.
I could have replaced the floor with Najee Harris. Having nothing to do with Harris being a former Steeler.
I think Najee, being a volume dependent, easily replaceable player who will likely be on another team in four years is a better comp for his "most likely".

I guess, technically there is a non-zero chance that Derrick Henry could be his ceiling, but in the grand scheme of statistically probabilities I think that outcome approaches fantastical and magical thinking. I think @pinkstapler hit his ceiling pretty spot on with Le'Veon Bell, although I don't know enough about Johnson's receiving skills. Bell was elite in that area.

I don't see how his floor could be anything other than; time share RB who is out of the league in 3/4 years. Unless he has good special teams skills, which could keep him employed somewhere for another 3/4 years.
 
So give this guy a crease in an outside zone play and he looks great. But he never makes people miss on his own. He needs good blocking. I just don't see the love for this guy.
This couldn't be more wrong. Google is free man. It's fine to not like him, but at least fact check yourself before saying things that are completely baseless. 66 missed tackles forced on 240 rushes; a rate of 27.5%. PFF also has him in the 94th percentile for YAC per attempt. He both makes people miss, and drags them for more yards, than just about any RB in this class. He's basically behind Jeanty, and alongside Skattebo, with regards to elusiveness. He also did this facing stacked boxes on 50% of all his touches. The next highest RB in this class was at 39%.

You wanna hate on him; jump on the "he's slow" bandwagon. At least there's some actual data to make that argument.
The slow stuff is nonsense. His 40 time is good for a guy his size, but also not a reflection of his speed. His game speeds are crazy fast. He has a ton of explosive runs.
This guy is going to thrive in Pittsburgh. I am not saying he is going to be incredible but he will get volume and is good enough to put up solid numbers.
Agreed. Easily one of the safest late 1st round rookie picks ever.
I guess it depends on your expectations but his poor draft capital does not allow me to share this point of view.

And fwiw I like him and was in on him early in redrafts before the NFL draft. I just see the low level of draft commitment as making him a long term dynasty asset as risky.
3rd round is pretty good draft capital for a RB
It's back end of round 3, let's not pretend that's less then ideal and it's a pretty far cry away from being safe.

Would have been nice if I had heard they thought about moving up. Instead I discovered they actually tried to forego the pick and move back into round 4.

The Steelers have three 3 thirds next year to say nothing of the two 4's and 5's. This again is why he's not what I consider a safe investment. The commitment to him is low and the ability to bring in comp is high.
To be fair to Meno (and these numbers will differ a bit based on what thresholds you use), in general fantasy success rates for 3rd round RBs are about 75% of the success rates for 2nd round RBs for a single season; they are about 50% of round 2 RBs for multiple seasons. The charting I use has 2nd round RB single season top 12 chance at 71% and 3rd round at 50%. I have multiple seasons as a top 12 back for 2nd round backs at 42%, while 3rd round drops to 22%. Trying to interpret that data leans into what I think Meno is getting at; multiple seasons of top 12 production start to drop with lower draft capital as they are simply more easily replaced/moved on from.

Kaleb aside; I'm still in the boat that as much as the above numbers are statistical trends for a reason, if there was a year to think some of guys will go against this trend it's this one. The class was incredibly talented and deep IMO. So while the odds are still certainly against a 3rd round RB having multiple top 12 seasons, the numbers tell us ~2 out of every 10 still do it and I think, in general, this class will provide us with more of these aberrations who hit the long odds. I'm making this same gamble with guys like Skattebo, Blue, Neal, and Brooks. And I think when we look at their profiles and data like YAC, MTF, YPRR, etc. and compare these numbers against rookie RB classes from the past 5+ years; the 2025 backs are generally comparable to previous rookies drafted a round+ higher than this year's guys were.

I'm still trying to find the balance between paragraph 1 and paragraph 2; but I'm continually leaning on the gamble of #2. Playing dynasty in a 3 year window, if Kaleb gives me an RB1 season and two RB2 seasons for a late 1st round pick, I still think I can consider that a win and not worry much about what happens after that. Anything more would just be "found money". And for Kaleb specifically, I think the Steelers have enough needs on that team that if Kaleb is doing well, I can see them not spending many/any early round picks on RB for the next few years. Not to mention, I think it's highly unlikely we have another RB class this deep for the next couple years (but who really knows on this front). I can say I'm not at all impressed with the 2026 class outside Love and Singleton. And those guys might be 1st round picks with the classes overall weakness. I'd bet heavily they aren't falling to the 3rd round outside injury or off field issues.
Thanks for the detailed reply but this convo has gone a bit sideways from my comment I don't view him safe.

I had Kaleb ranked as my 8th overall player in rookie drafts, chose him at 9, so I'm certainly not dismissing his chances but I was just responding to the safe comment. I was pretty high on him before the draft and had 9 redraft leagues before the NFL draft and chose him in 6 of the 9 leagues. I felt that his two best possible landing spots were the Bears or Steelers so there are certainly things to be hopeful about with him and him having a nice or big rookie season will be a boon to me.

But with regards to "safe".

I just don't view a player chosen in the 80's, when the team tried to move back off the pick and had reasons to believe it would have cost them Johnson moving back into round 4, as a safe investment. It's more taking a calculated swing IMO. For me safe is a player I view as talented who the team has a level of commitment towards with either draft capital and/or moving up to get if the player fell. Again in the Steelers case they were willing to move back.

My only thing to add on quality of the RB class pushing some players down is if we are making that contention should player like Judkins and Henderson be held in higher regard then RB's who were chosen as high as them? I don't view them that way myself, but they already got major bumps for going in a premium zone.


In terms of next years class I do see a lot of solid RB prospects with Love looking elite. But in the end how worried I would be on Kaleb surviving the draft has more to do with how he plays. I'm just making the point they have a boatload of draft capital next year and that if he's merely ok they got a ton of ammo to bring in meaningful comp which again puts some dents in his "safe" label.

As a far more minor issue is we don't yet really have a firm grasp on how good he can be if he's not in the outside zone scheme and what happens if that changes? Arthur Smith has head coaching ambitions and was reportedly offered the NC head coaching job. Just saying with a decent year there is a chance that the perfect system for Kaleb has legit danger or changing.

This guy could be the next Demarco Murry/Larry Johnson or just a RBBC/handcuff type of guy and neither outcome would be even midly surprising. The range is large. Again in summary this is why to me he's more of what I view as a homerun shot then "safe".
 
So give this guy a crease in an outside zone play and he looks great. But he never makes people miss on his own. He needs good blocking. I just don't see the love for this guy.
This couldn't be more wrong. Google is free man. It's fine to not like him, but at least fact check yourself before saying things that are completely baseless. 66 missed tackles forced on 240 rushes; a rate of 27.5%. PFF also has him in the 94th percentile for YAC per attempt. He both makes people miss, and drags them for more yards, than just about any RB in this class. He's basically behind Jeanty, and alongside Skattebo, with regards to elusiveness. He also did this facing stacked boxes on 50% of all his touches. The next highest RB in this class was at 39%.

You wanna hate on him; jump on the "he's slow" bandwagon. At least there's some actual data to make that argument.
The slow stuff is nonsense. His 40 time is good for a guy his size, but also not a reflection of his speed. His game speeds are crazy fast. He has a ton of explosive runs.
This guy is going to thrive in Pittsburgh. I am not saying he is going to be incredible but he will get volume and is good enough to put up solid numbers.
Agreed. Easily one of the safest late 1st round rookie picks ever.
I guess it depends on your expectations but his poor draft capital does not allow me to share this point of view.

And fwiw I like him and was in on him early in redrafts before the NFL draft. I just see the low level of draft commitment as making him a long term dynasty asset as risky.
3rd round is pretty good draft capital for a RB
It's back end of round 3, let's not pretend that's less then ideal and it's a pretty far cry away from being safe.

Would have been nice if I had heard they thought about moving up. Instead I discovered they actually tried to forego the pick and move back into round 4.

The Steelers have three 3 thirds next year to say nothing of the two 4's and 5's. This again is why he's not what I consider a safe investment. The commitment to him is low and the ability to bring in comp is high.
To be fair to Meno (and these numbers will differ a bit based on what thresholds you use), in general fantasy success rates for 3rd round RBs are about 75% of the success rates for 2nd round RBs for a single season; they are about 50% of round 2 RBs for multiple seasons. The charting I use has 2nd round RB single season top 12 chance at 71% and 3rd round at 50%. I have multiple seasons as a top 12 back for 2nd round backs at 42%, while 3rd round drops to 22%. Trying to interpret that data leans into what I think Meno is getting at; multiple seasons of top 12 production start to drop with lower draft capital as they are simply more easily replaced/moved on from.

Kaleb aside; I'm still in the boat that as much as the above numbers are statistical trends for a reason, if there was a year to think some of guys will go against this trend it's this one. The class was incredibly talented and deep IMO. So while the odds are still certainly against a 3rd round RB having multiple top 12 seasons, the numbers tell us ~2 out of every 10 still do it and I think, in general, this class will provide us with more of these aberrations who hit the long odds. I'm making this same gamble with guys like Skattebo, Blue, Neal, and Brooks. And I think when we look at their profiles and data like YAC, MTF, YPRR, etc. and compare these numbers against rookie RB classes from the past 5+ years; the 2025 backs are generally comparable to previous rookies drafted a round+ higher than this year's guys were.

I'm still trying to find the balance between paragraph 1 and paragraph 2; but I'm continually leaning on the gamble of #2. Playing dynasty in a 3 year window, if Kaleb gives me an RB1 season and two RB2 seasons for a late 1st round pick, I still think I can consider that a win and not worry much about what happens after that. Anything more would just be "found money". And for Kaleb specifically, I think the Steelers have enough needs on that team that if Kaleb is doing well, I can see them not spending many/any early round picks on RB for the next few years. Not to mention, I think it's highly unlikely we have another RB class this deep for the next couple years (but who really knows on this front). I can say I'm not at all impressed with the 2026 class outside Love and Singleton. And those guys might be 1st round picks with the classes overall weakness. I'd bet heavily they aren't falling to the 3rd round outside injury or off field issues.
Thanks for the detailed reply but this convo has gone a bit sideways from my comment I don't view him safe.

I had Kaleb ranked as my 8th overall player in rookie drafts, chose him at 9, so I'm certainly not dismissing his chances but I was just responding to the safe comment. I was pretty high on him before the draft and had 9 redraft leagues before the NFL draft and chose him in 6 of the 9 leagues. I felt that his two best possible landing spots were the Bears or Steelers so there are certainly things to be hopeful about with him and him having a nice or big rookie season will be a boon to me.

But with regards to "safe".

I just don't view a player chosen in the 80's, when the team tried to move back off the pick and had reasons to believe it would have cost them Johnson moving back into round 4, as a safe investment. It's more taking a calculated swing IMO. For me safe is a player I view as talented who the team has a level of commitment towards with either draft capital and/or moving up to get if the player fell. Again in the Steelers case they were willing to move back.

My only thing to add on quality of the RB class pushing some players down is if we are making that contention should player like Judkins and Henderson be held in higher regard then RB's who were chosen as high as them? I don't view them that way myself, but they already got major bumps for going in a premium zone.


In terms of next years class I do see a lot of solid RB prospects with Love looking elite. But in the end how worried I would be on Kaleb surviving the draft has more to do with how he plays. I'm just making the point they have a boatload of draft capital next year and that if he's merely ok they got a ton of ammo to bring in meaningful comp which again puts some dents in his "safe" label.

As a far more minor issue is we don't yet really have a firm grasp on how good he can be if he's not in the outside zone scheme and what happens if that changes? Arthur Smith has head coaching ambitions and was reportedly offered the NC head coaching job. Just saying with a decent year there is a chance that the perfect system for Kaleb has legit danger or changing.

This guy could be the next Demarco Murry/Larry Johnson or just a RBBC/handcuff type of guy and neither outcome would be even midly surprising. The range is large. Again in summary this is why to me he's more of what I view as a homerun shot then "safe".
I think next year’s draft, other than QB, is weak. You have a couple of RBs (Love, Singleton, and Taylor) and a bunch of mid tier WRs and no TEs. Baxter is a wildcard. Just my opinion of course.
 
Last edited:
So give this guy a crease in an outside zone play and he looks great. But he never makes people miss on his own. He needs good blocking. I just don't see the love for this guy.
This couldn't be more wrong. Google is free man. It's fine to not like him, but at least fact check yourself before saying things that are completely baseless. 66 missed tackles forced on 240 rushes; a rate of 27.5%. PFF also has him in the 94th percentile for YAC per attempt. He both makes people miss, and drags them for more yards, than just about any RB in this class. He's basically behind Jeanty, and alongside Skattebo, with regards to elusiveness. He also did this facing stacked boxes on 50% of all his touches. The next highest RB in this class was at 39%.

You wanna hate on him; jump on the "he's slow" bandwagon. At least there's some actual data to make that argument.
The slow stuff is nonsense. His 40 time is good for a guy his size, but also not a reflection of his speed. His game speeds are crazy fast. He has a ton of explosive runs.
This guy is going to thrive in Pittsburgh. I am not saying he is going to be incredible but he will get volume and is good enough to put up solid numbers.
Agreed. Easily one of the safest late 1st round rookie picks ever.
I guess it depends on your expectations but his poor draft capital does not allow me to share this point of view.

And fwiw I like him and was in on him early in redrafts before the NFL draft. I just see the low level of draft commitment as making him a long term dynasty asset as risky.
3rd round is pretty good draft capital for a RB
It's back end of round 3, let's not pretend that's less then ideal and it's a pretty far cry away from being safe.

Would have been nice if I had heard they thought about moving up. Instead I discovered they actually tried to forego the pick and move back into round 4.

The Steelers have three 3 thirds next year to say nothing of the two 4's and 5's. This again is why he's not what I consider a safe investment. The commitment to him is low and the ability to bring in comp is high.
To be fair to Meno (and these numbers will differ a bit based on what thresholds you use), in general fantasy success rates for 3rd round RBs are about 75% of the success rates for 2nd round RBs for a single season; they are about 50% of round 2 RBs for multiple seasons. The charting I use has 2nd round RB single season top 12 chance at 71% and 3rd round at 50%. I have multiple seasons as a top 12 back for 2nd round backs at 42%, while 3rd round drops to 22%. Trying to interpret that data leans into what I think Meno is getting at; multiple seasons of top 12 production start to drop with lower draft capital as they are simply more easily replaced/moved on from.

Kaleb aside; I'm still in the boat that as much as the above numbers are statistical trends for a reason, if there was a year to think some of guys will go against this trend it's this one. The class was incredibly talented and deep IMO. So while the odds are still certainly against a 3rd round RB having multiple top 12 seasons, the numbers tell us ~2 out of every 10 still do it and I think, in general, this class will provide us with more of these aberrations who hit the long odds. I'm making this same gamble with guys like Skattebo, Blue, Neal, and Brooks. And I think when we look at their profiles and data like YAC, MTF, YPRR, etc. and compare these numbers against rookie RB classes from the past 5+ years; the 2025 backs are generally comparable to previous rookies drafted a round+ higher than this year's guys were.

I'm still trying to find the balance between paragraph 1 and paragraph 2; but I'm continually leaning on the gamble of #2. Playing dynasty in a 3 year window, if Kaleb gives me an RB1 season and two RB2 seasons for a late 1st round pick, I still think I can consider that a win and not worry much about what happens after that. Anything more would just be "found money". And for Kaleb specifically, I think the Steelers have enough needs on that team that if Kaleb is doing well, I can see them not spending many/any early round picks on RB for the next few years. Not to mention, I think it's highly unlikely we have another RB class this deep for the next couple years (but who really knows on this front). I can say I'm not at all impressed with the 2026 class outside Love and Singleton. And those guys might be 1st round picks with the classes overall weakness. I'd bet heavily they aren't falling to the 3rd round outside injury or off field issues.
Thanks for the detailed reply but this convo has gone a bit sideways from my comment I don't view him safe.

I had Kaleb ranked as my 8th overall player in rookie drafts, chose him at 9, so I'm certainly not dismissing his chances but I was just responding to the safe comment. I was pretty high on him before the draft and had 9 redraft leagues before the NFL draft and chose him in 6 of the 9 leagues. I felt that his two best possible landing spots were the Bears or Steelers so there are certainly things to be hopeful about with him and him having a nice or big rookie season will be a boon to me.

But with regards to "safe".

I just don't view a player chosen in the 80's, when the team tried to move back off the pick and had reasons to believe it would have cost them Johnson moving back into round 4, as a safe investment. It's more taking a calculated swing IMO. For me safe is a player I view as talented who the team has a level of commitment towards with either draft capital and/or moving up to get if the player fell. Again in the Steelers case they were willing to move back.

My only thing to add on quality of the RB class pushing some players down is if we are making that contention should player like Judkins and Henderson be held in higher regard then RB's who were chosen as high as them? I don't view them that way myself, but they already got major bumps for going in a premium zone.


In terms of next years class I do see a lot of solid RB prospects with Love looking elite. But in the end how worried I would be on Kaleb surviving the draft has more to do with how he plays. I'm just making the point they have a boatload of draft capital next year and that if he's merely ok they got a ton of ammo to bring in meaningful comp which again puts some dents in his "safe" label.

As a far more minor issue is we don't yet really have a firm grasp on how good he can be if he's not in the outside zone scheme and what happens if that changes? Arthur Smith has head coaching ambitions and was reportedly offered the NC head coaching job. Just saying with a decent year there is a chance that the perfect system for Kaleb has legit danger or changing.

This guy could be the next Demarco Murry/Larry Johnson or just a RBBC/handcuff type of guy and neither outcome would be even midly surprising. The range is large. Again in summary this is why to me he's more of what I view as a homerun shot then "safe".
I think next year’s draft, other than QB, is weak. You have a couple of RBs (Love and Taylor) and a bunch of mid tier WRs and no TEs. Baxter is a wildcard. Just my opinion of course.
I don't view it as weak myself, always RB's available. You are listing a guy as RB2 and I saw two top 5 lists last week that Taylor did not crack any of them.

No one was viewing Kaleb as much of a prospect this time last year.
 
So give this guy a crease in an outside zone play and he looks great. But he never makes people miss on his own. He needs good blocking. I just don't see the love for this guy.
This couldn't be more wrong. Google is free man. It's fine to not like him, but at least fact check yourself before saying things that are completely baseless. 66 missed tackles forced on 240 rushes; a rate of 27.5%. PFF also has him in the 94th percentile for YAC per attempt. He both makes people miss, and drags them for more yards, than just about any RB in this class. He's basically behind Jeanty, and alongside Skattebo, with regards to elusiveness. He also did this facing stacked boxes on 50% of all his touches. The next highest RB in this class was at 39%.

You wanna hate on him; jump on the "he's slow" bandwagon. At least there's some actual data to make that argument.
The slow stuff is nonsense. His 40 time is good for a guy his size, but also not a reflection of his speed. His game speeds are crazy fast. He has a ton of explosive runs.
This guy is going to thrive in Pittsburgh. I am not saying he is going to be incredible but he will get volume and is good enough to put up solid numbers.
Agreed. Easily one of the safest late 1st round rookie picks ever.
I guess it depends on your expectations but his poor draft capital does not allow me to share this point of view.

And fwiw I like him and was in on him early in redrafts before the NFL draft. I just see the low level of draft commitment as making him a long term dynasty asset as risky.
3rd round is pretty good draft capital for a RB
It's back end of round 3, let's not pretend that's less then ideal and it's a pretty far cry away from being safe.

Would have been nice if I had heard they thought about moving up. Instead I discovered they actually tried to forego the pick and move back into round 4.

The Steelers have three 3 thirds next year to say nothing of the two 4's and 5's. This again is why he's not what I consider a safe investment. The commitment to him is low and the ability to bring in comp is high.
To be fair to Meno (and these numbers will differ a bit based on what thresholds you use), in general fantasy success rates for 3rd round RBs are about 75% of the success rates for 2nd round RBs for a single season; they are about 50% of round 2 RBs for multiple seasons. The charting I use has 2nd round RB single season top 12 chance at 71% and 3rd round at 50%. I have multiple seasons as a top 12 back for 2nd round backs at 42%, while 3rd round drops to 22%. Trying to interpret that data leans into what I think Meno is getting at; multiple seasons of top 12 production start to drop with lower draft capital as they are simply more easily replaced/moved on from.

Kaleb aside; I'm still in the boat that as much as the above numbers are statistical trends for a reason, if there was a year to think some of guys will go against this trend it's this one. The class was incredibly talented and deep IMO. So while the odds are still certainly against a 3rd round RB having multiple top 12 seasons, the numbers tell us ~2 out of every 10 still do it and I think, in general, this class will provide us with more of these aberrations who hit the long odds. I'm making this same gamble with guys like Skattebo, Blue, Neal, and Brooks. And I think when we look at their profiles and data like YAC, MTF, YPRR, etc. and compare these numbers against rookie RB classes from the past 5+ years; the 2025 backs are generally comparable to previous rookies drafted a round+ higher than this year's guys were.

I'm still trying to find the balance between paragraph 1 and paragraph 2; but I'm continually leaning on the gamble of #2. Playing dynasty in a 3 year window, if Kaleb gives me an RB1 season and two RB2 seasons for a late 1st round pick, I still think I can consider that a win and not worry much about what happens after that. Anything more would just be "found money". And for Kaleb specifically, I think the Steelers have enough needs on that team that if Kaleb is doing well, I can see them not spending many/any early round picks on RB for the next few years. Not to mention, I think it's highly unlikely we have another RB class this deep for the next couple years (but who really knows on this front). I can say I'm not at all impressed with the 2026 class outside Love and Singleton. And those guys might be 1st round picks with the classes overall weakness. I'd bet heavily they aren't falling to the 3rd round outside injury or off field issues.
Thanks for the detailed reply but this convo has gone a bit sideways from my comment I don't view him safe.

I had Kaleb ranked as my 8th overall player in rookie drafts, chose him at 9, so I'm certainly not dismissing his chances but I was just responding to the safe comment. I was pretty high on him before the draft and had 9 redraft leagues before the NFL draft and chose him in 6 of the 9 leagues. I felt that his two best possible landing spots were the Bears or Steelers so there are certainly things to be hopeful about with him and him having a nice or big rookie season will be a boon to me.

But with regards to "safe".

I just don't view a player chosen in the 80's, when the team tried to move back off the pick and had reasons to believe it would have cost them Johnson moving back into round 4, as a safe investment. It's more taking a calculated swing IMO. For me safe is a player I view as talented who the team has a level of commitment towards with either draft capital and/or moving up to get if the player fell. Again in the Steelers case they were willing to move back.

My only thing to add on quality of the RB class pushing some players down is if we are making that contention should player like Judkins and Henderson be held in higher regard then RB's who were chosen as high as them? I don't view them that way myself, but they already got major bumps for going in a premium zone.


In terms of next years class I do see a lot of solid RB prospects with Love looking elite. But in the end how worried I would be on Kaleb surviving the draft has more to do with how he plays. I'm just making the point they have a boatload of draft capital next year and that if he's merely ok they got a ton of ammo to bring in meaningful comp which again puts some dents in his "safe" label.

As a far more minor issue is we don't yet really have a firm grasp on how good he can be if he's not in the outside zone scheme and what happens if that changes? Arthur Smith has head coaching ambitions and was reportedly offered the NC head coaching job. Just saying with a decent year there is a chance that the perfect system for Kaleb has legit danger or changing.

This guy could be the next Demarco Murry/Larry Johnson or just a RBBC/handcuff type of guy and neither outcome would be even midly surprising. The range is large. Again in summary this is why to me he's more of what I view as a homerun shot then "safe".
I think next year’s draft, other than QB, is weak. You have a couple of RBs (Love and Taylor) and a bunch of mid tier WRs and no TEs. Baxter is a wildcard. Just my opinion of course.
I don't view it as weak myself, always RB's available. You are listing a guy as RB2 and I saw two top 5 lists last week that Taylor did not crack any of them.

No one was viewing Kaleb as much of a prospect this time last year.
I like Darius Taylor, thus the reason I listed him in the discussion. Baxter is interesting coming back from a serious injury. While Love is getting the hype, I wonder where he would rank if he was in this year’s draft? Personally I would have him 4th. I do not think the 2026 RB class measures anywhere close to 2025. Give me your top 5 RBs for 2026 and where they would rank against 2025. Just saying “always RBs available “ is easy. I agree someone will pop that you don’t expect, but as of today the class looks weak to me. Maybe as weak as 2011, 2013, 2014, 2015 (Melvin Gordon aside) and 2024 (Irving aside, jury still out). I think Love will be good, but how good, and how good are the others? It was clear to most the 2025 class was good, a good year or more out from the draft.
 
Last edited:

My only thing to add on quality of the RB class pushing some players down is if we are making that contention should player like Judkins and Henderson be held in higher regard then RB's who were chosen as high as them? I don't view them that way myself, but they already got major bumps for going in a premium zone.
IMO, yes. But everything I've learned/read over the years with relative draft position values, albeit it simplified for brevity, is a few picks range in the first round is semi equivalent to a full round later in the draft. So early vs mid vs late first might be statistically meaningful looking at historical projections and outcomes, but early vs mid vs late fourth round usually has next to no significant statistical correlation.

That being said; should Judkins and Henderson be held in higher regard than previous RBs drafted in the same spots over the past 5 years? Again, IMO, yeah; I think those two are better than most of the backs who've come out since Barkley save a few. But obviously that might be the difference of a few draft spots, not a half a round, or even a full round. As we move later in the 2025 draft, so say a guy like Skattebo taken in the 4th round, (and taking out my bias he was under drafted even in this class haha) I think he would have easily been a third round back (if not higher) in many of the previous draft classes.

It's all subjective, and I could be totally wrong. It's just the position I've fallen into after taking in as much info as I could on this class.

One quick addition; seems like your putting a decent amount of weight into this "the Steelers were going to trade back instead of take KJ" as a knock. If it's true, I get that. It's less confidence inspiring than trading up to take a player. I just haven't seen that info out there, and wonder if it's really true. Did a quick google search and saw lots of articles about them trying to trade back into the first potentially using that third round pick. But that would obviously have absolutely nothing to do with KJ. Didn't see anything about them being in the third round with KJ falling to them and trying to move out rather than take him. Again, even if Tomlin said that himself in an interview, I'd want a little more context before I made it a "they must not like KJ that much" thing. Afterall, my man crush Skattebo was still on the board; maybe they had them graded similarly in which case a trade back would make sense. I had Cam graded as my RB3/4 in this class.
 
So give this guy a crease in an outside zone play and he looks great. But he never makes people miss on his own. He needs good blocking. I just don't see the love for this guy.
This couldn't be more wrong. Google is free man. It's fine to not like him, but at least fact check yourself before saying things that are completely baseless. 66 missed tackles forced on 240 rushes; a rate of 27.5%. PFF also has him in the 94th percentile for YAC per attempt. He both makes people miss, and drags them for more yards, than just about any RB in this class. He's basically behind Jeanty, and alongside Skattebo, with regards to elusiveness. He also did this facing stacked boxes on 50% of all his touches. The next highest RB in this class was at 39%.

You wanna hate on him; jump on the "he's slow" bandwagon. At least there's some actual data to make that argument.
The slow stuff is nonsense. His 40 time is good for a guy his size, but also not a reflection of his speed. His game speeds are crazy fast. He has a ton of explosive runs.
This guy is going to thrive in Pittsburgh. I am not saying he is going to be incredible but he will get volume and is good enough to put up solid numbers.
Agreed. Easily one of the safest late 1st round rookie picks ever.
I guess it depends on your expectations but his poor draft capital does not allow me to share this point of view.

And fwiw I like him and was in on him early in redrafts before the NFL draft. I just see the low level of draft commitment as making him a long term dynasty asset as risky.
3rd round is pretty good draft capital for a RB
It's back end of round 3, let's not pretend that's less then ideal and it's a pretty far cry away from being safe.

Would have been nice if I had heard they thought about moving up. Instead I discovered they actually tried to forego the pick and move back into round 4.

The Steelers have three 3 thirds next year to say nothing of the two 4's and 5's. This again is why he's not what I consider a safe investment. The commitment to him is low and the ability to bring in comp is high.
To be fair to Meno (and these numbers will differ a bit based on what thresholds you use), in general fantasy success rates for 3rd round RBs are about 75% of the success rates for 2nd round RBs for a single season; they are about 50% of round 2 RBs for multiple seasons. The charting I use has 2nd round RB single season top 12 chance at 71% and 3rd round at 50%. I have multiple seasons as a top 12 back for 2nd round backs at 42%, while 3rd round drops to 22%. Trying to interpret that data leans into what I think Meno is getting at; multiple seasons of top 12 production start to drop with lower draft capital as they are simply more easily replaced/moved on from.

Kaleb aside; I'm still in the boat that as much as the above numbers are statistical trends for a reason, if there was a year to think some of guys will go against this trend it's this one. The class was incredibly talented and deep IMO. So while the odds are still certainly against a 3rd round RB having multiple top 12 seasons, the numbers tell us ~2 out of every 10 still do it and I think, in general, this class will provide us with more of these aberrations who hit the long odds. I'm making this same gamble with guys like Skattebo, Blue, Neal, and Brooks. And I think when we look at their profiles and data like YAC, MTF, YPRR, etc. and compare these numbers against rookie RB classes from the past 5+ years; the 2025 backs are generally comparable to previous rookies drafted a round+ higher than this year's guys were.

I'm still trying to find the balance between paragraph 1 and paragraph 2; but I'm continually leaning on the gamble of #2. Playing dynasty in a 3 year window, if Kaleb gives me an RB1 season and two RB2 seasons for a late 1st round pick, I still think I can consider that a win and not worry much about what happens after that. Anything more would just be "found money". And for Kaleb specifically, I think the Steelers have enough needs on that team that if Kaleb is doing well, I can see them not spending many/any early round picks on RB for the next few years. Not to mention, I think it's highly unlikely we have another RB class this deep for the next couple years (but who really knows on this front). I can say I'm not at all impressed with the 2026 class outside Love and Singleton. And those guys might be 1st round picks with the classes overall weakness. I'd bet heavily they aren't falling to the 3rd round outside injury or off field issues.
Thanks for the detailed reply but this convo has gone a bit sideways from my comment I don't view him safe.

I had Kaleb ranked as my 8th overall player in rookie drafts, chose him at 9, so I'm certainly not dismissing his chances but I was just responding to the safe comment. I was pretty high on him before the draft and had 9 redraft leagues before the NFL draft and chose him in 6 of the 9 leagues. I felt that his two best possible landing spots were the Bears or Steelers so there are certainly things to be hopeful about with him and him having a nice or big rookie season will be a boon to me.

But with regards to "safe".

I just don't view a player chosen in the 80's, when the team tried to move back off the pick and had reasons to believe it would have cost them Johnson moving back into round 4, as a safe investment. It's more taking a calculated swing IMO. For me safe is a player I view as talented who the team has a level of commitment towards with either draft capital and/or moving up to get if the player fell. Again in the Steelers case they were willing to move back.

My only thing to add on quality of the RB class pushing some players down is if we are making that contention should player like Judkins and Henderson be held in higher regard then RB's who were chosen as high as them? I don't view them that way myself, but they already got major bumps for going in a premium zone.


In terms of next years class I do see a lot of solid RB prospects with Love looking elite. But in the end how worried I would be on Kaleb surviving the draft has more to do with how he plays. I'm just making the point they have a boatload of draft capital next year and that if he's merely ok they got a ton of ammo to bring in meaningful comp which again puts some dents in his "safe" label.

As a far more minor issue is we don't yet really have a firm grasp on how good he can be if he's not in the outside zone scheme and what happens if that changes? Arthur Smith has head coaching ambitions and was reportedly offered the NC head coaching job. Just saying with a decent year there is a chance that the perfect system for Kaleb has legit danger or changing.

This guy could be the next Demarco Murry/Larry Johnson or just a RBBC/handcuff type of guy and neither outcome would be even midly surprising. The range is large. Again in summary this is why to me he's more of what I view as a homerun shot then "safe".
I think next year’s draft, other than QB, is weak. You have a couple of RBs (Love and Taylor) and a bunch of mid tier WRs and no TEs. Baxter is a wildcard. Just my opinion of course.
I don't view it as weak myself, always RB's available. You are listing a guy as RB2 and I saw two top 5 lists last week that Taylor did not crack any of them.

No one was viewing Kaleb as much of a prospect this time last year.
I like Darius Taylor, thus the reason I listed him in the discussion. Baxter is interesting coming back from a serious injury. While Love is getting the hype, I wonder where he would rank if he was in this year’s draft? Personally I would have him 4th. I do not think the 2026 RB class measures anywhere close to 2025. Give me your top 5 RBs for 2026 and where they would rank against 2025. Just saying “always RBs available “ is easy. I agree someone will pop that you don’t expect, but as of today the class looks weak to me. Maybe as weak as 2011, 2013, 2014, 2015 (Melvin Gordon aside) and 2024 (Irving aside, jury still out). I think Love will be good, but how good, and how good are the others? It was clear to most the 2025 class was good a good year or more out from the draft.
Have not ranked my 2026 RBs past the top two but IMO saying the RB class is weak is the easy thing to say, not saying there will always be RB's.

I'm pretty sure if you look at this years class a ton of the top 10 drafted RB's were barely on people's radar this time last year. Kaleb included.

And I think Love is an elite prospect.
 
One quick addition; seems like your putting a decent amount of weight into this "the Steelers were going to trade back instead of take KJ" as a knock. If it's true, I get that. It's less confidence inspiring than trading up to take a player. I just haven't seen that info out there, and wonder if it's really true
Nothing the Steelers said, was from the article on the Jags were Mike Silver was embedded in their draft room.

From the article: The Pittsburgh Steelers had reached out with an offer that could have allowed the Jags to move up to 83, but Gladstone deemed it insufficient.

 
One other thing; and it applies to much more than Kaleb, but it comes up with him for obvious reasons. "Sure ______ runs great in a zone scheme, but can ________ succeed in another scheme?" The way I've always interpreted it; consensus is it is much more difficult for a RB to run a zone scheme than a gap scheme. The main reason is a gap scheme has a designated hole that you hit and that's it. Lower your head and truck stick. The most you're tasked with doing tends to be following a pulling guard and deciding left/right of that pulling lineman.

Zone has a RB needing to actually use his vision to read a defense, find the crease that opens knowing it may not be exactly as designed, and often has to make a second level defender crashing down miss. It's safer bc it mitigates lost yardage run plays as typically you're first contact is a second level defender as opposed to gap where you are by design leaving a d-lineman unblocked. This is typically the d-end or in-line outside LB (probably the most athletic and elite guy on most defenses). While there are some differences between inside zone and outside zone schemes; they are mostly impacting the lineman blocking not the RB. And also most teams who run zone run both inside and outside, and both require the same skill sets. Inside zones rely a bit more on cut backs, outside more on beating a man to the edge. One final point; on average last I saw ALL NFL offenses run zone schemes. In fact zone running schemes are in general favored. The teams that run zone the least run it about 40% of the time (gap about 60%). The teams that run it the most are at about 80% of the time (gap 20%).

All that to say, in general, it takes more talent/skill to run a zone scheme than a gap. So typically if a guy can excel at zone, he will also excel at gap. It's just that your bowling ball RBs might have a slight advantage in gap schemes (but these guys also are much less transferable to running a zone). And regardless, zone is the prominent scheme to run in the NFL. Even those who run it the least are nearing 50% zone. Meanwhile a good chunk of the league is nearing 70%+. If player X excels at zone, it's much more logical to look at as a positive if he lands in a zone, and a net 0 if he doesn't. I don't think there's a real downside to that guy. I'd be much more worried about a RB who's played gap his whole career and now has to prove he has the vision, patience, and footwork/lateral agility to run a zone.
 

Users who are viewing this thread

Back
Top