I have a whole spreadsheet with workout numbers for all the first round RBs since the Steven Jackson/Chris Perry/Kevin Jones class.
If you're interested in some of the results, I made this post a while back:
EBF said:
Holy Schneikes said:
This would be more meaningful to me if the arbitrary cut off for big vs. small wasn't 210, when two of the upper tier prospects were measured at 207 and 209. So if Sankey was one pound heavier, he'd be a lock for the 1st round? He would certainly meet all the of the other criteria you mentioned.
Here is the list of players by BMI along with their 40 times:
NAME BMI 40 Jonathan Stewart 33.5 4.46 Trent Richardson 33.5 4.48 Doug Martin 32.7 4.46 Rashard Mendenhall 32.2 4.41 Mark Ingram 31.7 4.62 DeAngelo Williams 31.6 4.45 Ronnie Brown 31.4 4.43 Cedric Benson 31.4 4.62 Beanie Wells 30.9 4.52 Kevin Jones 30.8 X Knowshon Moreno 30.7 4.5 Cadillac Williams 30.5 4.43 Steven Jackson 30.1 4.55 Chris Perry 30 4.56 Donald Brown 30 4.46 Ryan Mathews 30 4.37 David Wilson 30 4.38 Marshawn Lynch 29.9 4.46 Laurence Maroney 29.7 4.48 Joseph Addai 29.7 4.4 Felix Jones 29.6 4.44 Jahvid Best 28.5 4.34 Reggie Bush 28.3 4.37 Adrian Peterson 28.3 4.4 Darren McFadden 27.7 4.33 CJ Spiller 27.7 4.27 Chris Johnson 27.5 4.24
The average BMI is 30.3. Once you start to get around ~1.5 points off that mark, I think you start to get into the territory of "big" and "small" backs. It is a little bit arbitrary, but there is a pretty large gap between that bottom cluster and the rest of the group. It's also very interesting that all six of the 28.5 or lower BMI backs ran at least a 4.40 in the 40. It demonstrates how critical it is to be blazing fast if you're a RB with a lean frame.
If you sort by weight, you get something like this:
Joseph Addai 29.7 214 4.4 Darren McFadden 27.7 211 4.33 Donald Brown 30 210 4.46 Felix Jones 29.6 207 4.44 David Wilson 30 206 4.38 Reggie Bush 28.3 201 4.37 Jahvid Best 28.5 199 4.34 Chris Johnson 27.5 197 4.24 CJ Spiller 27.7 196 4.27
The same general pattern holds true. Ignoring BMI, it's accurate to just look at weight and conclude that lighter backs have to be faster to be drafted high.
You can argue about the specifics all you want, but the general pattern is obvious. Any RB lower on the weight/BMI scale will generally have to run a blazing 40 time to get picked in the 1st round. Look at the 40 times for guys like Gio Bernard (4.50), Tre Mason (4.50), Lache Seastrunk (4.51), and Bishop Sankey (4.49). Those guys all weigh between 200-209 pounds and none of them has even above average measured track speed. The combination of the low overall weight and the lack of 40 speed probably explains why you didn't/won't see those guys come off the board in the first 32 picks.
It's a very similar story for the big backs. Even if they're heavy, they still have to test well. Of the 27 first round RBs, only 6 ran 4.50 or slower (Beanie, SJax, Benson, Perry, Moreno, Ingram). Of that group, only two ran 4.60 or slower (Benson and Ingram). That's a bad sign for Eddie Lacy (4.64), Carlos Hyde (4.66), and Jeremy Hill (4.66). LeVeon Bell ran 4.56 in the 40 (slower than everyone besides Chris Perry, Mark Ingram, and Cedric Benson). He also did very poorly in the jumps with a 31.5" vertical and 9'10" broad jump. Both well off the average marks.
zamboni said:
teams won't pay up for a starting RB unless he's viewed as a supreme talent.
That is the key idea. It's not enough to be serviceable to get picked this high. A RB prospect generally needs to be either insanely explosive (i.e. Spiller, McFadden, Bush) or be big with solid explosiveness for that size (i.e. Stewart, Martin, Mathews).
None of the highly-touted RB prospects from the 2013 class or 2014 class fit that mold, which has nothing to do with the league's valuation of RBs and everything to do with the player pool. You can't say that the NBA doesn't value franchise centers when all the centers in the draft are 6'9". That's essentially what's been going on the past two years. The argument that the league has moved away from coveting franchise backs would be a lot more compelling if there were somebody with awesome measurables, versatility and production who still somehow slipped out of the first round. I haven't seen that.
What we're seeing is probably just a temporary down cycle in the quality of the backs coming out of college. It doesn't help that a guy like Lattimore blew up his knee twice while a guy like Dyer who has freaky mass/speed/explosiveness went off the rails. If those things don't happen, maybe we're talking about how this 2014 class is a huge disappointment relative to the two first round RBs we had last year.
Some CliffsNotes details that stuck out to me:
- The average first round RB is 217 pounds with a 30.3 BMI, a 4.44 40, a 35.8" vertical, and a 10'2" broad jump.
- Only 8 of 27 backs were below 214 pounds. Of those 8 backs,
all 8 ran below 4.50 in the 40.
- Only 6 of 27 backs were below 210 pounds. Of those 6 backs, 5 ran 4.3X or better in the 40. The only one who didn't was Felix Jones (who btw was a bust).
- 21 of 27 had a BMI of 29.6 or higher. All 6 below that threshold ran at least a 4.40 in the 40.
There is an inverse correlation between body thickness and 40 time, which is why almost all of the fastest times came from the lightest/thinnest backs (i.e. Jahvid Best, Chris Johnson, CJ Spiller, Reggie Bush). Ryan Mathews is the only back with a 30+ BMI to also run a 4.3X or faster in the 40. McFadden and Mathews were the only 210+ pound backs to run 4.3X or better and McFadden is near the very bottom of the BMI scale (he has a decent weight, but only because he's tall).
If you want to look at this stuff more, let's go back to the averages for a second...
217 pounds with a 30.3 BMI, a 4.44 40, a 35.8" vertical, and a 10'2" broad jump.
It's not quite accurate to view these as cutoffs since a really fast/explosive back can get away with being lighter than 217/30.3 and a really heavy/thick back can get away with being slower/less explosive than 4.44/35.8"/10'2". In fact, MOST first round RBs won't hit the mark in every drill. But in general, these are good ballpark figures for what a first round RB needs to look like physically. Now consider this year's RB class, as ranked by Draft Scout:
Tre Mason -
207 pounds, 31.1 BMI,
4.50 40, 38.5" vertical, 10'6" broad jump.
Carlos Hyde - 230 pounds, 31.5 BMI,
4.66 40, 34.5" vertical, 9'6" broad jump
Bishop Sankey -
209 pounds, 30.5 BMI,
4.49 40, 35.5" vertical, 10'6" broad jump
Jeremy Hill - 233 pounds, 31.2 BMI,
4.66 40, 29" vertical, 9'5" broad jump
KaDeem Carey -
207 pounds, 30.3 BMI,
4.70 40, 32.5" vertical, 9'7" broad jump
Andre Williams - 230 pounds, 31.8 BMI,
4.56 40, 38" vertical, 10'9" broad jump
Terrance West - 225 pounds, 33.0 BMI,
4.54 40, 33.5" vertical, 10'0" broad jump
Lache Seastrunk -
201 pounds, 29.3 BMI, 4.51 40, 41.5" vertical, 11'2" broad jump
The fact that none of these guys has a totally clean profile shouldn't be very alarming, as it's almost impossible to find a RB who wouldn't have at least one red mark here. Peterson would get dinged for his BMI. Chris Johnson for his BMI and weight. Steven Jackson for any number of things. Of the guys on my list, only Jonathan Stewart and Marshawn Lynch clear the bar in every category. Mathews and Martin are extremely close. The fact that none of these rookies met that standard isn't really that damning on its own.
However, there are some interesting things in these rookie results. First off, if you look at all of the guys who are red-flagged for low weight, every single one of them is also red-flagged for a slow 40 time. In other words, the light backs in this draft are also not very fast. So there's no CJ Spiller or Reggie Bush this year.
Hyde and Hill pass the weight/BMI barriers easily, but they're off the mark in the speed/explosiveness. That's to be expected to a certain extent, as thicker/heavier backs tend to run a little slower and jump a little worse. It's not the fact that they missed the averages that's alarming. It's the fact that they missed by such a huge margin. Their 4.66 40 times aren't even remotely close to the 4.46 average. Hyde has a moderately decent vertical and putrid broad jump. Hill was just awful in the jumps. Far, far off the standard of guys like Doug Martin, Steven Jackson, and Ryan Mathews.
Carey's profile is just an absolute mess, as he's at or below average in every category. Usually by a huge margin.
If you believe that Seastrunk's pro day time is more accurate than his combine time, he starts to look like he has a shout at being a Jahvid Best/Reggie Bush/CJ Spiller/David Wilson type who compensates for small size with dynamic workout measurables. Therein lies the problem though. He ran a 4.51 at the neutral environment of the combine. Hardly a 1st round time for a 201 pound back.
Terrance West is intriguing because of his respectable 40/broad/vertical at a high weight and BMI, but all the same he's below par in all of those drills. Add in the small school factor and he's certainly not a first round back.
Oddly enough, Andre Williams comes out with the cleanest profile. On paper, he has many of the physical qualities of a first round back. He's big. He's explosive. He's reasonably fast for his height. I think he's a prime candidate to be picked higher than projected, but ultimately he's probably not quite special enough. Especially when you factor in subjective analysis and his total lack of elusiveness/receiving ability.
That's a really long-winded post, but I'm just trying to illustrate why I don't buy the "RBs are devalued narrative."
If Hyde had blown up the combine with a 4.45 40, a 38" vertical, and a 10'5" broad jump at his same height/weight, he'd likely be right in the first round mix.
It takes the right combination of physical traits and nobody out there seems like a strong candidate this year.
