Running Back Hit Rates 2016-2020
Each and every season NFL fans look back on the draft and immediately wonder: “Was it a good draft for my team?” At the same time, fantasy managers are busy preparing for their upcoming fantasy drafts and the dynasty managers for their annual rookie drafts. Since joining the RotoHeat team a few years ago, I have been looking into historical data to try and determine hit rates of drafted prospects. Today, I take a look at the Running Back position and their hit rates for those drafted from 2016 thru 2020. Frequently we see people labeling these college prospects as “can’t miss” prospects. Well, I hate to break to you Heat Seekers, but there is no such thing as a sure thing.
In order to review hit rates, it’s important to define what qualifies as a “hit.” I define a running back hit as any RB that has delivered a top-12 season at any point in their career. A RB that has multiple top-12 seasons is a Super-Hit and a RB with multiple top-6 finishes is a Mega-Hit.
Since the 2016 NFL draft, there have been 105 running backs drafted. Of those 105 RBs, 8 were first round selections, 13 in the second, 14 in the third, 23 in the fourth, and a total of 47 selected in rounds 5-7. What the data will shows us once again is that draft capital is king.
5. Rounds 5-7
What should come as little surprise, running backs selected in round 5-7 don’t frequently deliver fantasy relevant seasons. Of the 47 players drafted in these rounds, 3 have delivered a hit season from 2016-2020. Those players are Jordan Howard, Aaron Jones, and Chris Carson. Aaron Jones would be the only one to do it on multiple occasions, finishing as RB2 in 2019 and RB5 in 2020, giving Jones Mega-Hit status.
Sleepers at the RB position in these rounds are extremely rare. Taking a look back to 2010, there were an additional 59 RBs selected between 2010-2015, and only three of them (Alfred Morris, Latavius Murray, and Jay Ajayi) delivered a top-12 fantasy season. So, dating back to 2010, we have 106 RBs selected between rounds 5-7, and of those 106, 6 (5.67%), have delivered their fantasy managers a hit season. I think it’s safe to say that if you draft a RB selected in these rounds, then your expectations should be extremely low.
4. Round 4
Jumping into round 4, taking a look at the 23 RBs drafted from 2016-2020, there is one RB here that delivered a top-12 season, and that is Chicago Bears’ RB Tarik Cohen.
Cohen in 2018 finished as RB11 in PPR scoring and hasn’t come close since with a RB27 finish in 2019 and an injury related RB110 finish in 2020. There have been two other backs selected in round 4 from 2016-2020 that mustered up a top-24 season–Marlon Mack and his teammate Nyheim Hines. The other 20 backs here have RB3 or worse results throughout the duration of their careers thus far.
In addition to Tarik Cohen, there have been 4 RBs to deliver a hit season when included the 24 backs selected from 2010-2015–Lamar Miller, Devonta Freeman, James White and Mike Davis. Miller and Freeman hit Super-Hit status with their multiple top-12 seasons, and Freeman is the lone Mega-Hit member after his RB1 season in 2015 and his RB6 season a year later. In total, dating back to the 2010 NFL draft there have been 47 running backs selected in the 4th round and 5 of them produced a total of 7 hit seasons.
3. Round 3
A expected, we start to see some fantasy relevant RBs start to emerge from the 14 third round selected running backs. 4 of the 14 (29%) have delivered at least one hit season thus far in their careers. Alvin Kamara, Kareem Hunt, James Conner, and David Montgomery are that crew.
Alvin Kamara with his 4 hit seasons and Cleveland RB Kareem Hunt with his three top-12 finishes qualify for Super-Hit status. Kamara, with three seasons inside the top-6, is the lone Mega-Hit back drafted in the 3rd round from 2016-2020. There were 14 backs selected in round 3 from 2010-2015, and three of them climbed the top-12 mountain–DeMarco Murray David Johnson, and Duke Johnson. Both DeMarco Murray and David Johnson have three top-12 finishes to their name, and Duke had his lone top-12 season in 2017 finishing as RB11. Murray, with his RB6 finish in 2013 and RB2 finish in 2014, qualifies as a Mega-Hit.
Dynasty rosters can not be comprised of top-12 running backs only, and round 3 backs should be considered when drafting your rookies. Three of the fourteen backs drafted here between 2016-2020 have at least one top-24 season, and looking back on the 2010-2015 backs, another eight have done the same.
2. Round 2
Since the 2016 NFL Draft, there have been a total of thirteen RBs selected in round 2, and they have produced a grand total of eight top-12 finishes. Those eight hit seasons have come from Derrick Henry, Dalvin Cook, Joe Mixon, Nick Chubb, and Jonathan Taylor. Henry, Cook, and Chubb have delivered multiple top-12 seasons, and both Henry and Dalvin Cook have hit Mega-Hit status.
Taking a look further back, there were 19 RBs selected in the second round 2010-2015. Those 19 backs combined for 7 hit seasons. The hit seasons came courtesy of Le’Veon Bell, Eddie Lacy, Jeremy Hill and Carlos Hyde. Bell has done it three times and Eddy Lacy twice. Bell, with his RB1 2014, RB3 2016, and RB2 2017, is the lone Mega-Hit. Round two continues to see more and more elite backs coming off the board as NFL teams are less and less willing to select a running back in Round 1. In addition to the hit seasons, we have 7 more top-24 RB seasons from 2016-2021 and a lot of hope for this group in the coming years. Second round drafted RBs are backs to target in your rookie drafts.
1. Round 1
Round 1, as one would expect, sees a rather high hit rate. Of the 8 RBs selected in the first round between 2016-2020, 5 of them (62.5%) have delivered a hit season. Half of the first round class has Super-Hit status, and two (Ezekiel Elliott and Christian McCaffrey) are Mega-Hits. Drafting a first round selected running back is as safe as it gets when drafting your rookie running backs. Of the eight drafted here, only Rashaad Penny and Sony Michel have failed to deliver at top-24 season or better.
There were eight backs selected in round 1 from 2010-2015 as well. Of those eight backs, 7 of them combined to deliver 15 hit seasons. The only first round selected RB drafted between 2010-2015 to not deliver at least one hit season was New York Giant RB David Wilson. Four of those RBs – Mark Ingram (4), Doug Martin (2), Todd Gurley (3) and Melvin Gordon (3), did it on multiple occasions. Mega-Hit wise, Todd Gurley is the lone recipient with his 2017 RB1 and 2018 RB3 finishes.
In conclusion, we have 105 running backs drafted since the 2016 NFL Entry draft. Those 105 running backs have produced a total of 35 top-12 or better finishes, and 23 top-24 or better seasons. Those 35 top-12 or better finishes came from 16 of the 105 (34%). Four of the sixteen (25%) were first round selections, five of the sixteen (31%) were second round selections, and three of the sixteen (19%) were drafted in round 3. Twelve of the nineteen backs (63%) to deliver their fantasy managers a hit season were selected in the top three rounds of the NFL draft. The bottom line is when drafting running backs this offseason, you should be targeting the backs selected in the first three rounds to maximize the return on your investment.
It is difficult at this point of the offseason to predict where the top ranked rookie running backs will be drafted this season. Using the historical data dating back to 2010, we know that 234 running backs were selected. In addition, we know that there have been 34 (14.5%) backs to finish with a top-12 season at least once in their career. So, of the top 24 ranked RBs in the 2021 draft class, we would expect as of today that 3 of them will have at least one top-24 season. There will be useful RB2 and RB3 seasons from these backs as well. Rookies are risky, and to limit your risk you need to be drafting top-100 NFL picks whenever possible.
Thank you for reading 2016-2020 Running Back Hit Rates
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