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I don’t know who’s going to emerge from Washington’s backfield. I don’t know if it’ll be Matt Breida or Jordan Howard for the Dolphins. I couldn’t tell you who will be the best RB on the Bucs.
You don’t know either.
And that’s exactly why you should target those backfields.
You don’t know either.
And that’s exactly why you should target those backfields.
In what might be my favorite article of the offseason, @LateRoundQB succinctly broke down commonalities between late-round RB breakouts. He found they usually aren’t handcuffs; it’s the cheaper back in a committee. Link to full article:
https://www.numberfire.com/nfl/news/32021/how-to-find-breakout-running-backs-in-fantasy-football
https://www.numberfire.com/nfl/news/32021/how-to-find-breakout-running-backs-in-fantasy-football
This supports work done on @RotoViz in 2018. Charlie Kleinheksel split RBs into four groups based on ADP: clear RB1, clear RB2, RB1 in a committee, and RB2 in a committee. The final bucket averaged a 9.0% win rate, only behind the clear RB1 group. Link: https://www.rotoviz.com/2018/07/mind-the-gap-taking-advantage-of-backfield-adp-differentials/#link_ajs-fn-id_1-193650
Don’t fade ambiguous backfields just because they’re ambiguous. They often lead to lucrative roles if one guy breaks out, and we might be overconfident in our assessment of them (which is why the RB1 in a committee averages a below-expectation win rate, while RB2s overperform).
This also isn’t a new idea or an original thought. I just wanted to put it out there because I see a lot of people saying to fade the WAS backfield because we don’t know who will be the main guy. That’s exactly why we want to target (some of) them. Uncertainty pushes down cost.
