|| DERRICK HENRY WORKLOAD THREAD ||
The Big Dog rushed for over 2,000 yards this season, but you already knew that. I'm here to tackle a more important question for dynasty leaguers.

Is 300+ carries a season sustainable?

Let's look at history, and allow it to be our guide...

Looking at the data, I see 113 seasons from 2000 onward where a RB has 300 or more rush attempts in a season. 2 of those 113 seasons were from 2020, as Derrick Henry (378!) and Dalvin Cook (312) were the newest members of the workhorse club. In total, there are 49 different RBs

who have accomplished the 300 carries feat. Of these 49 players, 31 had at least 2 seasons of 300+ carries.

Derrick Henry is one of those guys, as he also hit the 300 carries threshold in 2019.

The top of this list has 2 notable names. One, I expected, the other surprised me.

LaDainian Tomlinson sits atop the list, with a whopping 7! seasons of 300+ rush attempts in his career. Then, we have Edgerrin James with 6 (this one surprised me), and then we have 8 guys with 4 seasons of 300+ carries, 8 RBs with 3 seasons of 300+ carries, 13 with 2 seasons of

300+, and 19 guys who rushed 300+ times in a season only once.

If we do some basic Bayesian style math (only name dropping that for credibility), we can then see that 18 of 49 players 18/49 = 36.7% only hit 300+ carries once. That means 31 of 49 RBs (31/49= 63.3%) reached 300+

carries multiple seasons. So, if you're on the 300+ carries in a season list like Derrick Henry, you are already more likely than not to do it again. He has, and 3 other current RBs (Adrian Peterson-4, Ezekiel Elliott-3, and LeSean McCoy-2) have also reached 300+ rush attempts

multiple times. Le'Veon Bell has only hit this mark once, and the Frank Gore has only hit 300+ carries one time, as well.

Now, another component to account for is age at the start of the season. Of these 113 seasons, the average age at the start of the season was 26.3 years

old. Derrick Henry will be 27.7 years old at the start of next season. He is already past the average age of these RBs on the whole. Uh oh.

But... let's only look at the RBs that reached 300+ carries multiple times, now that we know Derrick Henry is a part of this group. We

have 95 seasons of 300+ carries among the guys that accomplished this feat more than once, and the average age among these guys was 26.5 years old at the start of the season, very similar to the overall average age of any RB season with 300+ carries (26.3). Not good for

Henry. Fortunately, there have been A LOT of seasons with 300+ carries at ages of 27+. Of the 95 300+ carry seasons (from only the guys that had multiple 300+ carry seasons), 40 of them were accomplished at age 27+. Remember, Henry will be 27.7 at the start of the 2021

season.

Of these 95 seasons from the crew that compiled multiple 300 carry seasons, 7 were done at age 28, 9 were done at age 29, and 8 were done after age 30. This gives me hope for Derrick Henry. Yesterday, I posted that Derrick Henry is a major dynasty SELL coming off a 2,000

yard szn. That was primarily because I thought his value was at an all-time high. No RB has ever rushed for 2,000+ yards twice in their career. That was my reasoning, coupled with his age.

Now, I'm here to tell you that I've reformed my position, slightly. @ClutchFantasy posted

a couple pictures below my Derrick Henry post yesterday, one of Tomlinson, the other of Shaun Alexander. Both these guys had some elite RB seasons when they were in the 27-29 age range. It got me thinking, and I wondered how common it really is for a player to handle the workload

that Henry does, year after year.

I come away from my research changing my statement on Derrick Henry to this:

"Derrick Henry should be sold for a good 2020 RB + a pick, or he should be held onto, as multiple RB1 seasons may be in his future." The "nothing but carries" RB is

a tough line to walk in PPR scoring, but Henry has done that in back to back seasons now, and is joining an elite group in the process. With his frame, work ethic, & contract extension, he is well-positioned to continue to be an outlier. Eddie George (built similarly to Derrick

Henry at 6'3" 235 lbs) had 300+ carries at age 28, age 29, and age 30. There's no reason to think that type of outcome is unattainable for Derrick Henry. Curtis Martin handled 300+ carries in his age 28, 30, and 31 seasons, too. Lamar Smith randomly had 300+ carries in his

age 30 & age 31 seasons, and he was 5'11" 230 lbs, a brick house like Henry. Tiki Barber weighed only 205 lbs, yet he carried the rock 300+ times in his age 29, 30, and 31 seasons. Barber's NFL career path (pictured left) could end up being the blueprint for Derrick Henry (right)

Neither came out of the gate swinging in the NFL, but Barber held up remarkably well as his career went on, and Henry could definitely get there as well, with a full 40 lbs of weight that Barber never had.

If forced into it, I'd still bet against Henry, but it's a very hard

decision, now that I've done the in-depth research. Please leave a like, comment, or retweet if you enjoyed this thread. For those wondering how I can cobble together a thread like this in under an hour, I code in R. I'm happy to teach you everything I know if you want to code

in R for analytics, & I will teach you with football datasets.

http://ThatRCodingSite.com 

On the site, you can view the full course syllabus, read about my educational/professional background, & purchase the course if you want to support my FF work & my burrito addiction. If

you have any questions about the RBs with 300+ carries that my thread didn't cover, ask away. I see you, Big Dog. And I hope you prove me wrong, I really do. Here's to hoping his career path follows the Eddie George or Tiki Barber route, and not the Marshawn Lynch one.

@dynastymasters @jmthrivept @aaronstew09 @fantasynumbers
Talked some RBs with you guys a few times, thought you would enjoy this Derrick Henry thread.