Running back sleepers to consider in 2024 fantasy football drafts

23/08/2024 14:15

Later round running backs who can help give your fantasy football team a boost.

The engine of a proper and successful fantasy football team has historically been the running back position. Bell cows such as LaDainian Tomlinson, Priest Holmes and eventually Derrick Henry were the centerpieces of dominant fantasy football units.

With a rise in running back-by-committee coaching philosophies, the popularization of points per reception (PPR) fantasy formats and the general league shift toward a more pass-centric approach over the past decade, however, the era of the bell cow running back seems to have ended (save for some outliers such as Christian McCaffrey).

Despite the shift in landscape, the running back position continues to be essential in creating a strong spine of one's fantasy football roster, and finding gems late is often the difference between a run-of-the-mill season and something special.

Below are four sleepers to consider in your fantasy football drafts. First, let's define who can be considered a sleeper for the purposes of this article. FantasyPros.com has a handy tool which takes the average ADP (average draft position) of three different platforms — Yahoo, Sleeper and RealTime Fantasy Sports — and compiles them into one list.

Every name in this exercise will be ranked 30th or lower in Fantasy Pros' compiled positional ADP list for running backs in the half-PPR format, and all are typically available in the seventh round or later of 12-team fantasy drafts. You can find the full list of half PPR running back ADPs here.

Javonte Williams - Denver Broncos
Positional ADP: 30th; Overall ADP: 87th

Javonte Williams looked ready to be the NFL's next workhorse running back in his sophomore season, being fed 18, 19 then 20 touches in each of his first three games in 2022 before a torn ACL, LCL and PCL in Game 4 shelved him for the rest of the campaign.

The apprehension, and opportunity, with Williams comes in what was a lackluster 2023 season, where he finished as the overall RB30 in half-PPR in head coach Sean Payton's first year in charge. His yards per attempt fell to 3.6 and yards per reception went from 7.3 in his rookie season to 4.9 last year.

However, it is well known that most running backs just coming off of torn ACLs, let alone multiple torn knee ligament injuries, generally have a downturn in production the next season. Williams will be nearly two full years removed from the injury come Week 1, and he has put to rest any potential durability concerns by playing in 16 out of 17 games in 2023.

In the process, he ranked 17th in overall carries and 16th in overall receptions among running backs and still racked up over 1,000 yards from scrimmage, suggesting that the opportunity is there within the Broncos offense. Payton has also schemed up highly successful running back seasons in the past as head coach of the New Orleans Saints.

Denver employs Jaleel McLaughlin, Samaje Perine and rookie Audric Estime at RB, but make no mistake about it: This is Williams' backfield. The former second-round pick out of the University of North Carolina lost 11 pounds in the offseason and took the majority of first-team reps in training camp before taking the initial nine snaps with the starters in Denver's first preseason game against the Colts. He also had a receiving touchdown (which was called back) in the second preseason game.

Combining the extra year removed from injury with the potential workhorse opportunity share, along with Sean Payton's history of helping scheme an RB1 half-PPR season in each of his last seven years as head coach of the New Orleans Saints — all of that makes Javonte Williams a smash pick at his ADP.

Jerome Ford - Cleveland Browns
Positional ADP: 40th; Overall ADP: 114th

Staying on the topic of running backs coming off of multi-ligament injuries, Browns starting running back Nick Chubb will be aiming to make a return from a gruesome injury in which he tore his ACL, MCL and meniscus last season. This will be the second time he is attempting to come back from multiple torn ligaments in the same knee, the first being in 2015 while he was at the University of Georgia.

Jerome Ford stepped in admirably in relief of Chubb last season, leading the Browns with 1,132 yards from scrimmage and nine total touchdowns, finishing as the overall RB17 in half PPR despite the Browns signing Kareem Hunt for competition shortly after Ford was named starter and despite the fact that Cleveland's offensive line was plagued by injuries.

Ford seems to have been forgotten about going into 2024 with the expectation of Chubb's imminent return, but that return may not be so straightforward. The latest update we received on the former Bulldog's recovery, before preseason started, is that he still "has a little way to go." Chubb is currently on the physically unable to perform (PUP) list and is in danger of missing the start of the season.

Even after he gets back onto the field, one would be hard-pressed to believe that the Browns will give Chubb the type of work rate he received before the injury or that he will be as effective as he was before the injury, as a 28-year-old running back coming off of his second major surgery on the same knee.

All of this bodes well for Jerome Ford, who received 100% of the Browns' first-team snaps in the first preseason game (the starters did not play in the second game), in an offense which was fourth in the NFL in rushing attempts last season. Kareem Hunt is no longer on the roster and Cleveland boasts one of the league's best offensive lines. This is a worthwhile investment in nearly the double-digit rounds.

Rico Dowdle - Dallas Cowboys
Positional ADP: 42nd; Overall ADP: 136th

How often do you get an opportunity to take a running back in the double-digit rounds who may lead the previous year's No. 1 scoring offense in rushing this season? The answer is just about never.

Yet, this is the opportunity Rico Dowdle may find himself in within the Dallas Cowboys depth chart in 2024. Dowdle played second fiddle to Tony Pollard a year ago in what was overall an uninspiring ground game where Pollard took the vast majority of rushing attempts and parlayed them into an inefficient 4.0 yards per carry, a crater-like drop from the 5.2 YPC he had in 2022.

Now, Pollard is in Tennessee, with the Cowboys bringing in the aging Ezekiel Elliott as the primary replacement for Pollard and the main competitor for Dowdle atop the depth chart. Reports from training camp have been that both Dowdle and Elliott have split first-team reps over the summer, and Cowboys reporter Jon Machota from The Athletic even went as far as to say that Dowdle "has to be the favorite" to lead Dallas in rushing this season.

Both Zeke and Rico are going in the mid to later rounds, with the latter being taken on average 34 spots later according to Fantasy Pros' cumulative ADP rankings.

Even if this winds up being an uninspiring committee, Dowdle will be well worth the (on average) late 11th-round pick it will take to get him, given how explosive Dallas' offense is expected to continue being. And If Elliott, who turned 29 over this past summer, winds up missing time, Dowdle will turn into one of the best bang-for-your-buck picks at running back.

Tyrone Tracy Jr. - New York Giants
Positional ADP: 58th; Overall ADP: 198th

I will preface this one by saying that while Tracy suffered what looked to be a serious training camp injury, it was diagnosed to be a low ankle sprain with an expected recovery timeline that would get him back on the field around Week 1.

Opportunity is king for running backs in fantasy football, and Tyrone Tracy Jr. is one of my favorite dart throws you can get essentially for free, because of the potential opportunity.

Before the New York Giants selected him in the fifth round of the 2024 NFL Draft, Tracy put together an elite metric-based season at Purdue where he forced 46 missed tackles on only 113 carries and ranked fifth in PFF's elusive rating.

New York, meanwhile has the tall task of replacing recently departed workhorse Saquon Barkley and, along with Tracy, brought in journeyman Devin Singletary to spearhead the running back room. While Singletary will take the lead to start the season, I could easily foresee Tracy working his way into a timeshare as the year goes along.

The former Boilermaker seems to already have the inside track to the RB2 role behind Singletary, as he started the Giants' first preseason game and was incredibly impressive, forcing four missed tackles on five carries and gaining 23 of his 26 yards after contact.

Tracy, with a background as a wide receiver and with a heavier frame than Singletary, has a three-down skillset. He is certainly a very worthy dart throw in the last round of your draft.