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Plunging into the world of football analytics is without question a great way to find fantasy sleepers for the coming season. Especially in the case of running backs, considering overall elusiveness is arguably the best way to determine how good (or bad) a player's performance was. And that's what this is all about.
I will be looking at advanced rushing data from Pro-Football-Reference.com, and on top of that, crossing those numbers with 2021 ADP values from fantasy drafts up to this date in order to find the best sleepers poised to have big seasons this year given their 2020 numbers. All of it will be focused on how many missed tackles these players forced, how often they broke tackles relative to volume, and their tendency to accumulate yardage after contact.
The average draft position definitely plays a role here, considering many of these players can be had at a mid-to-late-round bargain price. Let's get to it!
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2021 Missed Tackles Forced Sleepers
Damien Harris, New England Patriots
This list of players is ordered alphabetically and I'm glad Damien Harris comes in first. That way, we can deal with the Patriots' never-ending three-headed monster of a backfield that, you're right, New England will most probably feature for another season--and that is without taking rushing-QB Cam Newton's presence on that same field... anyway. When it comes to missed tackles, few players did it to Harris' levels in 2020. The counting stats aren't gaudy (just 12 BrkTkl on the year) but when put in context, it looks much better.
Harris was one of only 29 rushers to break a tackle on fewer than a 12-rushing-attempt basis. Not that great, right? Well, now consider that only 12 of those players have better averages than Harris while still having an ADP cheaper than Harris' 107 (at the time of this writing). Things look much better from that angle. And it gets even tastier if we keep adding data to the analysis: Harris is one of three players with 200+ snaps, <12 ruAtt/BrkTkl, and a 100+ ADP.
New England will, once more, run (no pun intended) with all of Harris, Sony Michel, and James White, sure, but Harris has the best numbers when it comes to dodging defensive bullets while bulldozing his way through tackles. He racked up the most Yards Before Contact (429) and second-most Yards After Contact (262) among players with <250 snaps played in 2020 and added a couple of scores to his line.
James Conner, Arizona Cardinals
Although James Conner only played 13 games in 2020, starting 11 of them, he was still able to stay on the field for the 15th-most snaps (522) among all rushers. The efficiency definitely wasn't mindblowing with 0.32 FP/snap (15th-highest among RBs with 500+ snaps) but the volume was so high that Conner easily made up for his lack of overall efficiency.
The volume might go a little bit down in Arizona, as he profiles as the no. 2 back behind RB1 Chase Edmonds. Whether that ends being true or not, we'll have to wait and see, but Conner's numbers on the YAC and BrkTkl cats were absolutely insane. Conner amassed 721 total rushing yards on the year with a 1.15 YBC:YAC ratio. He broke 17 tackles in his 169 rushing attempts. Those 17 BrkTkl "only" ranked 11th among all rushers, but when looking at the ruAtt/BrkTkl, the mark sits at 9.9, the seventh-best mark among rushers with 150+ rushing attempts in 2020.
The most incredible thing about Conner as I'm typing this is his ultra-low 122+ ADP. Sure, he will be facing competition that just wasn't there in Pittsburgh, but even then, finding Conner available past the 10th round in 12-team leagues is still a little surprising considering his abilities.
Mike Davis, Atlanta Falcons
Mike Davis is rising through the ADP leaderboards by the day and becoming one of the most coveted fantasy assets during the early fantasy draft season. A 100-ADP player by the start of April, the fact that Atlanta opted to pass on bolstering its backfield other than adding veteran Cordarrelle Patterson has fantasy GMs salivating out there with the possibilities of seeing a full season of Mike Davis putting on Carolina numbers. And oh boy were those good backing up CMC in 2020.
Davis logged 15 games played last season, though realistically he was the RB1 of the Panthers in the 12 games CMC missed entirely. All games considered, though, Davis played 557 snaps and piled 165 rushing attempts in which he gained 642 yards with six scores while racking up 373 extra yards catching 59 passes for two more touchdowns. Not bad for a backup, am I right? Well, it is not only that those numbers aren't bad, it is that they are even better if you look under the rug.
Even removing any snap or rushing-attempt threshold, Mike Davis ranked 17th in YBC/YAC ratio at 0.61. That mark was the second-best among rushers with 100+ ruAtt in 2020 with Davis getting 244 yards before contact but a monster 398 after contact. In case you're wondering, Davis broke 21 (!!!) tackles (tied fourth-most) and one every 7.9 rushing attempts. Do you know how many players did it on a higher basis? None, with the second-best already at 8.5 ruAtt/BrkTkl.
Nyheim Hines, Indianapolis Colts
The Colts' backfield has changed between zero and nothing at all, with the biggest change being their bodies now a year older than they were in 2020. Not that it is great news, as Indy already featured three strong tailbacks in Hines, Jonathan Taylor, and Marlon Mack last year, but not that those are the worst news ever either as Hines found his little niche and took advantage of Mack's early season-ending injury to get his numbers up.
Hines closed 2020 with only 89 rushing attempts, but he got 380 yards on the ground for a 4.27 YPC while scoring three rushing touchdowns. Obviously, Taylor was the one taking the heavier ground-load while Hines did most of his damage through the passing game with 64 receptions for 482 yards and four more touchdowns. That overall production meant 0.52 FP/Snap for Hines, the seventh-highest mark among RBs with 350+ snaps on the year. Uh oh.
Focusing on the ground game, though, Hines was far from bad. As it happens with low-volume rushers, his total eight broken tackles look low until you realize he was getting them every 11.1 rushing attempts. That's tied for the 15th-best mark among 350+ snap players, sitting at the same spot as Derrick Henry's. Hines couldn't win a lot of YAC (1.8 per attempt) but he was fairly consistent at breaking tackles. Expectations talk about a three-man RBBC in Indy, but you saw what happened to Mack last season and how Hines will provide value on the passing game no matter how rushing touches are shared between the Colts' tailbacks.
Zack Moss, Buffalo Bills
Buffalo chose to stay (mostly) put when it comes to its backfield for the 2021 season. RB Devin Singletary landed in Bills Town back in 2019 and already out-touched Frank Gore 180 to 179. One year later, Zack Moss was added to the roster and finished with 126 touches to Singletary's 194. That will most probably remain on these same terms in 2021 with the lone addition of Matt Breida to a backfield that should have their two most-used players in Devin and Moss.
While Singletary (9.1 FPG) was slightly better than Moss (7.3) overall, it was the latter who made the most of his--fewer--chances and turned out to be the most efficient tailback of the two. On both fewer targets and rushing attempts, Moss posted higher marks on FP per snap and per opportunity than Singletary. He broke 13 tackles to Devin's eight, and he finished with the fifth-lowest number of attempts per BrkTkl among rushers with at least 300 snaps played through the season.
For the insanely high volume of Singletary, his nine broken tackles were rather low for an average of 17+ rushing attempts between broken tackles, one of the lowest marks among that same group of rushers. Moss outscored Singletary four to two in rushing touchdowns and added one receiving to Singletary's zero in that department. It makes sense to find Moss with an ADP 50+ spots above Singletary's, but even then, everything points toward Zack Moss turning into a late-round steal given the efficient underlying numbers he posted last season.
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