XFL Fantasy Awards - Most Valuable Unit

It was a fun five weeks of XFL action in its second iteration. Sadly, it is over and we only have next season to look forward to.

We carry on with our premature postseason awards for the XFL 2020 season by looking at the most valuable unit. What positional group helped its team the most?

I have already written about the most valuable players, most promising players, and most disappointing players. For links to those articles and more XFL coverage, check the bottom of this page.

Most Valuable Unit - Winner: Houston Roughnecks WR/TEs

There wasn't a more dominant offensive unit in the XFL this season than that of the Roughnecks receivers and it wasn't even close. Houston's receivers (WRs+TEs) racked up 324.9 PPR points on the season and ranked no. 1 in that fantasy category along with those of total receptions, receiving yards, and receiving touchdowns. P.J. Walker manned an offense that went all the way to the highest spot of every available leaderboard and guided Houston to an impeccable 5-0 season.

Houston was overly reliant on the exploits of Cam Phillips, who led the league at the position with his impossible 136.5 PPR, but the contributions of Nick Holley (55.9) and Kahlil Lewis (55) were also notable for the Roughnecks.

One thing I considered when picking Houston's unit as the winning one was durability. All of the aforementioned players took the field in all of the five played games while the no. 2 unit (LA's, as we'll see next) missed a bunch of matches thus lowering its fantasy impact on a weekly basis.

Most Valuable Unit - Runner Up: Los Angeles Wildcats WR/TEs

As I already stated, had it not been because of the games they missed, it's more than probable that the Wildcats receiving unit would have snatched this award from Houston's. LA put two receivers in the top-five players at the position (Tre McBride and Nelson Spruce) yet both of them missed two games entirely. The third-best receiver of the Wildcats (Jordan Smallwood) finished as WR14 AND 21st-best player on the year no matter the position.

Of all receivers with at least 20 targets on the season (there were 20 players meeting the threshold), LA had three players with 28 or fewer yet ranking inside the top-17 of those 20 players. Looking at it from the opposite angle, of players with 30 targets at most the three Wildcats rank first, second, and seventh in PPR over the season.

On a per-play basis, I'm sure anyone could make a case for the Wildcats having the best receiving unit of the league, but for fantasy purposes, it was too much of a risk over the five-game season to bet on weekly. If they can keep the pack together next season and on the field more often than not, there is no reason to not consider them a potential contender for this award.

Most Valuable Unit - Third Place: Dallas Renegades RBs

Running backs don't matter... unless you use them as pseudo-receivers just forming in the backfield. That is Dallas did in the XFL, and that is how the Renegades tailbacks dominated the position by a considerable margin. A quick look at how each team used their running backs is telling enough.

Not only did Dallas' rushers led the league in PPR points over the season, but they did so easily. Cameron Artis-Payne reached 70.6 PPR and finished as RB1 and eighth-best player overall while Lance Dunbar (61 PPR) closed the year as the RB3 and 13th-best player in the XFL. The combination of the two (along with Marquis Young and Austin Walter) logged just the fifth-most rushing attempts on the season but finished light years ahead of the competition in targets. Artis-Payne (27) and Dunbar (29) were targeted 56 times, and the whole New York Guardians backfield saw a combined 26 targets, just 46% of what the two players did when looked at paired, and fewer than any of them alone. New York used four tailbacks, by the way.

If you're targeting any running back for the 2021 season, make sure you bank on Dallas' and keep in mind that no matter what receiving numbers will always trump rushing stats.

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