Josh Jacobs is coming off the best year of his career as he led the NFL in rushing yards and yards from scrimmage. He is still hoping for a new contract, but the expectation is that he will be on the field for Week 1.
But will Jacobs have the same type of success this season? Or is he destined to regress? In a recent article by Mike Clay and Field Yates of ESPN, they named six players you should consider avoiding in your fantasy football leagues.
That list included Jacobs, who is going in the third round of drafts right now (ADP of 28.2 on Underdog Fantasy). Here is a snippet of why Clay believes you should be careful about selecting Jacobs too high in your fantasy leagues:
Jacobs is again positioned for a feature back role in Las Vegas, but here’s the concern: He had 340 carries (393 touches) last season. That is a massive number, and history suggests he’s a long shot to (A) repeat that usage, (B) appear in every game again and (C) post as good of a fantasy season.
That barrage of numbers in no way guarantees Jacobs will bust this season, but it should give you pause that he’ll be able to post consecutive top-five fantasy campaigns. I still view him as a back-end RB1, though I’ll be a lot more comfortable going another direction with my second-round pick on draft day. After all, I’ve seen this film before, and I didn’t like the ending.
The history of running backs having success after having 370+ touches in a single season isn’t great. But the good news is that Jacobs should be in line for a ton of touches again this year and we know that translates to fantasy points.
While there is some obvious reason for concern, he is still a major value in the third round of your drafts as he was the highest-scoring running back in fantasy last year. Expect his production to regress a bit to the mean, but not by that much.
