In Kyren Williams’ last two games, he’s rushed for 301 yards on 36 carries. That’s an average of 8.4 yards per carry, helped by his seven runs of 10-plus yards and four carries of at least 24 yards – including a season-long of 56 yards on Sunday against the Cardinals.
He’s hit his stride as the Rams’ starting running back, ranking 18th in the NFL with 599 yards in just seven games; he missed four games due to a sprained ankle. In rushing yards per game, he leads the league with an average of 85.6, slightly ahead of Christian McCaffrey (85.4).
Williams isn’t the biggest, fastest or most athletic running back, but he’s taking full advantage of the opportunity in front of him – and what’s in front of him is a whole lot of light boxes presented by defenses.
According to Next Gen Stats, Williams is the only qualified running back in the NFL who has yet to run into a stacked box of at least eight defenders. Derrick Henry, for comparison, leads the league with a stacked-box rate of 41.5%.
Going back to the start of the Next Gen Stats era, the lowest stacked-box rate any running back has faced in a season is J.D. McKissic in 2020, when his rate was only 1.18%. Other than that, every running back has had a stacked-box rate of at least 5%. Williams is going for the record because right now, he stands at 0.0%.
There are two questions about this. One, why aren’t teams stacking the box against him. And two, when will this change, if ever?
The first answer is two-fold. Defenses simply aren’t respecting Williams yet, daring the Rams to beat them on the ground. They’re using light boxes and dropping more players into coverage on the outside and deep to take away the Rams’ passing attack, which makes life tougher on Matthew Stafford, Cooper Kupp, Puka Nacua and the other central figures in the passing game.
Secondly, Sean McVay’s scheme is excellent when it comes to opening up the field and spreading out the defense. Because the Rams are so confident in the blocking ability of their receivers, they can heavily utilize 11 personnel, with three receivers on the field. That forces defenses into nickel and dime sets with only one or two inside linebackers out there. The Rams can either run the ball successfully or throw it out of these three-receiver sets, which obviously benefits Williams because the defense is so spread out.
To answer the second question, it may not change all that much. Last year, Cam Akers had the second-lowest stacked-box rate in the NFL at 10.11%. In 2021, Darrell Henderson Jr. had the fourth-lowest (12.75%). 2020 was the exception because the passing game was struggling and defenses were daring Jared Goff to beat them, so Henderson and Akers both faced stacked boxes at least 30% of the time. Defenses loaded up against Todd Gurley in 2019, too (23.98%), but in 2018, Gurley faced stacked boxes just 8.2% of the time (3rd-lowest).
McVay has always done a great job of spreading defenses out and it makes everything much easier on the running backs because there are seven or fewer defenders clogging up running lanes. Of course, it’s possible defenses will adjust because of the success Williams is having, but don’t expect a dramatic shift.
If he keeps feasting on these light boxes, the Rams will be much better for it. And if defenses do adjust, watch out. Stafford is going to pick defenses apart when that happens.
