It's more difficult than ever to run the ball in the NFL. The four lowest league-wide yards-per-carry marks of the past decade have been posted during the past four years. And this despite a 2016 campaign that saw Le'Veon Bell, David Johnson, Ezekiel Elliott and Jordan Howard look occasionally unstoppable.
With those stars in place, we now also enter the 2017 draft class -- one of the deepest at running back we've seen in years -- led by potential superstars Leonard Fournette, Dalvin Cook and Christian McCaffrey and supported by potential workhorses Joe Mixon, Alvin Kamara, Kareem Hunt, Samaje Perine and D'Onta Foreman, as well as a hybrid type in Curtis Samuel (172 college carries).
The NFL is now loaded with talented backs. Can that fix the current yards-per-carry dive? It's not that simple.
In short: These guys need help.
A deeper look suggests it's not the backs who are to blame, and that an influx of young talent might not be the antidote. To wit: While yards per carry have been down, average yards after contact has remained steady -- an identical 1.74 in both 2009 and 2016. What the data shows is a progressive drop in blocking help for running backs over the past decade. The key numbers:
-- Less blocking help: An average of 7.0 available blockers in 2007 to an average of 6.7 in 2016.
-- But no less run D: The numbers of players lined up in the box defensively has remained roughly the same. In fact, it reached its second-highest total of the past decade in 2016 (7.56).
In a nutshell, 21st-century offensive schemes are taking help away from running backs to get additional receiving threats on the field. The problem is defenses are still motivated to stop the run from a personnel standpoint.
Teams are also throwing more than ever before, having called pass 61.4 percent of the time last season. That's up from a 10-year low of 57.2 percent in 2008. Tailbacks accrued 11,267 rushing attempts during the 2016 regular season, which was 790 fewer attempts than what we saw during that 2008 campaign. So teams aren't running as often and aren't providing their backs with as much help, but to what extent does this impact the run game, and what can we learn?
The numbers and themes are fairly telling. Here are some facts:
-- Defenders are progressively added to the box at a higher rate than backs are provided with blocking help, which leads to inefficiencies as both the offense and defense get heavier. Running against five-man (5.8 YPC) and six-man (4.9) boxes is quite beneficial. On the other end of the spectrum, backs average 2.4 YPC against 10-man boxes, and 0.7 when there are 11.
-- Of our sample of 122,716 carries, the back has had an "edge" (more blockers than defenders in the box) on 5,887 carries (or 4.8 percent) of the sample. The field has been "level" on 50,286 (41.0 percent) and has resulted in a healthy 4.59 YPC, which is well above the tailback league average on all carries of 4.20.
-- No coach uses more three-wide sets than Giants head man Ben McAdoo (NFL-high 69 percent of runs last season), so it's hardly a surprise that Paul Perkins and Rashad Jennings were best positioned for rushing success in 2016. In fact, Jennings averaged a league-low 6.1 blockers per run, and Perkins was second at 6.2. Perkins faced a league-low average of 6.57 defenders in the box, and Jennings was second at 6.61.
-- With Le'Veon Bell and DeAngelo Williams, the Steelers also sport a pair of backs who ran with an edge often. This is super intriguing, as Bell is undoubtedly one of the game's most electric and productive backs, but defenses were clearly more intimidated by Pittsburgh's passing game. The Steelers had a second tight end on the field for 45 percent of their running plays and averaged 6.87 blockers per rush, both of which ranked sixth in the league. And yet, their rushers faced an average of 7.54 defenders in the box, which ranked 18th. That gap between sixth and 18th was the largest in the NFL last season.
-- Matt Asiata (-1.23) tops the chart of backs who faced the biggest disadvantage in terms of blocking personnel during the 2016 season. David Johnson (-1.02) sits eighth, which is notable considering that the eight-lowest 2016 marks are also the lowest eight of the past decade. Digging even deeper, 34 of the 50 lowest marks of the past decade came in 2016.
-- Ezekiel Elliott led the NFL in rushing as a rookie, and the data shows that, although the Cowboys' offensive line was terrific, he still achieved the feat despite his blockers being outnumbered by in-box defenders at an extremely high rate. Elliott averaged 6.8 blockers per rush (17th-highest) and faced 8.0 in-box defenders (fifth-highest). Those rates were the same for Dallas as a team, and that 1.2 gap was largest in the NFL. Because their offensive line could provide large running lanes without much blocking help from other positions, the Cowboys were able to keep three-plus wide receivers on the field often -- a huge boost to the passing game, considering how often teams were stacking the box to stop Elliott.
-- Derrick Henry was afforded a league-high 7.3 blockers per rush, and DeMarco Murray ranked third at 7.2 in Tennessee's exotic smashmouth scheme. Defenses weren't caught off guard, as Henry faced an average of 8.2 in-box defenders (third-most) and Murray faced 8.1 (fourth).
It's easy to be intrigued by the latest wave of young NFL running back talent, especially after the likes of Elliott, Jordan Howard, Jay Ajayi and Rob Kelley burst onto the NFL scene by dominating after initial contact last season. However, this study shows us that tailbacks now need to overcome modern offensive schemes designed to increase passing-game weapons at the expense of rushing efficiency.