Bush Trade Good For Daniel Thomas
Kamis, 28 Juli 2011 by Android Blackberry
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| D.Thomas |
Bush Trade Good For Daniel Thomas
I'm about to big-time you.
Last fall, I spent my Sundays inside the war room at ESPN World Headquarters, watching games with the NFL Countdown guys. It was quite fun, and as you can picture, several football discussions and anecdotes eventuated. At 1 point, a former player, who shall remain nameless, asked me what I thought of Reggie Bush. I told him I thought Bush was an injury-prone tease whose career amounted to a quite large disappointment.
This former player (a skill-position guy) thought I was crazy. He asked about the room, specifically former defensive players: Who was the 1 player on the Saints' offense that NFL defenses feared probably the most? The same answer came back time and again. Reggie Bush.
Now, this apocryphal tale does not mean Bush is a great player, and it specifically doesn't mean he's an awesome fantasy player. He's not. What the NFL pros meant by this is that Bush lines up all over the place, trying to make mismatches. If you are not ultra-aware of where he is at all times, you'll wind up having a defensive end or lumbering linebacker on the ultra-quick Bush, and that's harmful. I fully grasp this.
But I still think Bush is actually a fairly massive disappointment.
In theory, he's supposed to do all these factors to NFL defenses, but in practice, Bush has missed 16 of his past 42 games. His career per-carry average can be a humdrum four.0 (specially low thinking about he's not an inside runner). His reception total has literally diminished in each and every 1 of his 5 pro seasons. And he scored but 1 TD last year.
Thursday morning, Bush was traded from the Saints to the Dolphins. This is most likely good news for his fantasy value. He escapes a crowded New Orleans backfield, where Mark Ingram, Pierre Thomas and Chris Ivory all toil, and goes to a Miami team that has apparently jettisoned Ronnie Brown and Ricky Williams. Only rookie Daniel Thomas is plainly ahead of Bush on the depth chart, and last year we all got a wholesome dose of reality for how rookie RBs can disappoint (hello, Ryan Mathews!). If he stays wholesome, Bush will likely generate in between 150 and 200 touches from scrimmage. He's not a terrible short-yardage alternative, especially around the edge, as his 17 rushing TDs from the first 4 years of his career indicate. And we all know he might be a force within the receiving game (he had 87 and 73 grabs in '06 and '07, respectively). But he's brittle. You'll be able to draft him as a flex if you're feeling mighty optimistic, but expecting him to play 16 games this year borders on pie-in-the-sky.
Meanwhile, this transaction is pretty excellent news for Daniel Thomas. Yes, he's still a rookie who missed an entire summer of working out for his new team. Yes, Bush will eat into his touches. But the Dolphins had been never ever going to entirely hand over their RB touches to an untested dude (regardless of how talented), so they were usually going to acquire a veteran. Over the past couple of days, there had been rumors that Miami was significant about signing Ahmad Bradshaw, which would've been far much more calamitous for Thomas' value. Bush is injury-prone and nobody's notion of a feature back. As such, Thomas is actually a top-30 fantasy selection, using the upside to be more than that.
In New Orleans, the major unknown is the status of Ivory's injured foot. He needed Lisfranc surgery this winter, and for the moment I'm assuming he's a distant third on the depth chart. If that is so, the most important RB gig comes down to Ingram and Pierre Thomas. We all know Sean Payton likes to split his rushing workload: Over the past 4 years, no Saints rusher has been given additional then 230 total touches in a season, and only 1 -- Bush, in '07 -- has gotten a lot more than 186. Though the fantasy value of Ingram and Thomas almost certainly gets slightly clearer with Bush gone, my rankings of those guys generally quite a lot assumed Bush would leave. The fact is, Ingram and Thomas are going to battle each other for looks. At the moment, I believe they're quite close; Ingram looks like the favorite for plow-horse work (such as brief TDs), though Thomas will catch some passes and carry it in more spread formations. I like Frenchy in this kind of role -- in a similar position in '08 and '09, he averaged much more than 1,000 total yards and 10 TDs -- and I really believe I may possibly draft him 1st. But Ingram is going to go greater in most drafts, and probably has significantly additional upside.
I'm about to big-time you.
Last fall, I spent my Sundays inside the war room at ESPN World Headquarters, watching games with the NFL Countdown guys. It was quite fun, and as you can picture, several football discussions and anecdotes eventuated. At 1 point, a former player, who shall remain nameless, asked me what I thought of Reggie Bush. I told him I thought Bush was an injury-prone tease whose career amounted to a quite large disappointment.
This former player (a skill-position guy) thought I was crazy. He asked about the room, specifically former defensive players: Who was the 1 player on the Saints' offense that NFL defenses feared probably the most? The same answer came back time and again. Reggie Bush.
Now, this apocryphal tale does not mean Bush is a great player, and it specifically doesn't mean he's an awesome fantasy player. He's not. What the NFL pros meant by this is that Bush lines up all over the place, trying to make mismatches. If you are not ultra-aware of where he is at all times, you'll wind up having a defensive end or lumbering linebacker on the ultra-quick Bush, and that's harmful. I fully grasp this.
But I still think Bush is actually a fairly massive disappointment.
In theory, he's supposed to do all these factors to NFL defenses, but in practice, Bush has missed 16 of his past 42 games. His career per-carry average can be a humdrum four.0 (specially low thinking about he's not an inside runner). His reception total has literally diminished in each and every 1 of his 5 pro seasons. And he scored but 1 TD last year.
Thursday morning, Bush was traded from the Saints to the Dolphins. This is most likely good news for his fantasy value. He escapes a crowded New Orleans backfield, where Mark Ingram, Pierre Thomas and Chris Ivory all toil, and goes to a Miami team that has apparently jettisoned Ronnie Brown and Ricky Williams. Only rookie Daniel Thomas is plainly ahead of Bush on the depth chart, and last year we all got a wholesome dose of reality for how rookie RBs can disappoint (hello, Ryan Mathews!). If he stays wholesome, Bush will likely generate in between 150 and 200 touches from scrimmage. He's not a terrible short-yardage alternative, especially around the edge, as his 17 rushing TDs from the first 4 years of his career indicate. And we all know he might be a force within the receiving game (he had 87 and 73 grabs in '06 and '07, respectively). But he's brittle. You'll be able to draft him as a flex if you're feeling mighty optimistic, but expecting him to play 16 games this year borders on pie-in-the-sky.
Meanwhile, this transaction is pretty excellent news for Daniel Thomas. Yes, he's still a rookie who missed an entire summer of working out for his new team. Yes, Bush will eat into his touches. But the Dolphins had been never ever going to entirely hand over their RB touches to an untested dude (regardless of how talented), so they were usually going to acquire a veteran. Over the past couple of days, there had been rumors that Miami was significant about signing Ahmad Bradshaw, which would've been far much more calamitous for Thomas' value. Bush is injury-prone and nobody's notion of a feature back. As such, Thomas is actually a top-30 fantasy selection, using the upside to be more than that.
In New Orleans, the major unknown is the status of Ivory's injured foot. He needed Lisfranc surgery this winter, and for the moment I'm assuming he's a distant third on the depth chart. If that is so, the most important RB gig comes down to Ingram and Pierre Thomas. We all know Sean Payton likes to split his rushing workload: Over the past 4 years, no Saints rusher has been given additional then 230 total touches in a season, and only 1 -- Bush, in '07 -- has gotten a lot more than 186. Though the fantasy value of Ingram and Thomas almost certainly gets slightly clearer with Bush gone, my rankings of those guys generally quite a lot assumed Bush would leave. The fact is, Ingram and Thomas are going to battle each other for looks. At the moment, I believe they're quite close; Ingram looks like the favorite for plow-horse work (such as brief TDs), though Thomas will catch some passes and carry it in more spread formations. I like Frenchy in this kind of role -- in a similar position in '08 and '09, he averaged much more than 1,000 total yards and 10 TDs -- and I really believe I may possibly draft him 1st. But Ingram is going to go greater in most drafts, and probably has significantly additional upside.
