(05-23-2024, 10:54 AM)NYC4jags Wrote:

(05-23-2024, 10:03 AM)mikesez Wrote: For about a decade, fewer and fewer teams had a bell cow RB and fewer and fewer RBs were reaching 1000 yards.  

That trend is reversing.  In 2021 only seven players got to 1000 yards rushing.  But in 2022 sixteen players got there.  It is now becoming more important to have one of the top running backs, after years of it being less important.  And the top guys are almost all former first round picks.  This trend you see in the draft is a fluke, I predict.

OK - I don't necessarily agree with any of that in the way that you've stated/framed it - but - 

What does that have to do with their pay scale or the surplus of players at the position? 

If teams like the business model of running the wheels off of a back (MANY of whom are picked in the 3rd-6th rounds) and continuing to draft their replacements instead of signing second contracts, what's the problem? 

It works. There are rare exceptions when a back is worthy of a deal and the team has money to burn,  but I don't see a problem here. 

Drafting and developing at the easiest position to do so seems really smart to me. I whole-heartedly support the methodology. There is no reason to alter the way teams choose to address their backfield rostering decisions.

Not much.  Mikey brought it up.  I don't want to take anything away from a guy who was lucky enough to get picked in the first round.  I just want to see the guys who weren't high picks get richer rewards year to year, if they prove themselves.  They shouldn't have to wait for that second contract that may never come.  

The problem theoretically goes away if all RBs from now on are late round picks, and that's what you predict. The disparity in pay during that first contract would be small in that case. But I predict that we will see RBs picked in the first round again in the next few years.

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