I’ve loved getting to write the Zero RB dynasty articles for RotoViz readers over the last two months — I hope you’ve gleaned something useful or at least been entertained. I often deliver that article late in the week, after I’ve gotten to soak up much of the site’s content for the week, grind my Wednesday waivers, work trades, and then let my mind wander a bit more over the prior week’s results. This week though, with our Zero RB hero Shawn Siegele roaming the globe and asking me to sub in, I’m going to try to keep the starship steady and zoom through the Zero RB universe on a fairly straight course. To get you ready for Week 8, let’s look back game by game at what happened in Week 7.
Jaguars at Saints
With the clouds of dust from all the games settled, we can look back and see that Alvin Kamara and Travis Etienne put up two of the week’s top-five PPR RB scores, and there’s little reason to doubt both backs will be near the top a lot going forward.
- Kamara’s workload is trumping efficiency concerns. His 14 targets really stand out on a week in which only eight running backs saw at least five. Perhaps Jamaal Williams sees an uptick in usage another game back from injury, but positionless weapon Taysom Hill may make it difficult for another RB to shine while Kamara is healthy. Kendre Miller played only a few snaps, but has flashed enough in the pass game to remain in my mind one of the top handcuffs — those targets will have to go somewhere.
- The Tank Bigsby standalone value thesis seems shot, between his own lackluster performance to date and Doug Pederson’s apparent willingness to move away from his past timeshare ways to make room for Etienne’s continuing emergence as one of the best RBs in the league.
Falcons at Buccaneers
- Bijan Robinson was active and is overall seemingly in OK health but we are thrust into the upside down already just having to read his name below Ke’Shawn Vaughn’s in EP.
- Tyler Allgeier of course soaked up the majority of the rushing work, but Cordarrelle Patterson popping in to put up almost the same rushing total as Allgeier on less than half the carries might spook managers who are counting on Bijan SZN. Could we be dealing with three RBs getting touches going forward? I’m not sure what to think, but I’m certainly a lot more interested in rostering Patterson as a deep handcuff than I was a week ago.
- It feels safe to say at this point in his sophomore season that Rachaad White is not a special talent, but the value of the receiving role and the failure of Vaughn and Sean Tucker to muscle past him on the depth chart means there is still a floor.
- The Bucs designated Chase Edmonds to return from IR, which in theory could lower White’s floor, but a more likely best-case scenario for Edmonds is just that he leapfrogs the others for RB2 spot.
