St. Louis Rams Tre Mason showed feature back upside

The St. Louis Rams 2014 NFL Draft class was one of the most successful of any team’s, as they managed to find one of the best players in the class in Aaron Donald, one of the best corners in the class in E.J. Gaines, and one of the best running backs in the class in Tre Mason.

If we’re only looking at the 2014 season, then Mason looked like the second-most talented rookie rusher (Jeremy Hill has to be first at this point), as, like Isaiah Crowell, he showed off some serious playmaking ability. But unlike Crowell, he actually forced missed tackles, which allowed him to average 4.3 yards per carry despite playing behind an incredibly disappointing offensive line.

Mason gave the Rams a real spark on offense that would have been clearly absent without him, since they didn’t exactly have sufficient blocking or above-average quarterback play. The former Auburn Tigers star had at least 60 rushing yards in six of the team’s final nine games (when he consistently received double-digit carries) each week, but the problem is that Mason’s yards per carry averages on a week-to-week basis left something to be desired.

In his 12 games last season, Mason averaged less than four yards per carry in seven of those contests, but the lack of a steady week-to-week YPC can be attributed to a few things that go beyond Mason himself. First of all, the Rams run blocking was as unreliable as it gets, and, secondly, he had to face elite run defenses like the Denver Broncos and Seattle Seahawks, though he did workhorse his way to a 113-yard day on 29 carries against Terrance Knighton and the Broncos.

If you look at his season as a whole, Mason averaged 63.8 rushing yards per game, which means that he would have hit 1,020 yards in 16 games. Considering the fact that he wasn’t even the Rams primary rusher for all of his 12 appearances, he could have easily topped that if handed the feature back role.

Of course, the Rams couldn’t make him a feature back, since he isn’t polished enough in the passing game. While Mason has shown flashes as a pass-catcher once he does get the ball in his hands, the key, as with most running backs, is what he does before the catch. As we expected, he’s not the finished product there, and that’s one of a few things he’ll have to improve on in the offseason.

It would also be a good idea for Mason to improve his pass protection, though there’s no need to harp on what is a known- and slightly exaggerated- weakness. If he can make slight improvements as a receiver, then he could be a huge threat due to his explosive ability after the catch.

“Explosive” is probably the first word that comes to mind when describing Mason’s playing style, because he’s one of the more exciting running backs in the league already. According to Pro Football Focus, a third-best 37.3% of Mason’s runs went for at least 15 yards, meaning that only Justin Forsett and Knile Davis generated more big plays as a proportion of their total carries.

That shouldn’t be taken lightly, since it confirms Mason’s big-play ability and upside. The Rams are a team that could use a big playmaker, particularly in the backfield, since Benny Cunningham and Zac Stacy are solid members of a rotation but do not bring that sort of home-run threat on the ground.

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With 28 missed tackles forced, Tre Mason showed that he has the shakes to turn tough runs into positive gains for the offense, but, again, his 4.3 yards per carry despite poor blocking tells you that story. Both Stacy and Cunningham averaged 3.8 yards per carry, so the difference between Mason and those two is quite profound on paper, and it’s more fair to compare his stats to his teammates’, since their blocking/quarterbacking situations are actually comparable. Both should improve next season, which means Mason should improve as the situation around him does.

That said, he can help accelerate his own improvement on the stat sheet by making strides over the offseason, and it will be interesting to see what he does with a new offensive coordinator. Per Advanced Football Analytics, just 34.1% of Mason’s plays were successful based on down and distance factors, and that’s substantially lower than the success rates of the other two backs in the St. Louis Rams rotation. I usually don’t weigh SR% too heavily, but 34.1% is far too low.

Based on the number of times he’s been stuffed and the number of first downs he’s generated for the offense, the problem for Mason isn’t his ability to move the chains; it’s his ability to avoid negative plays. That will improve with experience and better blocking, with the latter contributing more. If he can run with better vision and improve his hands, route-running, and blitz recognition by a tab, then he might be good enough to shatter the Rams committee and become the feature guy all on his own. If not, then he’ll still be one of this team’s most valuable pieces on offense.

People seem to think that it’s easy to transition to the running back position in the NFL, but that simply isn’t the case, especially when you look at the recent play of most rookie running backs. It takes a year or two to get fully into the swing of things, and I think Mason is a better breakout candidate than someone like Crowell. For starters, he’s much better at generating missed tackles, and he’s also able to do more with less and generate even more big plays.

If he can continue to develop and become a more consistent back, then he will likely be a star player at the position. Mason was touted coming into the NFL Draft, and he met expectations as a rookie, showing more burst than many backs in this league. That said, it’s very difficult to evaluate a running back who didn’t receive many holes up front, so hopefully the Rams blocking can improve to help lead him to a big sophomore season. He has major talent and cutting ability, and he’ll be better with improved line play.

Next: Where do the Rams rank among franchises with the best RBs?

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