There are three superstar NFL running backs who have lost their role on the offense of their respective team heading into the 2022 NFL season.
The 2022 NFL season features many running backs who established themselves as genuine threats to opposing defenses, but there are also some superstars who fell from grace and simply aren’t living up to their expectations salary or performance-wise.
In this list, we’re looking at those three superstar backs who lost their value in the 2022 NFL season.
There is no position in any major sport that has a shorter career lifespan than running back. From the intense workload these guys face, the gruesome hits they take from colossal giants on the defense to insurmountable high expectations, playing this position simply isn’t sustainable for the long haul.
There’s a reason why it’s the most easily replaceable spot in the depth chart and it’s because the average lifespan for a halfback is just 3-5 years.
The ones that surpass this mark, they’re some of the all-time greats like Frank Gore, Adrian Peterson, Emmitt Smith, Walter Payton, and so on.
Without further delay, let’s take a look at the three superstar running backs who lost their value in the 2022 NFL season.
3 superstar RBs that have lost their value in the 2022 NFL season
No. 3 – Saquon Barkley (New York Giants)
Taken 2nd overall in the 2018 NFL Draft out of Penn State, Saquon Barkley has yet to finish a full season since his rookie year.
When the prototypical back was taken just after Baker Mayfield, everyone thought we were going to see the next Barry Sanders as “Saquads” had the once-in-a-lifetime blend of power, speed, athleticism, and patience.
Despite his freakishly large frame of 5’11”, 233 pounds, Barkley is able to make cuts on a dime and run with incredibly downhill speed. As if it wasn’t hard enough to stop him as is, he’s a viable pass option with reliable hands and quick decision-making out of the backfield making him a potent two-way threat.
Unfortunately, due to a porous offensive line and misuse of his talents, the New York Giants have left their superstar running back vulnerable to injury, and over the last few seasons, they’ve taken a toll on the young buck.
While the Giants are working towards improving their line now, it may be too little too late for Barkley as he’s already headed into year five of his NFL career.
Big Blue would be making a horrible mistake if they were to sign Saquon to a massive contract extension this season due to the injuries he’s suffered as of late.
The talent and potential were there, but drafting a running back at No. 2 overall in the draft, regardless of the talent, is a tough sell when you have one of the worst offensive lines to protect him.
The Giants have to bite the bullet and move on from Saquon while he still has value.
No. 2 – Ezekiel Elliott (Dallas Cowboys)
Ranking in at number two is Ezekiel Elliott, which comes as little surprise to anyone who has watched him play the previous few seasons on the Dallas Cowboys.
In his rookie year, Elliott set the bar insurmountably high when he totaled 1,631 rushing yards and 15 touchdowns on the ground off of 322 attempts to average an astounding 5.1 yards per carry.
Since then, his yards per game have continued to digress as the average becomes smaller and smaller with each passing year. In the 2020 NFL season, Zeke had a career-low performance finishing the campaign with 244 rush attempts for 979 yards (4.0 YPC) and six touchdowns on the ground.
Throughout the season he averaged just 65.3 yards per game, a significant fall from the career-low he posted the year prior with 84.8 YPG.
This brings us to the horrid season Ezekiel Elliott put together last season in 2021, as his yards per game decreased even more so to just 58.9.
Yes, Zeke reached the 1,000 rushing yards mark during the season (1,002), but that was due to the increased length of the schedule from 16 regular season NFL games to 17.
Additionally, easily the biggest facet of Elliott’s game is his ability to pick up yards after contact as well as being able to break tackles with freakish athleticism and size at 6’0″ – 230 pounds.
However, his number of broken tackles has also fallen substantially, as from 2019-2021 he’s registered 24, 15, and 9 broken tackles in the respective seasons.
With all of this being said, there are two reasons why Ezekiel Elliott has lost his role in the Dallas Cowboys.
The first is the emergence of Tony Pollard who shared the workload with him last season, racking up 719 rushing yards off of a mere 130 attempts (5.5 YPC).
The second reason, and most important one of all, is that Elliott is signed to a 6-year $90 million contract. When you compare the stats to the money, he simply isn’t worth such a lucrative deal.
Based on last season alone, Tony Pollard is the no-brainer solution at RB1 for the Dallas Cowboys.
No. 1 – Christian McCaffrey (Carolina Panthers)
No running back has had as big of an impact on the ground and air attack, respectively, as Christian McCaffrey has since 2018.
His best season came in 2019 in which he put together a 1,000+ rushing and a 1,000+ receiving yard season. Those fortunate to have CMC on their fantasy team that year, remember his dominance rather fondly.
However, apart from that magical season in which he averaged 149.5 scrimmage yards per game (sheesh), he has played just 10 total games since then, sitting out of 23 games due to injury largely related to receiving too many touches per game.
Since being drafted in 2017, McCaffrey has averaged a combined 19.7 touches per game, and 23.6 combined touches per game since 2019.
There are only so many hits a running back can take before his body starts to lose the ability to absorb the impacts and recover from them.
With the Carolina Panthers falling down in power rankings in each passing year, the workload has intensified for McCaffrey and has effectively led to his decline in health.
It’s with a heavy heart as a huge fan and supporter of the elusive back to say that Christian McCaffrey’s best days are behind him. While he can easily serve as a complementary back in a 1A/1B role, the games in which you let CMC carry the offense are gone.
The reason why teams nowadays are electing to draft a running back in the 1st Round of the NFL Draft is to have an elite talent for five years on a rookie contract and repeat the process when the said contract expires, as opposed to retaining the player’s services for an extra duration at a damaging cost to the salary cap.
Running backs don’t have the durability of other positions. You may get an Emmitt Smith once every generation, but the risk/reward sways heavily in favor of the risk when you sign a back to such a lucrative deal.
Until they can figure out a solution, the Panthers will cringe every time they see CMC’s 4-year $64 million contract that still has another two years left before it expires.