Fantasy Football Stat of the Day: The most defenders in the box

(Leading up to the 2021 NFL season, FTN’s Tyler Loechner will dive into the fantasy football numbers to bring you his Fantasy Stat of the Day, five days a week.)

In theory, running the football is a whole lot easier when you don’t have as many defenders near the line of scrimmage trying to stop you. If the defense is spread out and further away from the ball, there should be more holes opening up for the RB to hit quickly.

Today’s Stat of the Day will take a look at the RBs that did not have that luxury last season. We’ll examine the RBs that had the highest average number of defenders “in the box” (near the line of scrimmage) on their rushing attempts.

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Damien Harris had to evade the most defenders last season

Here are the top 10 RBs from last season based on the average number of defenders in the box on their rushing attempts (min. 100 attempts).

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Player	Rushes	Avg. Defenders in Box
Damien Harris	137	7.47
Kareem Hunt	198	7.42
Wayne Gallman	147	7.39
Gus Edwards	144	7.36
Mike Davis	165	7.35
Nick Chubb	190	7.34
Latavius Murray	146	7.32
Jeffery Wilson	126	7.31
Darrell Henderson	138	7.30
Derrick Henry	378	7.24

A few thoughts:

Damien Harris ran into stacked boxes. This one isn’t a huge shocker considering how reliant New England’s offense was on running the ball las season, but Harris’ 7.47 average defenders in the box was easily the highest among qualifying RBs. Sony Michel, who didn’t qualify with 79 attempts, didn’t have it much easier, with 7.37 defenders in the box on his rushing attempts. New England added an array of pass-catchers to their offense for 2021, and the rushing lanes will almost assuredly open up some more.
Kareem Hunt had more average defenders in the box than Nick Chubb. This one was definitely a surprise. The numbers are close — Hunt at 7.42 and Chubb at 7.34 — but Hunt is viewed more of the receiver and Chubb more of the rusher, so this wasn’t the expected result. It goes to show that defenses did not treat the RBs as different threats last year.
Darrell Henderson had a rough road. Henderson ranked ninth among qualifying RBs with 7.30 average defenders in the box on his rush attempts last season (Cam Akers had 7.22). The addition of Matthew Stafford will in theory make the passing attack more potent and perhaps pull some defenders out of the box more often.
Derrick Henry is an unstoppable force. The fact that he topped 2,000 rushing yards while facing defensive boxes that ranked among the 10 busiest last season is unreal. And with Julio Jones now in Tennessee, defenses may not be able to tee up on Henry as often. He may see fewer attempts in 2021, but his YPC could increase as well.