Fantasy Football’s Tier Risers of 2024: Running Back

Puka Nacua is the dream — a player going undrafted (or essentially undrafted) and finishing as WR4. If you were the smart one to draft him or the lucky one to land him on waivers, Nacua alone was probably enough to at least get you into the fantasy football playoffs if the rest of your roster was even mildly competent.

It’s the dream — but generally speaking, it’s also the fantasy.

The fantasy world stumbles across massive risers like that every now and then, individual fantasy managers even more rarely. More common is the player who makes a small jump. The player drafted 10^th at his position who finishes second. The player going as an end-of-the-list starter who becomes a weekly must-start. The bench player who sneaks his way into weekly consideration.

And for fantasy managers, those are very important as well. Assuming you are getting the majority of your roster at or close to value, the players who rise up a tier or two in the season are the ones who can get you a title.

So that’s what we’re looking for now. We’re not looking for players up and down the draft board who can be Puka Nacua. We’re looking for the ones who are the best candidates to rise up a tier. A back-end top-10 who can be No. 1. A second-tier starter who can be a lock-it-in guy. A bench player who can start. The risers who can make your season.

Today: Running backs.

Fantasy Football’s Tier Risers of 2024: Running Back

Potential RB1 Finisher

Derrick Henry, Baltimore Ravens

Derrick Henry has slipped to RB9 in early ADP, likely due in part to the fact that he’s 30 now and the fact that he is coming off his lowest carries-per-game average (16.5) since 13.4 in 2018, before he was “King Henry.” And yes, time catches up to everyone, even the Indiana Jones boulder in running back form. But Henry moves into a role in Baltimore that could make him a mega-contributor in fantasy even if he continues to show deterioration.

We know a few things about Lamar Jackson specifically and rushing quarterbacks in general:

• Jackson doesn’t really throw to running backs. (Who cares! Henry’s value has never been tied up in his receiving.)
• Jackson doesn’t really rush at the goal line, with Gus Edwards leading the non-Tush-Push contingent in goal-line rushing scores last year. (The best news possible for Henry!)
• Good rushing quarterbacks open up lanes for their running backs. (Giving that to a behemoth makes him that much harder to tackle.)

Put all that together, and it’s not a sure thing that Henry is RB1-or-close in 2024, but man he seems like one of the better candidates to get there.

Potential Top-12 Finishers

James Cook, Buffalo Bills

James Cook was a fringe RB1 last year, coming in 12^th in PPR scoring at the position. It was his first year as the starter following Devin Singletary’s departure, and he came in with 1,567 scrimmage yards. When Ken Dorsey was the offensive coordinator in Buffalo (Weeks 1-10), Cook was RB18 overall with 117.7 PPR points, RB29 in points per game at 11.8. After Dorsey was fired and Joe Brady took over, Cook rose to RB11 overall with 115.0 points (nearly as many points in seven games as he had put up in 10 before), with 16.4 PPG that was 11^th. Over the full season, 16.4 PPG would have been RB8. Why? With Dorsey, the Bills ran the ball 41.2% of the time. With Brady, it was 51.8%. And that was with Stefon Diggs and Gabe Davis to throw to. With a lesser receiving corps and a full year with a run-first OC, Cook could easily shoot firmly into the RB1 ranks in 2024.

Joe Mixon, Houston Texans

Take out his rookie year of 2017, when he didn’t take over the starting job until midseason, and Joe Mixon has only finished worse than RB13 once, in 2020 when he only played in six games. And that year, his per-game average of 16.6 points would have prorated to RB4 over the full season. Sure, he turns 28 in July and has averaged under 4.0 yards per carry across the last two seasons combined, but then efficiency has never really been Mixon’s calling card — 2018 was his only season with over 4.9 YPA. Now, he heads to a Texans team that has an ascending offensive line, an elite quarterback, little competition for touches and plenty of receiving skill to pull defenders. Mixon won’t be exciting in 2024, but he’s got a great chance of being a late RB1 yet again.

Potential Top-24 Finisher

Tony Pollard, Tennessee Titans

This really comes down to which version of Pollard you believe in. Last year, Tyjae Spears smoked Pollard in efficiency, gaining 4.5 yards per carry to Pollard’s 4.0 and 5.5 yards per target to Pollard’s 4.6. Of course, Pollard was coming back from a not-that-long-before brutal leg injury, and if you believe he was slow to rebound from the injury and want to look at his 2022 efficiency rather than his 2023, you get far more excited:

The year after the year after. It’s typically an ACL thing, but I think it applies for Pollard, and giving him more time to recover from his injury should shoot him right back ahead of Spears behind an ascending offensive line under new O-line coach Bill Callahan and with JC Latham on the roster.

Brian Robinson Jr., Washington Commanders

This isn’t as much about Robinson’s outlook as it is about Austin Ekeler’s. If Ekeler can bounce back to his 2021-2022 status in Washington, Robinson’s ceiling is a flex option. But Ekeler is 29 now and saw his production plummet across the board last year. Sure, the Chargers spiraled and Ekeler was caught up in the dissolution, but he’s small and aging, and I’m ready to sell, a year early if not right on time. And that means Robinson, who just turned 25, gets to have his prime. Everything improved for Robinson from Year 1 to Year 2, as he got further into his career and, crucially, further away from his gunshot injury. That happens again in 2024.