The NFL regular season is about to start and many fantasy football fans have a lot of questions. One of them revolves around Javonte Williams, who has been struggling for two years to regain his pre-injury form. Could a fresh start with the Dallas Cowboys be the solution? Is the team’s presumed favorite to be RB1, Williams, a safe bet in fantasy football or a risky gamble?
At this point, every fantasy manager has heard the phrase: “Running backs don’t matter”. Last year, players like Saquon Barkley and Josh Jacobs helped counter that narrative. But, overall, for most of the last decade, NFL teams have decided that it doesn’t pay to pay more for the running back position. It is quite ironic that the Cowboys have become the paradigm of this philosophy, as they once spent the fourth overall pick on Ezekiel Elliott.
The runners have shown that they give important points
The Dallas Cowboys settled on Tony Pollard as their lead running back in 2023. After his departure in 2024, it was assumed that they would surely sign or recruit a replacement. Instead, they began the season with a completely shattered Elliott and the former 2020 undrafted free agent, Rico Dowdle, as their top two running backs. By the second half of the season, Dowdle was already being used as a three-down back. Strangely enough, it worked with an average of 12.4 fantasy points per game, finishing as the RB24. From Week 5 on, he averaged 13.5 points per game, at which point the Cowboys began to rely more on him.
The idea in recapping all of this is that the role of the Cowboys’ RB1 is valuable in fantasy. Whoever stands out will be a starter. Currently, Williams tops the list of players. Behind him is a talent that is not quite a replacement: Miles Sanders, who shouldn’t even be in the NFL, and the fifth-round rookie, Jaydon Blue. I’m optimistic about Blue’s emergence because I don’t believe in Williams’ talent (and obviously not Sanders’ either).
When to use running backs in Fantasy Football?
At the same time, the track record of third-day rookie running backs who have made a big fantasy impact is not very good. Occam’s razor tells us that the simplest solution is usually the correct one. The most likely scenario in Dallas is that Williams ends up as the lead running back, just in case. There was a time when Williams was destined for greatness in Denver. He had an excellent rookie year, averaging 12.1 points per game while sharing time with Melvin Gordon. Before his second year could take off, Williams tore his ACL.
When Williams returned in 2023, he was no longer the same. Not even a year after the injury in 2024 helped Williams regain his explosiveness. At this point, it’s debatable whether he ever will. That said, is Williams really much worse than Dowdle? What we can say for sure is that if Williams gets 50% of the opportunities in Dallas, he will be worth having on the fantasy team, especially if he is the goal-line running back.
Read the full article here
