As always, well done, well written, and well researched.

I’m hoping to go into FA for the RB this year because I don’t love the top tier backs in the draft, personally, and (forgive my ignorance) I don’t know enough about the second or thrid tier RBs to sound intelligent on the subject.

I love these posts, so please keep up the good work. Dispelling myths like these is important business. I’d love to trade down in round one and snag Knowshon Moreno.

I really do not believe the Broncos need a new RB to the point they would use a draft choice in lieu of a badly needed defensive player.

I’m not sure how well known this is, but the Broncos were #3 in the league in rushing, in terms of YPA. Hillis is coming back, as well as Pittman, Tater, and Selvin. And the O-line was just beginning to do some good things in their blocking last year. I just don’t think the Broncos are as needy as we might perceive . . . anywhere on offense, for that matter.

Defense is a desperate situation, and the Broncos will not see a postseason until they have a decent one. They had the worst defense in the league, and if they do not fill some gaping holes, they will continue to be the worst. I will not enjoy seeing 20- to 30-yard runs by the offense if the defense is giving up 30+ points a game.

Again, I appreciate the work you put into this, NYBroncosFan, enough that one of your recs is from me. But—you
know what?—the offense barely even has my attention right now. It’s that (lack of a) defense that has all of that.

the comparison in the % to how many starters in other positions (is it higher of lower than RBs)

Bring in Knowshon!!!!!

particularly with respect to trying to draft a feature running back. I wonder though, with so many teams going to a running back by committee approach, what would the break down look like if it were based on yards per carry instead of yards per game? Maybe for runners with some minimum number of carries, what was the YPC rate.

Great work though.

Knowshon Moreno anyone? :)

I’m all for mr.moreno, just an excellent article there nyc. I believe we’ll see a 1st or 2nd round (McCoy or Green) choice this year, atleast I think it’s really time to protect JC from himself in the form of a potent rushing attack.. That guy won’t be found in the later rounds this year and the free agent money needs to go to the defence.

Thanks to Zappa, the chart in this post has been updated with some color to aid visually.

Although,to be accurate I think that Ward is pricing himself out of the market for nearly anyone but Cleveland – I think he’s asking too much for Denver. I would have paid the money for Turner last year and hoped that they would, but this is a different case and a different runner

It’s harder to quantify a runner for a specific system. Although Shanahan had a strange habit of running off his better running backs, it is still important to specifically address the needs of Denver for a one-cut ZB scheme back who has good hands out of the backfield. This is by no means a criticism of the article, which is a good one, but it is also true that you can’t talk about the needs of the specific (Denver) by analyzing the league at large (the general). Shonn Greene, for example, may be a very good back for someone, but he’s completely wrong for our system, regardless of which details McD decides to go with.

I do think that we need to address the D first, although I understand other perspectives. It will be interesting to see how we approach free agency – that should tell us a lot about what we will do in the draft. Rec’d!

Great analysis, nyc. All I have to contribute has already been spoken, so all I can say is great job highlighting an area we have taken greatly for granted. I always felt we were spoiled with the backs we found, but this really does seem to confirm that our greatest RBs truly were phenomenal finds.

Obviously the guys taken in later rounds get far less carries yet they are still averaging more than 4 ypc so is it more a lack of opportunity than a lack of talent? I would also like to see what teams are using more late round running backs. As we have seen in Denver, the system/O-line is just as (if not more) important than the guy running the ball so if the guys taken in the later rounds are used more by crappy teams than by good teams than they will likely have worse numbers….and how many teams are going to seriously look at a 6th round rb from Detroit who carried the ball 30 times for 120 yards over the course of the year, so even though he might be a good player he won’t get an opportunity to get legitimate playing time.

This is basically what I have been trying to say in most of my writing here at MHR, the good teams value 1st round RB’s. Thank you for shedding some light on the situation.

My personal thoughts are that the Broncos are not as bad on defense as many think we are. We were, as a team bad defense and all, the leader of the AFC West for 16 straight weeks. We only needed one more win to reach the playoffs!! Casey Wiegmann must have read my post about “all down Hillis since Peyton’s departure” because he agreed that with a running game this team goes to the playoffs. He had to be thinking the Buffalo game when Denver was in control, up 13-0. Then Buffalo did what we should have done…they pounded the running game, kept our defense on the field and wore them out. If we had Hillis against Buffalo we win that ball game. So, let’s get an impact running back in the first, make the offense special not servicable and win while we rebuild.

The defensive changes (Cutting Bly, Engleberger..etc) alone are going to make this defense better….McDaniels and Xanders understand that they are overhauling the defense, but one can only assume that it is going to be better. They cut those men knowing they either already had upgrades or new it wouldn’t be hard to find. Couple the upgrades with the new coaching staff and new players to fit their scheme and one would have to assume we will improve.

So, the argument for me comes down to this, it all starts with getting into the playoffs….What gets Denver into the playoffs? I think it’s a dynamic 1st Round RB. A dynamic RB makes the horrible 2008 Defense a playoff team. So what will it do with a new an improved Defense? Then when Denver gets into the playoffs, much like Arizona did, the pundits will be saying, “the Broncos are team to watch out for in the playoffs, their dynamic offense could cause some teams problems”

Defense ultimately does win Championships but running the football gives us the best chance to win while we build a Championship caliber defense. I think we all want our first pick to be an impact player who can help right away, a RB can do that, especially in Denvers system. Not to mention what it would do for Jay Cutler.

The Phillip Rivers vs Jay Cutler battle would now be heavily swayed toward Cutler…considering the Running Game in San Diego is the only reason they were knocking on the Super Bowl door for years.

nycbroncosfan has put together a fantastic analysis and at first I was surprised by the results. Then I got to thinking about it. Of course first round picks are more successful. That’s why they’re first round picks. The question is, are they enough better to justify using a first round pick. So I did a little analysis. Using the draft value chart on MHR I calculated the average points for each round of the draft as follows:

1 – 1158
2 – 416
3 – 188
4 – 71
5 – 34
6 – 21
7 – 8

If we divide these by the probability of finding an above average back in each round from the table above we get the expected draft points needed to find an above average pick in each round as follows:

1 – 1331
2 – 717
3 – 470
4 – 229
5 – 342
6 – 160
7 – 89

Sure you are more likely to pick a good back in the first round, but it cost a lot of draft points. If you want to maximize your chances at drafting a good back, you would trade down and draft lots of low round backs. It takes a lot more picks but they cost you less. I guess there was method to Shanny’s madness!

We made it to 8-8 – .500 Mediocre. Getting to the playoffs because the rest of our division stank, and then missed because SD woke up. Very few 8-8 teams make the playoffs, and even less go anywhere.

So, I’ll agree to disagree. No, the issue is defense. Ours is terrible. You don’t fix that by drafting a RB. I know – you can’t help but love Moreno. Hey, I love Moreno. But we need a defense, and he doesn’t help us get there. We have very little chance of ever making the playoffs unless we improve the D, and if we get there we’d get creamed, just like this year. I believe that we have a deep need for good players on D, and you feel that a mediocre D is enough, that’s all.

http://www.nfl.com/combine/story?id=09000d5d80ee645e&template=with-video-with-comments&confirm=true

Instead of saying that an improvement on offense will get us into the playoffs, why not say that an improvement on defense will do the same? We had a playoff caliber offense last year with a terrible D, so if we can just make that D average (which is possible with a few good FA’s and draft picks) we should have a chance to make the playoffs. Of course this could all be pointless if Cutler and crew don’t perfect McD’s offense quickly, in which case neither a top RB or a better defense will matter…but I have faith!

There are way to many factors that go into success of running backs.

If you are on dimensional like you can only run the ball you are not going to be successful.

If you have a poor defense and are always playing catch up you going to throw the ball not run.

If you are a good team with a good running back your schedule is going to be harder….

It goes on and on and on

The Broncos have a system that fits a specific type of runner. That is why they have success. They draft someone who fits

This year we had to throw the ball to catch up. that does not mean your running back is bad.

The people on this blog are brainiacs. Nice Job. Always interesting and gets you thinking. Maybe the broncos could hire this site for scouting. Keep up the good work

I’d love to take the time to give the many points made in the thread their due but it’s too much for me even though I’ve read everything — pretty much.

The argument that I’ve been making concerning the RB position is that our greatest utility in this draft was to hold off somewhat (~3rd to 4th round) and draft a one-cut back, which have a lesser value in the draft. Part of the argument was to draft one of the pretty good backs that were projected to go around that time, but it was also an argument based on the idea of cost-effectiveness, which is contingent upon our being a ZB team using a Running-Back-by-Committee approach (RBC).

The Crux

The crux of the argument is a sort of marginal analysis that recognizes the need at RB but makes a tradeoff between quantity and quality, although a ~3-4 pick is still relatively high. The thinking is that more fresh, young RBs can add more to the team than using a lot of value at RB now rather than helping the team elsewhere. Moreover, IMO, the cost of using a lot of value on RB now, rather than elsewhere, doesn’t appreciably increase our chances of improving the team in the future. Additionally, the RB situation wasn’t considered in isolation; I advocated using an even higher pick on the OL in recognition of our needs in the running game. And this was partly based on general principles but also because of the specific ‘shape’ of this draft class. In short, I’d rather attend to the foundation of the running game — the OL — now, because of OL value and availability and the time it takes develop an OL (unlike RB).

MORE IS MORE

Using a higher pick always makes it more likely that you’ll succeed, but at what cost? Can we produce an effective running game next year by drafting a ‘middling’ level RB or do we have to spend more lavishly? I would argue that the triage scenario we’re facing on defense makes it hard to justify using a top pick (with caveats) because the prospective reward is incremental. On the other hand, it’s just as hard to argue that we shouldn’t use some resources at RB given the amount of injuries last year and the importance that the running game has to team success. So, some investment seems indicated.

The framing of this topic is a strawman, although it’s one that many Kool-aid drinkers have heard and swallowed (including me), and there’s even some truth to it. A ZB/RBC team should be able to get by with less total investment at RB. But the crucial word here is “total,” and we’ve spent virtually nothing on our RBs, despite experiencing a fairly generous return. One-cut backs are cheaper, it’s true, but it pays dividends if you have a speed/feature type back, too. We have Selvin Young, and that’s it. Ironically, since I first made the argument for using a lower pick on a one-cut I’ve re-evaluated our situation and come to the conclusion that our greatest need at RB is a faster back, who can be more expensive, and we can’t expect a return unless we make an investment. So the argument for the cheapness of ZB/RBC accepts the idea that you occasionally expend a higher pick at RB.

BUT WHEN?

I’m not against using a higher pick on a RB but I’m not convinced that there’s a greater utility in using a #1 on a RB this year. For instance, just as as a partly hypothetical example — I’d see more value in taking Coffee in the 5th AND Gartrell Johnson in the 6th than using our 1st on Moreno. It’s not because I don’t like Moreno — I DO — but because the chances to improve our team are greater, as a general principle, when we use most of our draft value on our greatest weaknesses. The positions of NT, ILB and S are gushing blood and because we’re on a triage footing we must stop the bleeding above all else, and this probably requires using high picks. It’s possible that we’ll fill our needs somewhat in free agency so there’s still the chance of us using a fairly high pick — ~2-3 — at RB this year, but I would hope if we do it’s because there’s very high value pick available; not because of the logical converse of the straw man argument — that we have to use a top pick at RB (that’s what they do in Oakland!).