How NFL running backs lost their power at the negotiating table, and how they can get it back

NFL running backs are in a contract crisis, but there can still be a happy medium.

The running back position in the NFL has fallen on hard times. Both of the position’s highest paid players in terms of cap number were released this offseason in Ezekiel Elliott and Dalvin Cook. The two premier backs that were set to hit free agency this year, Josh Jacobs of the Las Vegas Raiders and the New York Giants’ Saquon Barkley, were given the franchise tag, which neither player has signed yet.

Jacobs has made his intent clear to work for a long term contract with guaranteed money, but he’s not working only for himself. In a tweet he sent on June 10, Jacobs said this:

It’s clear that the Raiders tailback believes running backs aren’t compensated fairly, relative to the work and value they bring to a team. Barkley and the Giants have yet to reach an agreement, and Barkley said at his youth football camp that he wants to be a Giant for life, but also wants to be respected with his next contract.

These two fighting for their deals, along with top RBs getting cut, has created a critical point for the value of a running back. If RBs can’t get back to major contract levels, can they at least find a solid midpoint?

Well, it’s complicated.

Schematically, the argument can be made that the run game is making a comeback in the NFL. I wrote about it earlier this year, but with light boxes and lighter builds of front-seven football players, the run game could become more and more efficient. Expanding it out to the end of the season, of the top five teams in rushing Success Rate via RBSDM.com, three of them saw light boxes at or above 25 percent of the time, according to Sports Information Solutions. With NFL defenses betting on teams running the ball into light boxes, the next counterpunch could be for offenses to lean more into gap scheme runs and get vertical displacement and force the defense to account for the run game. This would lead you to believe that teams would begin to look more for the back who can handle 25-27 carries per game, correct?

Well, not exactly. Of those same five teams who led the NFL in rushing success rate, only one of those teams had a ballcarrier tote the rock for more than 50 percent of the team’s total carries (RB Najee Harris, Pittsburgh Steelers). Most of the top teams in success rate either have a mobile QB who gets a lot of carries on the ground, or multiple backs who can take the load off of each other in the run game. Long story short, instead of giving 30+ carries to one back, teams are opting to split it evenly, to keep their legs fresh. While it helps the team in the success of the run game, it doesn’t exactly help a running back when comes to the negotiation table. The entire premise of not paying running backs a lot of guaranteed money is the notion that you can get similar production for a lesser value. For teams who do running back by committee, this is true.

However, getting similar production to replace a guy such as Jacobs or Barkley might be a little more difficult. According to Next Gen Stats, both Barkley and Jacobs finished in the top-10 of Rushing Yards over Expectation, and are two of only four players to finish in the top ten of said metric and have double digit rushing TDs (the other two being Nick Chubb and Derrick Henry). Both were also in the top ten of explosive runs, Jacobs finishing second in the NFL with 41 explosive runs (rushes over 10+ yards). Furthermore, both of these players are critical to the success of their respective offenses. Last year, I wrote about the spike in offensive play the Raiders had when they handed the ball off to Jacobs in 21 personnel, and with Barkley and the Giants, his gravity not only opens up the run game for Daniel Jones, but provides an explosive outlet in the passing game.

It really depends on how you choose to build your team. If you want to have a bellcow back who can do what Jacobs and Barkley do, then that’s a very viable option. Expanding past the NFL though, how many of those players are still around? With 7 on 7 becoming more marketable and players switching to receiver and DB to get recruited, running back development might not be as strong as it used to be. Teams at every level are more willing to take two former receivers or safeties and turn them into running backs, and take those 220-230 pound backs and move them to linebacker as the game both spreads out and gets lighter. With the supply of backs getting lower, teams aren’t opting for cornering the market—rather, they’re ignoring the market overall, choosing to draft later round backs instead of drafting backs early or paying established backs.

Football is cyclical, though. The ideas and concepts that dominate the game now aren’t new—high schools have been running the same concepts that the NFL is just getting around to for almost 20 years now. With this cyclical nature, the run game is sure to come back around.

The bellcow back and bellcow back pay? That might take a few more years.