As the summer of Fantasy Points Per Route Run (FPPRR) for backs and tight ends rolls on, one player that has been causing a major stir in competing for the number one overall selection is Jamaal Charles.
With Andy Reid taking over as the new Chiefs head coach, owners are excited to see what that means for JC Superstar’s upcoming fantasy production, especially in the passing game.
One big misnomer about Reid that we need to debunk immediately is that he neglects his running backs. Nothing could be further from the truth.
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In his time under Reid, LeSean McCoy averaged 18.1 touches per game. How many touches has Charles averaged per game in his career in Kansas City? A pedestrian 14.4 combined reception and rushing attempts on a per game basis.
Now that we have that cleared up, let’s look at the effect that Reid’s offense has had on running backs in point per reception (PPR) leagues over the past five years (remember, we only have five years of route data from the amazing folks over at Pro Football Focus, which provides the data for FPPRR).
| Eagles RB 2008-2012 | |||||
| PLAYER | YEAR | ROUTES | REC. PTS | FPPRR | PPR FINISH |
| WESTBROOK | 2008 | 379 | 124.2 | 0.33 | 8 |
| WESTBROOK | 2009 | 120 | 49.1 | 0.41 | 59 |
| MCCOY | 2009 | 290 | 70.8 | 0.24 | 31 |
| MCCOY | 2010 | 425 | 149.2 | 0.35 | 2 |
| MCCOY | 2011 | 388 | 97.5 | 0.25 | 2 |
| MCCOY | 2012 | 280 | 109.3 | 0.39 | 17 |
In Andy Reid’s passing attack, his backs receive plenty of opportunity. McCoy in 2010 is the only running back over the past five years to run 400 + routes in one season and has the top two seasons (’10,’11) for most routes run over that timeframe. Westbook’s 379 snaps in route in 2008 ranks as the 4th highest total in one season (Ray Rice’s 386 routes in 2009 is sandwiched in-between).
Over the past five seasons, the Eagles offense has produced three top-12 backs and twice McCoy finished with a silver medal in overall PPR scoring for running backs.
McCoy would’ve most certainly finished in the top dozen a season ago if he hadn’t missed four games. The only other season that failed to produce a Philly top scoring back was 2009, when McCoy and Brian Westbrook split duties. Westbrook and McCoy also tallied three seasons topping the elite 100+ points receiving, with McCoy falling just shy in 2011. Charles has posted just one season over the century mark in receiving points.
In 2011, McCoy was able to overcome a below average FPPRR score due to the insane amount of usage in the passing game. Just like Arian Foster was able to be 6th in the NFL in rushing last season despite having the 23rd ranked yards per carry, an obscene amount of usage can trump a sub par score.
Even though he wasn’t as efficient per play as the average player in the pass game, McCoy’s volume of work was so great that all of those nickels and dimes added up. That sort of production should never be overlooked by fantasy footballers.
| PLAYER | YEAR | ROUTES | REC. PTS | FPPRR | PPR FINISH |
| CHARLES | 2008 | 218 | 60.3 | 0.28 | 61 |
| CHARLES | 2009 | 294 | 75.7 | 0.26 | 11 |
| CHARLES | 2010 | 258 | 109.8 | 0.43 | 4 |
| CHARLES | 2011 | 20 | 11.9 | 0.6 | N/A |
| CHARLES | 2012 | 204 | 65 | 0.32 | 9 |
Charles’ usage in the passing game is significantly lower than anything we seen from the Eagles backs.
His career high in routes run is 294 in 2009 (McCoy ran 280 last year, missing four games). Shockingly, Charles actually ran fewer routes last season than he did in his rookie campaign. That boggles the mind, considering the riches that we all know Kansas City had on offense last season.
One area that I have concern for Charles this season is the increased amount of pass blocking he will have to do, and we really have no clue how his body will respond to the increase in punishment.
Per Pro Football Focus, in his career, Charles has only been in pass protection for 251/2250 (11.2 percent) of regular season snaps and was asked to block on only 19.3 percent of passing plays with him on the field.
In the Philly scheme, McCoy was asked to block on 502 (double that of Charles) of 3,050 snaps. He blocked on 26 percent of his passing snaps as well. Considering who is behind Charles on the depth chart, it’s doubtful that he will surrender a ton of those snaps in pass pro, but asking him to take on that increased amount of hits may be scaled back a bit.
Now that I’ve brought a little bit of rain to the picnic, let’s bring the sunshine back and get into why we came here in the first place.
To be conservative, we will use the 353 routes run per year from Eagles number one backs as our average for Charles despite using the two years of down usage from McCoy (due to injury and timeshare). The reason we will use that lower average is to temper our expectation level and possible share of blocking responsibilities if Charles is not asked to take that on as much as McCoy was in Philadelphia.
If Charles was to run 353 routes, his .32 career FPPRR (excluding his 20 snaps from 2011) would put him at 112.9 receiving points.
He averages a reception once every 6.5 routes run (54 catches) and averages 8.4 yards per catch (454 yards) over his career. His TD/reception rate would project a touch over two touchdowns (2.4) catches, so we’ll round down. Those numbers would put him at 111.4 receiving points, which would the highest scoring receiving season of his career.
There’s plenty of reason to be excited about Charles, and here’s my projection for him this season.
| PLAYER | TEAM | BYE | ATT | YDS | TD | REC | YDS | TD | PTS | PPR PTS | .5 PPR |
| Jamaal Charles | KC | 10 | 264 | 1347 | 7 | 54 | 454 | 2 | 234.1 | 288.1 | 261.1 |
