It’s that time of year once again! Football Absurdity will bring you a breakdown of every notable fantasy football-relevant player throughout June, July, and August. We continue with the running backs. Alvin Kamara is a difficult nut to crack because few running backs in the league have his upside and his game-to-game floor, but he also faces a new offense and a little battery charge he has to shake before we know if and when he will play this season. So, what can we expect from Alvin Kamara for 2022 fantasy football?
Alvin Kamara ADP and AAV:
Average Draft Position: RB10, Pick 17
Average Auction Value: $40
Alvin Kamara Statistics:
| Year | G | GS | Rush | Ru Yds | Ru TD | Tgt | Rec | Yards | TD | Touches | Opp | Total Yards |
| 2021 | 13 | 10 | 240 | 898 | 4 | 67 | 47 | 439 | 5 | 287 | 307 | 1337 |
| 2020 | 15 | 10 | 187 | 932 | 16 | 107 | 83 | 756 | 5 | 270 | 294 | 1688 |
| 2019 | 14 | 9 | 171 | 797 | 5 | 97 | 81 | 533 | 1 | 252 | 268 | 1330 |
| Year | YPC | Rush/G | Ru Yd/G | Tgt/G | Rec/G | Catch% | Yds/Tgt | Yds/Rec | Touches/G | Opp/G | Yds/G |
| 2021 | 3.74 | 18.5 | 69.1 | 5.15 | 3.62 | 70.1% | 6.55 | 9.34 | 22.08 | 23.62 | 102.8 |
| 2020 | 4.98 | 12.5 | 62.1 | 7.13 | 5.53 | 77.6% | 7.07 | 9.11 | 18.00 | 19.60 | 112.53 |
| 2019 | 4.66 | 12.2 | 56.9 | 6.93 | 5.79 | 83.5% | 5.49 | 6.58 | 18.00 | 19.14 | 95.00 |
| Year | Std Pts | HPPR Pts | PPR Pts | Pts/G | HPPR Pts/G | PPR Pts/G | Pts/Tch | HPPR Pts/Tch | PPR Pts/Tch |
| 2021 | 187.7 | 211.2 | 234.7 | 14.44 | 16.25 | 18.1 | 0.65 | 0.74 | 0.82 |
| 2020 | 294.8 | 336.3 | 377.8 | 19.65 | 22.42 | 25.2 | 1.09 | 1.25 | 1.40 |
| 2019 | 167.5 | 208 | 248.5 | 11.96 | 14.86 | 17.75 | 0.66 | 0.83 | 0.99 |
2022 Alvin Kamara Fantasy Football Overview:
Alvin Kamara is one of my favorite players in all of fantasy football. Not just because I love his skill set, but because he’s also a litmus test to see if the person talking about fantasy has any idea what they’re talking about. If they don’t, they cite the fact that Kamara has just six 100+ yard rushing games in his career. Kamara is one of the pre-eminent dual-threat running backs in the league, so someone quoting his 100-yard rushing games is like someone quoting Lamar Jackson’s 300+ yard passing games for fantasy football… that’s not why we love him. We love him because of his pass-catching prowess offsetting his lack of rushing attempts. While Kamara has just six 100+ yard rushing games, he also has the second-most 100+ yard from scrimmage games from running backs since he entered the league.
Kamara is a constant dual-threat, which is why he has five 100+ yard receiving games to go with his six 100+ yard rushing games (and 25 where he combines to top 100 yards from scrimmage). Kamara remained one of the most-used running backs in the NFL, ranking sixth in both rushing attempts and targets, as well as snaps. He’s always on the field, and always being used when he’s on the field. The changeover to Jameis Winston does not frighten me, as he averaged 96.2 yards per game last year in Jameis starts (though he averaged just 3 receptions per game). He’s also, by far, their best healthy player. So, should he play this year, there’s no reason to believe that Kamara doesn’t smash his draft day price. Speaking of which…
2022 Alvin Kamara Fantasy Football Draft Strategy:
Alvin Kamara Salary Cap Value: $40
Draft Ranking: Find out for your league settings in a Beersheet! (coming in early July)
Alvin Kamara, who finishes as a top-five running back more than 30% of the time, and top-12 running back over 60% of the time, barely hangs on as a top-12 running back, as he is RB12 in price ($40.5) and RB10 by ADP (16.5 overall). Given that he didn’t fall off last year with Jameis under center, this price drop has to do almost exclusively with the pending battery case. For me, I am going to lean into the Kamara price drop in salary cap drafts, as the $40 represents a nearly 50% price drop from last season’s ~$70 price point. I can afford to eat losing a $40 player for half the season if the upside is a $70 player. It’s not so cut-and-dry in snake drafts, as taking Kamara means passing on D’Andre Swift, Aaron Jones, CeeDee Lamb, and Mark Andrews. It’s there where I struggle with taking Kamara, since all those guys have top-five upside (just like Kamara) but without the downside of missing a massive chunk of the season.
This is where a lot of guys will play amateur lawyer and try to decipher video and precedent and criminal codes to try to make some sort of prediction as to how many games Kamara will miss. I will tell you the thing that they are too scared to say: we have no idea, but we think it might be six. Because of this, I can’t countenance taking him in the second round of a snake draft, but in a salary cap draft, you can hedge against losing Kamara by taking multiple round two and round three running backs to buoy your corps. If you take Kamara in a snake draft, I would skip out on a top-five running back or wide receiver by price, to accomplish getting multiple RB2s for when you lose Kamara. Think of it as trading your first-rounder in a snake draft for an extra third, fourth and fifth.
Best Case Scenario:
Alvin Kamara beats the case and goes on his “Christmas Day Redux Revenge Tour” and scores six touchdowns per game for every game of the season. I don’t think this is extremely likely, but it would be neat.
Worst Case Scenario:
He doesn’t beat the case and misses significant time, slamming your investment into the pavement.
Check out all our 2022 player profiles, here.
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[Statistics are sourced from pro-football-reference.com, airyards.com, and ftnfantasy.com]
[Image Source: Alvin Kamara on Twitter]
