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. Today, we take a look at the face of the Pass Catching Running Back Movement, J.D. McKissic, with the Washington Commanders.
J.D. McKissic ADP and AAV:
Average Draft Position: RB47, 148 overall
Average Auction Value: $1.4
J.D. McKissic Statistics:
| Year | G | GS | Rush | Ru Yds | Ru TD | Tgt | Rec | Yards | TD | Touches | Opp | Total Yards |
| 2021 | 11 | 3 | 48 | 212 | 2 | 53 | 43 | 397 | 2 | 91 | 101 | 609 |
| 2020 | 16 | 7 | 85 | 365 | 1 | 110 | 80 | 589 | 2 | 165 | 195 | 954 |
| 2019 | 16 | 3 | 38 | 205 | 0 | 42 | 34 | 233 | 1 | 72 | 80 | 438 |
| Year | YPC | Rush/G | Ru Yd/G | Tgt/G | Rec/G | Catch% | Yds/Tgt | Yds/Rec | Touches/G | Opp/G | Yds/G |
| 2021 | 4.42 | 4.4 | 19.3 | 4.82 | 3.91 | 81.1% | 7.49 | 9.23 | 8.27 | 9.18 | 55.4 |
| 2020 | 4.29 | 5.3 | 22.8 | 6.88 | 5.00 | 72.7% | 5.35 | 7.36 | 10.31 | 12.19 | 59.63 |
| 2019 | 5.39 | 2.4 | 12.8 | 2.63 | 2.13 | 81.0% | 5.55 | 6.85 | 4.50 | 5.00 | 27.38 |
| Year | Std Pts | HPPR Pts | PPR Pts | Pts/G | HPPR Pts/G | PPR Pts/G | Pts/Tch | HPPR Pts/Tch | PPR Pts/Tch |
| 2021 | 84.9 | 106.4 | 84.9 | 7.72 | 9.67 | 7.7 | 0.93 | 1.17 | 0.93 |
| 2020 | 111.4 | 151.4 | 191.4 | 6.96 | 9.46 | 12.0 | 0.68 | 0.92 | 1.16 |
| 2019 | 49.8 | 66.8 | 83.8 | 3.11 | 4.18 | 5.2375 | 0.69 | 0.93 | 1.16 |
2022 J.D. McKissic Fantasy Football Overview:
While I don’t always consider myself to be the smartest person in the world, I do sometimes appreciate how my weird and broken brain operates at times. The other day, as I as playing with my new puppy, Lyla, I started to think about how we consider a 100-yard game to be a “good game” from a real-life NFL perspective. And it is! That’s a whole football field! Very productive! But, not every 100-yard game is built the same. 25 carries for 100 yards is scored the same in PPR as 8 catches for 60 yards and 12 runs for 40 yards, despite the former being 10 PPR points and the latter 18 PPR points. So, I wanted to see how many “100-yard equivalent” (10 PPR point) games players had last year, and who did it with the fewest yards (follow with me, I’m getting somewhere with this).
There were 307 running back games of at least 10 PPR points in 2021. Of these, 228 games (74.3%) would have been 10+ PPR points (a Good Game Equivalent, or GGE) without any touchdowns. By the end of the season, 60 different running back had a GGE. Well, guess who had a Good Game Equivalent in 45% of his games? That’s right, J.D. McKissic. His five GGE performances tied him with teammate Antonio Gibson, as well as James Conner, Devin Singletary, Damien Harris, and Christian McCaffrey for fifteenth at the position. Except Conner, Singletary, Harris, and Gibson all did it in far more games than McKissic. Assuming that McKissic kept up his pace, he likely would have tied for fifth in GGE with seven.
That is to say, J.D. McKissic gains a ton in PPR leagues because of the Commanders’ demand to get him targets. He had at least 5 targets in six of his eleven games in 2021, which ties him with Myles Gaskin, Josh Jacobs, and Saquon Barkley for the sixth-most games with at least 5 targets at running back. All this is to say that J.D. McKissic is a productive running back and you should want him on your fantasy football teams.
This is doubly true when you consider that McKissic was all but a Buffalo Bill when the Commanders came back knocking at his door and lured him back from Buffalo. Since he didn’t get a mondo contract, there’s only one reason he would come back from the potential Super Bowl winner Buffalo Bills to Washington, and it isn’t because he loves Jack Del Rio’s thoughts on stuff: it’s a guaranteed role waiting in the wings.
2022 J.D. McKissic Fantasy Football Draft Strategy:
J.D. McKissic Salary Cap Value: $1
Draft Ranking: Find out for your league settings in a Beersheet! (coming in early July)
J.D. McKissic’s salary draft cost is bonkers low, at $1.5. That means that if you play your cards right, you can get him for literally the minimum cost that it takes to fill a roster spot in your particular league. And, given how simple it is for him to get to a GGE through targets, he provides a nice and safe floor, and given how a target is 2.5 as productive from a fantasy points perspective compared to a carry, it gives him a nice chance at spike weeks too. All for the low, low price of maybe $2 in your salary cap drafts.
In a snake draft, J.D. McKissic is behind 18 quarterbacks, three kickers, and five DSTs in ADP (and just one pick above the Patriots’ DST). He’s basically free, at running back 45, to the point that backup quarterbacks, kickers, and defenses are coming off the board before him. He’s all upside.
Best Case Scenario:
He is a weekly flex play or RB2 in your PPR leagues at dirt cheap prices.
Worst Case Scenario:
He falls off the face of the earth and you “wasted” a pick that could have been the Patriots DST or Matt Gay, instead!
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[Statistics are sourced from pro-football-reference.com, airyards.com, and ftnfantasy.com]
[Image Source: https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/a/a7/WFT_RB_J.D._McKissic.jpg, cropped under CC BY SA 2.0]
