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 a player that many were all-in on in 2021, but he missed the season with a torn Achilles. Gus Edwards is consistently over 700 yards rushing, year over year, but is that enough to draft him in your 2022 redraft leagues?
Gus Edwards ADP and AAV:
Average Draft Position: RB55, 172 overall
Average Auction Value: $2.2
Gus Edwards Statistics:
| Year | G | GS | Rush | Ru Yds | Ru TD | Tgt | Rec | Yards | TD | Touches | Opp | Total Yards |
| 2021– | — | — | — | — | — | — | — | — | — | — | — | — |
| 2020 | 16 | 6 | 144 | 723 | 6 | 13 | 9 | 129 | 0 | 153 | 157 | 852 |
| 2019 | 16 | 1 | 133 | 711 | 2 | 7 | 7 | 45 | 0 | 140 | 140 | 756 |
| Year | YPC | Rush/G | RuYd/G | Tgt/G | Rec/G | Catch% | Yds/Tgt | Yds/Rec | Touches/G | Opp/G | Yds/G |
| 2021 | — | — | — | — | — | — | — | — | — | — | — |
| 2020 | 5.02 | 9.0 | 45.2 | 0.81 | 0.56 | 69.2% | 9.92 | 14.33 | 9.56 | 9.81 | 53.25 |
| 2019 | 5.35 | 8.3 | 44.4 | 0.44 | 0.44 | 100.0% | 6.43 | 6.43 | 8.75 | 8.75 | 47.25 |
| Year | Std Pts | HPPR Pts | PPR Pts | Pts/G | HPPR Pts/G | PPR Pts/G | Pts/Tch | HPPR Pts/Tch | PPR Pts/Tch |
| 2021 | — | — | — | — | — | — | — | — | — |
| 2020 | 119.2 | 123.7 | 128.2 | 7.45 | 7.73 | 8.0 | 0.78 | 0.81 | 0.84 |
| 2019 | 85.6 | 89.1 | 92.6 | 5.35 | 5.57 | 5.79 | 0.61 | 0.64 | 0.66 |
2022 Gus Edwards Fantasy Football Overview:
Gus Edwards missed 2021, but that doesn’t mean that all the good things we had to say about him going into the season just stopped being true. Going into 2021, there were just sixteen backs with at least 700 yards per season in all three seasons from 2018 – 2020. Edwards was also one of 30 backs to total at least 2,300 yards in the last three years. He just doesn’t get a lot of hype because, well, he’s Gus Edwards. He’s been second fiddle in all of his time NFL; first to Mark Ingram, and then to J.K. Dobbins. Then, he tore his ACL and disappeared from our consciousness.
But, there’s a lot of reason to like Gus Edwards. While he doesn’t get receptions (18 catches in three seasons), he is extremely efficient with the ball. Gus Edwards has been in the NFL for three seasons, and in each of those three seasons, he topped 100 carries while averaging 5.0 yards per carry (or better). Gus Edwards and Nick Chubb are the only active players to do this in those seasons, and only six players (Chubb, Edwards, Matt Breida, Derrick Henry, Aaron Jones, and Raheem Mostert) pulled off this feat multiple times from 2018 to 2020.
2022 Gus Edwards Fantasy Football Draft Strategy:
Gus Edwards Salary Cap Value: $1
Draft Ranking: Find out for your league settings in a Beersheet! (coming in early July)
Go get Gus Edwards. He’s cheap, and he has an extremely solid floor. The Ravens are one of the most run-heavy teams in the league, splitting 363 running back rushing attempts in the last season they had a full complement of running backs. This should go mostly to J.K. Dobbins and Gus Edwards, with Mike Davis soaking up the rest. It’s a dense running back rush distribution, and it’s all going to Edwards and Dobbins.
Dobbins is dirt cheap ($3 in salary cap drafts, RB52, pick 167 in snake drafts), making him a dead-easy stash at his draft price. There are very few running backs over pick 100 who feel like slam dunks to get at least 800 yards this year, and Edwards is one of them… going after pick 150, even! I’m excited to see what Gus Edwards can do with a bigger workload, and that completely ignores the unthinkable: J.K. Dobbins suffers a season-ending injury.
Gus Edwards is in some rarified company and needs a shot to break through to 1,000 all-purpose yards. It doesn’t seem like it’s that difficult to scale him up to that amount, given the Ravens’ dedication to the run and the roster around Edwards. Edwards had over ten touches in a game six times in his last season, and he turned in at least 70 total yards or a touchdown in all six of those games.
Best Case Scenario:
Gus Edwards slowly wrests control away from J.K. Dobbins and ends the year in the bigger side of the platoon, with about 1,200 yards and 8 touchdowns for his troubles.
Worst Case Scenario:
Gus Edwards somehow has the short end of the platoon quickly wrenched from him by Mike Davis, who proceeds to steal Edwards’ 1,200 yards and 8 touchdowns.
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[Statistics are sourced from pro-football-reference.com, airyards.com, and ftnfantasy.com]
