Don’t Trust The Box Score: The Jets Should Keep Running Braelon Allen
Trust The Film
Fantasy football is all about the box score: Yards and TDs equal fantasy points, and fantasy points win your league.
But not every 5-100-1 is built the same. That’s why we use not only advanced analytics, but also film to identify talented players on the verge of delivering numbers.
Every week, I’ll bring my 2 years of experience analyzing college and NFL film to highlight when the box score doesn't match reality, showcasing a few players who performed significantly better or worse than the box score indicates.
Braelon Allen, RB, New York Jets
Braelon Allen has been solid in the five games since Breece Hall’s Week 3 quad injury. He averaged 18.6 rushes for 100.8 yards and 0.4 TDs per game, plus 2.6 catches for 14.0 yards.
That’s been good enough for RB15 in PPR over the past five weeks. So, should the Jets give Allen more snaps and carries when Hall returns? Let’s review the film.
The Jets run inside zone here, and the center of the O-line is clogged when Allen takes the ball. He makes an impressive jump cut to hit the open hole without losing acceleration.
That move wasn’t something I recall from Allen’s college or early NFL film. He typically would try to step and cut left, usually slowing down to find the right spot. That would have allowed the hole to fill up much quicker.
Instead, Allen gets 8 yards and a first down while showcasing improved vision and a new move that will be useful going forward.
Allen’s power continues to be a strength in his third season.
First, he shows some short-area quickness shifting around blocks while continuing forward. When the third level cracks down, Allen lowers his head and carries them for extra yardage.
Allen stays balanced and breaks through those tackles with the defense requiring a third defender to stop him.
That power gives Allen upside when he can reach the secondary and run through small DBs.
Allen’s still developing as a receiver. Here he blocks briefly before turning into the checkdown option for Geno Smith. Allen slows down as he turns back to Smith, who immediately tosses it to Allen with the Raiders playing a deeper zone.
Allen does pluck the high throw but doesn’t offer much open-field ability with a lack of after-catch explosion. He does make a good catch on this play, but struggles with inconsistent speed and movement when running routes. There remains work to do for Allen to be a consistent receiving threat out of the backfield.
Allen’s improvement as a runner could mean a larger work share going forward, but I still believe Hall to be the superior and more explosive back. And his edge remains large in the passing game.
It’s worth remembering that Allen doesn’t turn 23 until January and missed nearly all of last season, so he could yet present more upside.
The Jets would be wise to use a two-back system and lighten the workload for Hall, especially coming off his quad injury. We’ll have to see, of course, whether Allen can keep enough work to be fantasy viable, but OC Frank Reich’s history says it might be an RB-friendly environment.
The Jets’ 54.9% neutral pass rate sits just 17th in the league this season. Reich’s previous five seasons -- four as Indy’s head coach and one as Carolina’s -- found his offenses landing among the top 13 in neutral run rate four times. That included three top-9 finishes and two among the top 6.
Expect Hall to quickly return to startable fantasy usage, while Allen will have a shot to remain relevant in deeper leagues. At the least, he’ll remain a high-level handcuff.
Cam Ward, QB, Tennessee Titans
Cam Ward’s second year has been a disaster. He sits at QB30 in points per game and has thrown INTs in five of his last six games.
Week 8 showed some glimmers of hope, though. Ward finished QB4, throwing for 304 yards and 2 TDs with 41 yards rushing.
But Ward’s Week 8 film was mixed, showing some positive growth along with problems he still needs to overcome.
Ward shows some high-level QB skills on this play.
He opens to his left off the snap, looking at the two options on that side and pulling the Bengals coverage shallower in that direction. Then he turns back to the middle of the field, sets his feet, and delivers an arcing pass into Wan’Dale Robinson’s hands.
The eye manipulation along with the accuracy makes this one of the best passes I’ve seen from Ward all season. This type of pass gives me some hope for Ward’s future.
Ward has performed well on run-pass options. Here he keeps his eyes up while holding the ball out to Tony Pollard. When he sees the LBs crash down, Ward throws it to Chimere Dike for an easy TD against man coverage.
Ward’s play-action passing has been the best part of his game this year. Play action and RPOs have helped freeze the defense and allow Ward to make quick decisions to hit open WRs.
The Titans could help his development by running more play action.
Ward’s legs continue to be an asset as well.
The Bengals bring a four-man rush on this play, opening up a lane in the middle. Ward decisively takes off into the open field and gets down before contact.
Ward scrambles prematurely at times when he feels pressure (even when it isn’t there), but that didn’t happen against the Bengals. More of these properly timed and decisive scrambles would help both the offense and his fantasy value.
Ward’s biggest thorn has been when pressure does arrive. He struggles to keep his eyes up and get the ball out before taking a sack.
This is another four-man rush, but the Bengals get a bit more push than in the previous example. Ward looks down the field and ignores the checkdown as the rush approaches. Instead of staying focused on his options, he immediately drops his eyes and starts scrambling out of the pocket.
Dexter Lawrence gets a hand on the back of Ward’s jersey, and it's over: a 13-yard sack. The panic from Ward led to this sack and killed the drive.
There are some overall positives to Ward’s game. He has developed a strong RPO game and continues to progress in how he manipulates the defense to help WRs get open. His scrambling remains a plus, too.
But Ward’s lack of pocket presence and his struggles against pressure have been huge problems. He’s too slow to his checkdowns and panics when the O-line breaks down, which happens often with Tennessee.
I still have some hope for Ward to turn things around and become a usable fantasy QB. That probably doesn’t happen this season, but it does make Ward worth holding in dynasty superflex leagues.
Oronde Gadsden II, TE, Los Angeles Chargers
Gadsden showed promise as a rookie last season, finishing as TE20 in PPR points per game. The WR/TE hybrid outperformed expectations for a fifth-round draft selection, but the Chargers weren’t ready to make him their lead tight end.
The team brought in Charlie Kolar and David Njoku, relegating Gadsden to just 18% of the snaps in Week 1. That jumped to 44.1% in Week 2 and to the high 50s after Kolar and Njoku went down in the same game. Overall, Gadsden has played 46.9% of the offensive snaps.
The receiving production has mostly lagged, but Week 8 offered some promise. Gadsden came out of the bye to catch all five of his targets for 52 yards and finish 14th among PPR tight ends for the week.
Gadsden’s film shows the Chargers using him well in a short-range role built to beat zone defenses.
Gadsden lines up out wide here, but he stays shallow against the Rams’ deeper zone. He runs an in route and settles in front of the LBs.
This leads a quick throw from Justin Herbert with enough space for Gadsden to turn it upfield and gain 12 yards.
The shallow role for Gadsden worked extremely well in this game. The Rams played deeper zone most of the game, and Gadsden took advantage.
Here he lines up inline and runs a shallow drag route. Gadsden does slow down when he makes his break horizontally, but the Rams defense getting cleared out still opens up space.
This creates another easy pass as Herbert moves to his right. Gadsden makes the catch with good technique and turns upfield for a 15-yard gain.
Once the shallow role for Gadsden was working, the Chargers continued to exploit it.
He did have some success against man coverage as well.
Gadsden lines up wide and gets inside leverage on this slant. The read seemed predetermined, with Herbert starting his eyes left and immediately switching to throw to Gadsden.
The tight end doesn’t get separation, which will be a problem for Gadsden against CBs (Josh Wallace in this case), but he has the size to make the contested catch in this case.
If the Chargers stick with deploying Gadsden in the short range more often, he could see a continued boost in target volume. Week 8 marked his second straight game with 5 targets and just the third time this season he has exceeded 3.
This game wasn’t enough to turn Gadsden from bench fodder to starter, but we’ll see if the role evolves from here.
