Chris Johnson is currently coming off of the mock draft boards as the #3 overall pick. If you take Johnson at that spot I think you have a ton of risk that you’re not being honest with yourself about. Let’s name a few risk factors:
- Jake Locker could either start the season as the Titans #1 QB, or could become the starter midway through the year. The Titans offense could suffer as a result and they might spend their entire season on their side of the 50 yard line. See the Rusty Smith game from 2010.
- The Titans will have a new coaching regime and we know nothing about CJ’s usage going forward.
- Defenses might have so little to worry about coming out of the Titans passing game that they can totally key on stopping CJ. If Kenny Britt were to have any suspension from the team or the league, the Titans passing game is not going to look pretty regardless of who starts at QB.
- There is likely to be a large amount of variance in CJ’s results. Which is to say that he might lose your game for you one week when he racks up 15 carries for 30 yards, and then he might win your game for you the next week when he gets loose for 200 yards and 2 TDs. That’s the kind of variance that doesn’t help you get into the playoffs.
There’s also the issue of the poor Tennessee running game in 2010. CJ disguised what was otherwise a dreadful running game. To look at this issue we’ll do an exercise that is similar to Filtered YPC. We’ll split runs into short runs (4 yards and less) and long runs (over 4 yards). We do this under the theory that the runs of less than 4 yards can be explained generally by scheme and offensive line, and that runs greater than 4 yards can be attributed to the RB. This is obviously an oversimplification as good blocking could produce a long run by letting the RB go untouched. But still, this analysis is worthwhile.
UPDATE: The rest of this post is premium content. For a free post on Chris Johnson, see: Chris Johnson Was Not a #1 Back When Titans Lost
