Chris Johnson Historical Comparisons

Chris Johnson is a  great example of a guy who is going to test my evaluation criteria to its breaking point.  He’s a fascinating puzzle this year and I’m having fun with his evaluation almost like a Rubik’s Cube.  Almost all of the signals that my evaluation criteria give on Johnson are conflicting!!

Johnson grades out relatively poorly from a consistency standpoint (how many of the games he carried the ball in did he exceed a base level of fantasy production).  He has a relatively poor Adjusted Yards Per Carry, which is basically Johnson’s YPC and then subtract out the YPC of the defenses he faced.  But Johnson grades out as elite in the Filtered YPC metric, which throws out runs less than 4 yards.  Johnson’s Filtered YPC average is the same as guys like Jamaal Charles and Darren McFadden.  So we know he can still run.

Below is a table of players who have had seasons similar to Johnson’s 2010 campaign.  You’ll notice that these comparisons are buckshot!  They’re all over the place.  Barry Sanders, Rudi Johnson, and Willis McGahee.  Who are three people who have never been in my kitchen?

Chris Johnson Historical Comparisons to 2010 Season

Player	Age	Season	Tm	G	Att/G	Y/G	YPC	TD/G	Rec/G	Rec Y/G	FP/G S	FP/G PPR
Chris Johnson	25	2010	TEN	16	19.8	85.3	4.1	0.7	2.8	15.3	14.6	17.3
Barry Sanders	24	1992	DET	16	19.5	84.5	4.4	0.6	1.8	14.1	13.6	15.4
Travis Henry	25	2003	BUF	15	22.1	90.4	3.9	0.7	1.9	10.5	14.5	16.4
Willie Parker	26	2006	PIT	16	21.1	93.4	4.2	0.8	1.9	13.9	16.7	18.7
Deuce McAllister	26	2004	NOR	13	20.5	82.5	4.1	0.7	2.6	17.5	14.2	16.8
Rudi Johnson	25	2004	CIN	16	22.6	90.9	4.0	0.8	0.9	5.3	14.1	15.1
Terry Allen	27	1995	WAS	16	21.1	81.8	3.8	0.6	1.9	14.5	13.8	15.7
Willis McGahee	26	2007	BAL	15	19.6	80.5	4.1	0.5	2.9	15.4	12.8	15.7
Travis Henry	24	2002	BUF	16	20.3	89.9	4.4	0.8	2.7	19.3	16.2	18.9
Ryan Grant	27	2009	GNB	16	17.6	78.3	4.4	0.7	1.6	12.3	13.2	14.8
Chris Warren	27	1995	SEA	16	19.4	84.1	4.2	0.9	2.2	15.4	16.0	18.1
Stephen Davis	26	2000	WAS	15	22.1	87.9	3.9	0.7	2.2	20.9	15.3	17.5
Natrone Means	22	1994	SDG	16	21.4	84.4	3.9	0.8	2.4	14.7	14.4	16.8
Clinton Portis	27	2008	WAS	16	21.4	92.9	4.2	0.6	1.8	13.6	14.0	15.8
Eddie George	23	1996	HOU	16	20.9	85.5	4.1	0.5	1.4	11.4	12.7	14.1
Corey Dillon	27	2001	CIN	16	21.3	82.2	3.7	0.6	2.1	14.3	14.5	16.6
Clinton Portis	24	2005	WAS	15	23.2	100.5	4.4	0.7	1.8	13.5	15.8	17.6
Rudi Johnson	26	2005	CIN	16	21.1	91.1	4.3	0.8	1.4	5.6	14.2	15.6
Adrian Peterson	25	2010	MIN	15	18.9	86.5	4.6	0.8	2.4	22.7	16.1	18.5
Terrell Davis	24	1996	DEN	16	21.6	96.1	4.3	0.8	2.3	19.4	17.2	19.4
Bobby Humphrey	24	1990	DEN	14	20.4	85.5	4.1	0.5	1.7	10.9	12.6	14.4
Corey Dillon	26	2000	CIN	16	19.7	89.7	4.2	0.4	1.1	9.9	12.6	13.7

If we look at the list of Chris Johnson similar players in the year after they were similar to Johnson we see the problems with Johnson’s 2010 season.  Our similarity based projections do not like guys who average low yards per carry and aren’t productive in the receiving game (where Johnson averaged less than 6 yards/reception).  In Similarity Based Projections I have 11 backs ahead of Johnson and they’re all good pass catchers.

You’ll also note that a number of the guys on the list played partial seasons in the year after being similar to Johnson 2010 (see below table).  We don’t think of Johnson as old, but of the running backs who ran for 1000 yards last year, only Michael Turner, Steven Jackson and Cedric Benson were older than 25 years old.  Johnson will be 26 this year.

Chris Johnson Similar Players Y2

Player	G	Att/G	Y/G	Y/A	TD/G	Rec/G	Rec Y/G	Rec TD/G	FP/G S	FP/G PPR
Barry Sanders	11	22.1	101.4	4.6	0.3	3.3	18.6	-	13.6	16.9
Travis Henry	5	17.4	60.0	3.4	-	1.6	7.0	-	6.7	8.3
Willie Parker	14	22.9	94.1	4.2	0.1	1.6	11.7	-	11.4	13.1
Deuce McAllister	5	18.6	67.0	3.5	0.6	3.4	23.4	-	12.6	16.0
Rudi Johnson	16	21.1	91.1	4.3	0.8	1.4	5.6	-	14.2	15.6
Terry Allen	16	21.7	84.6	3.9	1.3	2.0	12.1	-	17.5	19.5
Willis McGahee	12	13.8	53.9	4.0	0.5	1.8	12.3	-	9.6	11.5
Travis Henry	15	22.1	90.4	3.9	0.7	1.9	10.5	0.1	14.5	16.4
Ryan Grant	1	8.0	45.0	5.6	-	-	-	-	4.5	4.5
Chris Warren	14	14.5	61.1	4.0	0.4	2.9	19.5	-	10.2	13.1
Stephen Davis	16	22.3	89.5	4.0	0.3	1.8	12.8	-	12.1	13.9
Natrone Means	8	22.6	89.8	4.0	0.6	0.8	5.1	-	13.2	14.0
Clinton Portis	7	17.1	70.0	4.1	0.1	1.3	8.1	0.1	9.5	10.8
Eddie George	16	22.3	87.4	3.7	0.4	0.4	2.8	0.1	11.6	12.1
Corey Dillon	15	19.5	80.2	4.0	0.5	2.3	15.4	-	12.4	14.7
Clinton Portis	8	15.9	65.4	4.1	0.9	2.1	21.3	-	13.9	16.0
Rudi Johnson	16	21.3	81.8	3.8	0.8	1.4	7.8	-	13.5	14.9
Terrell Davis	15	24.6	116.7	4.6	1.0	2.8	19.1	-	19.6	22.4
Bobby Humphrey	2	5.0	16.5	3.3	-	-	-	-	1.7	1.7
Corey Dillon	16	21.3	82.2	3.7	0.6	2.1	14.3	0.2	14.5	16.6

If we think about Johnson’s 2010 season and what we know about him through our metrics (he’s elite when he gets in space, he suffered from a screwed up TEN system last year), it turns out that we really need to have some comfort related to the TEN offense this year.  You have to be comfortable that they’ll be able to stay on the field and move the chains, giving Johnson more opportunities than he comes up with just on his own.  If you think that they can just hand the ball off to Johnson like they did two years ago, you’re going to be mistaken.

I think the TEN offense is where the problem lies.  Tennessee may have made a mild upgrade from rookie Jake Locker by bringing in Matt Hasselbeck, but it probably wasn’t much.  Here are Hasselbeck’s stats going back to 2002.  Notice the deterioration?  I do.  I think Hasselbeck is problematic just in terms of knowing whether he can stay on the field, and then if he is on the field, what kind of upgrade does he provide over a rookie?  12 TDs and 17 INTs look like rookie numbers to me.

Matt Hasselbeck Passing Stats

It’s taken me some time to get here, but I think I have to move CJ out of the “Big Four”. I think he has the same talent level as the other three (probably a lot more talent than Foster actually), but he’s in the worst offensive situation. Even MIN will be more efficient I think. So I would still take CJ before LeSean McCoy, but after Adrian Peterson, Arian Foster, and Jamaal Charles.