Best running back handcuffs for your draft

There are popular trends that you don’t always follow. The Madman is notoriously averse to the soul-selling transition to PPR that has occurred across the breadth of the fantasy community. We don’t ever initially begin a draft employing the Zero-RB Theory. And we don’t care a lot for handcuffs.

But, we do have a bit more sympathy for that idea than we do the others.

In general, we like to pick at least four startable RBs in every draft — guys we can use in any given week. Only the fifth or sixth RBs on our roster become wild-card options, and often any handcuff-useful choices are gone by then.

Nevertheless, there are some RBs who just beg for a handcuff. And sometimes, we agree. But it takes a rare confluence of events: You have to draft a must-cuff RB, that cuff must be reasonably affordable, and there can’t be any potential every-week options available when it comes time to pick that cuff.

And those are just the criteria for our RB position. We also aren’t going to pass up quality guys at other spots if they slip into our cuff target’s range.

For the sake of argument, let’s pretend all those factors have been checked off, the planets are aligned. Here are some pairs we would consider cuffing, and why it likely would or wouldn’t happen in a Madman draft (for 12-team PPR formats):

Top fantasy football handcuffs

1. Dalvin Cook/Alexander Mattison

The ideal handcuff situations are for your best RBs. Many times, however, if the dropoff in expected production by the backup or the decline of the offense in general is so steep, or there is no clear-cut No. 2, a handcuff becomes irrelevant. Hence, we don’t like cuffing for Jonathan Taylor or Christian McCaffrey. Cook is a different story.

He plays in a good Vikings offense. His backup is clear. His backup has performed in the past when needed. And the primary RB in this case has some mileage. Plus, you can wait until the 10th round to target Mattison. That’s the kind of handcuff bargain we like.

2. David Montgomery/Khalil Herbert

We’re not big fans of this Bears offense, and we’re not in a rush to draft Montgomery. But if things fall a certain way, he isn’t someone we’re avoiding either, so he could end up on our roster. If he does, we have a laser focus on Herbert. He averaged 13.5 in PPR over a four-game Montgomery absence last season. Even better news, Herbert is normally available into the 13th round.

3. Ezekiel Elliott/Tony Pollard

Zeke recently has had the look of an RB on his last legs, and his third-round ADP reflects that — we would rather have Montgomery a few picks later with a cheaper cuff. Pollard has been the more explosive Cowboys runner for the past year or two. The younger back has shined when given opportunities, and some of those come even when Elliott is healthy. Target Pollard in the seventh.

4. Cam Akers/Darrell Henderson Jr.

We have more confidence in Akers this season than it appears most do. He came on strong, really strong, for the Rams during the playoffs, despite missing virtually the entire regular season with an Achilles injury. He also dealt with separate rib and ankles issues in his 2020 rookie year. And right now, he isn’t practicing, because of what is being called a “soft tissue” issue. So there are justifiable health concerns. But none of these ailments seem interrelated. But if he can’t go, Henderson is the guy. Here’s the thing: Henderson is also dealing with a soft-tissue issue. At Akers’ current middle-third-round value, we’re fine with the risk, especially when you consider you can buy Henderson insurance in the 10th. The chances current ailments linger for both? Too low for us to worry about.

6. Travis Etienne/James Robinson

Robinson, like Akers last season, is coming off an Achilles injury. Akers’ recovery time was amazing; he was injured in Week 1 and made it back for the playoffs. So there is a chance Robinson, injured in December, can make his own heroic return for the Jaguars. And that would be great. For everyone except fantasy managers. If both Robinson and Etienne are healthy, it undercuts the potential production of both — since we can envision a split workload. So we’re rooting for some abundance of caution here, to get Etienne off to a good start so he can solidify his hold on the job, at which point Robinson becomes an ideal handcuff. Is that self-serving and sort of a grimy way of thinking? Absolutely. But it’s not as if we’re wishing actual harm on anyone, just, at worst, too much caution. If we get our wish, Etienne at around the round 3-4 turn and Robinson in the 10th make a nice pairing. If Robinson proves tougher than our evil desires, then, well, to be continued …

Here, we enter a new category of cuff stuff. These are potential tandems that are just too expensive to grab both, and/or we expect enough production out of the backup in normal circumstances that we just bypass the first guy and take the No. 2 as a fourth or fifth RB on our roster. We call this approach:

Just draft the second guy

1. Aaron Jones/A.J. Dillon

Sure, we like the Packers’ Jones. But we also worry about any RB who was out-rushed the previous season by his backup. His ADP has slipped in recent weeks from the late-first/early second round to later in the second round, making him a bit more enticing. But we would just skip him and take Dillon in Round 5 or 6. That’s how Just Draft the Second Guy works.

2. Nick Chubb/Kareem Hunt

Chubb is often drafted in close proximity to Jones. We like Chubb better as a player, but that is offset, and then some, by working for the Browns in a worse offense. Hunt goes a couple of rounds later than Dillon, despite more of a career track record for success. We’ll just wait on Hunt. But apologies to Chubb. We still think you’re great.

Betting on the NFL?

3. Breece Hall/Michael Carter

Hall certainly feels like the most potent RB of this duo, and reports out of Jets camp suggest the same. At the same time, it is not as if Carter has played his way out of a job. He had a fine rookie season last year, and performed OK on the fantasy front despite being in a terrible offense. We expect improvements on that front this season. What we don’t expect is for Carter to disappear. For this reason, we think Hall might be a tad overpriced in the middle-fourth — right behind Montgomery, who we would much rather have — and even ahead of Josh Jacobs, which we don’t understand. You can often get Carter in the 10th. At that price, as your RB5, as long as his playing time doesn’t disappear, he is almost guaranteed to exceed draft value.