The Age of RB by Committee

TL;DR

Saquon had over 400 carries last year (436 carries and 482 touches to be precise), only 1 of the 11 backs who've had such a season since 1999 have improved (fantasy wise) in the following season.
Thus I'd argue Saquon shouldn't be redrafted in round 1, and is probably not worth his current dynasty price.
In redraft, I'd prefer Gibbs and Bijan over Saquon. Henry and Jeanty deserve consideration too.

Overview

It's been a while since I've made one of these, but the offseason blues and a change of pace from my other projects got me exploring RB load and future production.

So, in this post, I create data tables that include running back seasons that meet a certain volume criteria (e.g. 350 carries, 400 carries, 350 touches, etc.). Each of the tables is sorted from the highest fantasy points difference between the previous and upcoming season. This means the higher up in the table, the more you improved, from a fantasy perspective, after that X criteria season.

I should mention that the X volume criteria is an aggregate of regular season and post season stats (i.e. regular and post season carries or regular and post season touches), whereas the fantasy numbers and more detailed stats tables are just from the regular season (except for the games differential... for some reason the Python library used doesn't distinguish this... oh well).

For example, in the first table, Min 350 Carries. Shaun Alexander had a 350 carry season in 2004, where he was 27 years old. In 2005 (the upcoming season) he had 62 more fantasy points than 2004, which would mean his fantasy_points_diff is 62.

NOTE: most backs that met the volume critera proceeded to underperform in their following season. I'll let you explore the tables, and more detailed versions (including differences across stats like rushing yards, receiving yards, touchdowns, etc.) can be found in the appendix.

Load By Carries

Min 350 Carries

13 of the 45 rows above resulted in a positive increase in fantasy points. This equates to a 28.89% chance of an RB having a better upcoming season, if they just had a minimum of 350 carries.

Min 400 Carries

1 of the 11 rows above resulted in a positive increase in fantasy points. This equates to a 9.09% chance of an RB having a better upcoming season, if they just had a minimum of 400 carries.

Load By Touches

Min 350 Touches

38 of the 134 rows above resulted in a positive increase in fantasy points. This equates to a 28.36% chance of an RB having a better upcoming season, if they just had a minimum of 350 touches.

Min 400 Touches

13 of the 49 rows above resulted in a positive increase in fantasy points. This equates to a 26.53% chance of an RB having a better upcoming season, if they just had a minimum of 400 touches.

Min 450 Touches

2 of the 9 rows above resulted in a positive increase in fantasy points. This equates to a 22.22% chance of an RB having a better upcoming season, if they just had a minimum of 450 touches.

Appendix

Full versions of the tables above: