Margins are thin in fantasy football –- one move can elevate your team to a contender, but taking a misstep can set your roster back years. With that in mind, let’s take a look at the top trio of dynasty RB trade targets as we move onto the 2024 offseason.
Top Dynasty RB Trade Targets for the 2024 NFL Offseason
Rhamondre Stevenson, New England Patriots
One option in the running back trade market is to try to get ahead of a breakout season, while the other is to be less concerned about a down season than your competition.
Entering the final year of his rookie contract, how should dynasty fantasy football managers view Patriots RB Rhamondre Stevenson? https://t.co/nVsWtNQrhR
— PFN Fantasy (@PFNFantasy) January 31, 2024
New England Patriots RB Rhamondre Stevenson falls squarely into the latter bucket, as his follow-up to an RB11 (half-PPR points per game) finish in 2022 was an uninspiring RB28 rank that saw his yards per carry drop by 20% and his targets per route run fall by 21.9%.
To make matters worse, he missed the final month of the season due to an ankle injury. But with the expectation being for him to be healthy entering the 2024 campaign, I’m more bullish than most on Stevenson entering his age-26 season.
RB Ezekiel Elliott isn’t under contract, thus opening up a return to a bell cow role for Stevenson. That sort of volume simply isn’t easy to find, and if this offense can take any sort of step forward — not a tall ask for a unit that ranked bottom-five in scoring, yards, yards per play, first downs, and third down conversion rate — Stevenson’s price right now is as favorable as it figures to get.
In 2023, he converted three of his seven carries from inside the 10-yard line, a 42.9% conversion rate that dwarfs his 26.7% career number prior. Yes, that’s a tiny sample, but the idea that he can add some semblance of scoring equity to an otherwise well-rounded profile is promising.
Dynasty is primarily about looking forward, but let’s not forget just how good Stevenson was in 2022. Backtracking too far in a running back’s career can be dangerous, given the wear-and-tear of the position, but going back a single season is reasonable given his age.
Over the past decade, here are players with at least 1,000 rushing yards and 60 catches in a season in which they averaged 5.0+ yards per touch:
- Christian McCaffrey (four times)
- Le’Veon Bell (twice)
- Matt Forte
- David Johnson
- Todd Gurley
- Saquon Barkley
- Ezekiel Elliott
- Rhamondre Stevenson
That’s a list of fantasy royalty and RBs who were able to sustain top-shelf production through the majority of their 20’s. I’m taking advantage of a down season from Stevenson and a previously messy situation in New England — the environment around him should be more advantageous moving forward, and his versatility is exactly what I’m looking for in the trade market at the position.
Javonte Williams, Denver Broncos
We’ve done this song and dance before, but people seem to have forgotten how it works. Players are quick to return from formerly catastrophic knee injuries these days, though a return to form can take a little bit of time. That means patient dynasty managers are rewarded.
As mentioned in my Javonte Williams dynasty value check, New York Giants RB Saquon Barkley suffered a major knee injury in 2020, and it took him a season to challenge the form he showed prior. In his second year following the injury, Barkley’s yards per carry increased by 18.9% compared to his first year back.
He ran hard in both of those seasons, but his body caught up with his mind in year two, as his yards per carry before first contact rose by 70.4% in the second season.
MORE: 2024 Dynasty Mock Draft
It should be noted that every player recovers differently — I just mention the Barkley instance as a way to highlight the potential gains you have from embracing the extended window for RBs coming back from an injury like what Williams suffered in 2022.
There isn’t a running back on the current Broncos roster that poses a serious threat to Williams’ role as the bell cow, leaving the door wide open for a quality/quantity situation in 2024 and beyond.
Any investment in an RB is risky, but if I’m going to go that direction in the trade market, targeting a running back yet to celebrate his 25th birthday that averaged 5.0 yards per touch prior to a knee injury from which he’s a full season removed is the profile of a target in my eyes.
Roschon Johnson, Chicago Bears
The first two backs on this list have given us proof of concept as a viable option, something that cannot be said about Chicago Bears RB Roschon Johnson after a 115-touch rookie season. The Texas product is still searching for his first NFL game with more than 10 carries and was used as more of a specialist than anything in 2023.
Excelling in pass blocking and having 29.6% of touches coming through the pass game generally isn’t the path to fantasy greatness — relax. A rookie capable of earning his way on the field in hard-to-establish-trust spots (i.e., most third-down situations) tells me that the organization is bullish on his future, and that is enough to catch my eye.
As for his rare chances on first down?
- RB Johnson: 4.8 yards per carry (2.3 ypc before contact)
- RB Khalil Herbert: 3.7 yards per carry (1.2 ypc before contact)
- RB D’Onta Foreman: 3.1 yards per carry (0.9 ypc before contact)
Who says he can’t produce on the early downs? There’s not enough on his NFL resume to consider Johnson a future building block, but many managers want production from Day 1 at running back given the short shelf life of the position and have already lowered their opinion on the 2023 fourth-round pick.
If you’re playing the long game, Johnson’s buying window now is for you. The Bears offense is influx, but they figure to have a quarterback with potential for the foreseeable future. That gives this offense as a whole more upside than they are being given credit for right now.
MORE: Dynasty Fantasy Football Trade Value Chart
Herbert’s contract is up after 2024, paving the way for Johnson to take over this backfield in 2025 at the latest. In buying now, you get ahead of that ascension, and who is to say that Johnson doesn’t take over in 2024 (Herbert has missed nine games over the past two seasons and isn’t signed to a big enough deal that would give him an extended leash)?