It’s definitely not the time of year when fantasy football owners want to hear about a starter being out with an injury. Then again, fantasy football players never want to hear about a player being out with an injury.
One running back who has probably helped lead many teams to their fantasy football playoffs is Jacksonville Jaguars rookie T.J. Yeldon. Unfortunately, Yeldon went down last week with a sprained MCL and he has yet to practice this week. Considering sprained MCL injuries usually take several weeks to heal, it seems doubtful that Yeldon would suit up for Week 15 against the Atlanta Falcons.
Denard Robinson will likely start in place of Yeldon, and is worthy of starting in leagues this week. Robinson can’t take the pounding of a full 16 game season workload, but he can be extremely effective for one or two games in a row. I would peg him in as a RB2 this week.
Robinson won’t be able to replace Yeldon though. The rookie has 740 yards and two touchdowns on just 182 carries. That’s an average of 4.1 yards per carry. Yeldon has also hauled in 36 passes for 279 yards and another touchdown. Meanwhile, Robinson has 196 yards on 42 carries (4.7 yard per carry average) and eight catches for 68 yards.
Unfortunately, Yeldon isn’t the only running back dealing with an injury. Miami Dolphins starter Lamar Miller was listed as a limited participant in practice on Wednesday with an ankle injury. The same ankle injury that held him to just five carries in the second half of Miami’s Monday Night Football loss to the New York Giants.
Miller is, however, expected to play this week against the San Diego Chargers. I would consider him a RB2 this week.
Through 13 games Miller has 769 yards on 151 carries and seven touchdowns. He is averaging 5.1 yards per carry. He also has 39 catches for 346 yards and another two touchdowns in the receiving game.
As for Arizona Cardinals running back Andre Ellington, it was originally believed that he would return to the lineup this week, but he has yet to practice since suffering a turf toe weeks ago. His status will likely be updated later in the week, but you can forget about starting him this week.
The Cardinals will once again reply on rookie David Johnson to carry the workload out of the backfield.