Running backs are some of the greatest athletes in the sport. From a BMI-to-athleticism ratio — which admittedly I’m making up as a thing — running backs are up there with any other position with the exception of defensive end, where some of those athletes look like they came from other planets. When you think of the great running backs in NFL history, you think of the bruising power of an Earl Campbell, Larry Csonka, Jerome Bettis, or John Riggins, or the speed of a Barry Sanders, Gale Sayers, Chris Johnson, or Marshall Faulk or the unmatchable power/speed combination of an O.J. Simpson, Jim Brown, Adrian Peterson, or Bo Jackson.
And yet, we all seem to understand that the great running back is fading from the NFL. Le’Veon Bell still can’t get his long-term contract, and Devonta Freeman is the second highest paid running back with a contract paying him $8.25M per year. And it’s not just free agent running backs that are struggling: draft capital being spent on running backs is still on the decline, although the 2018 Draft (which was regarded as very running back heavy) had a bit of a rebound.
On Sunday, I wrote that completion percentage (including sacks) is strongly tied with run/pass ratio. If completion percentage started falling (or, perhaps, other measures of pass efficiency started falling), presumably the run/pass ratio would reverse as well.
There are probably other ways to make running backs more valuable, or at least star running backs more valuable. While perhaps good for overall offense, and good for individual running back health, the re-emergence of running back by committee is bad for top-end running backs. The Eagles and Patriots met in the Super Bowl and both teams were at the forefront of RBBC in 2017.
So today, I open things up to you. If you were the NFL Commissioner, and had the ability to make rules changes unilaterally, and your goal was to make running backs more valuable, what rules changes would you propose? Let’s assume you can’t make teams change what they do — that is, you can’t tell teams to stop throwing short passes instead of calling run plays — but you can implement rules that would encourage certain behavior.
So what rules changes would you consider implementing?