Damien Williams: is it time for a change?

[dlphg9]

I know the title is my own question, but I'm going to answer my own question. This guy has very clearly shown that last year was an absolute fluke. He can't do anything worth a shit and if Veach wouldn't have given him a stupid ass extension, then he'd be off this team. In what universe do you keep giving the ball to a guy that has 41 rushes for 70 yards and 1.7 ypc. This last game was absolute dog shit 11 total touches for 6 ****ing yards. Are you kidding me? He shouldn't touch the ball again.

Bad is an understatement. He's horrendous. Literally the absolute worst back in the league. There are 43 qualified players and he ranks 43rd in ypc. He's at 1.7 ypc and no one else is under 3.0 ypc. The distance between him and the 42nd rank player, Le'Veon Bell, is 1.3 ypc. The distance between Le'Veon Bell and the 20th ranked player, Chris Carson, is 1.3 ypc.

This is definitely something that needs brought up more. That's gotta be some kind of record for worst ever. We are seeing history boys. The absolute worst RB performance in the history of the game or close. I took off the hide non qualifiers filter and it looks even worse. He's 192 out of 227. There are only 5 other players with 10+ carries that average less ypc, it's pretty much a Who's Who of most electric runners in the league.

#194 Kalen Ballage - 22 car/36 yards/1.6 ypc/13 carries since being demoted from being a starter 3 games ago

#198 Joe Flacco - 11 car/11 yards/1.0 ypc/He's a statue of a QB. **** id hope Williams would have more ypc than this bum. Spoiler alert - all the rest of this list is the same. Statue QBs.

#208 Jared Goff
#210 Jimmy G.
#213 Tom Brady

Did some more research and going all the way back to 1999, so 20 other years, and the lowest ypc for qualified runners is 2.5 ypc in 1999. The average of all the lowest ypc is 2.9. I can't believe how bad that he has been. There is no way anyone can even try to defend him. He's the king of shit fest running backs and for Reid to continue to allow him to play is egregious.

[MAHOMO 4 LIFE!]

Williams is one of the best on the team at making players miss

[Lzen]

Originally Posted by BWillie

We don't have an above avg RB on the roster, unless Darwin is one. Haven't seen him enough to know. Damien just has the most straight away speed than any RB. He's bad at seeing holes though, but he is okay in the pass game. One play doesn't make him the best option, though. It really doesn't matter who we use I don't think. The other options aren't any better or worst than the other. Using any of our 4 RBs probably doesn't really matter at all.

Once again, you don't know what you're talking about.

[O.city]

They don't have a great RB, which is fine because the difference between a great RB and a good one is pretty much negligible in terms of wins and losses.

Once you have the MVP back under center, the RB position is fine.

[DJ's left nut]

Originally Posted by duncan_idaho

Was Williams hurt to start the year?

He looks like a completely different player the past 2 weeks.

He's hitting the hole a lot harder.

I'm done with the Shady thing. I don't care about his YPC - he's a dancer and brings no authority with him to the line. If he can't get through fairly clean, he's just going to go down so you can't run downhill with him at all.

Damien, OTOH, isn't terribly shifty but he's gonna take the handoff and run it as blocked. He'll leave a few backside running lanes missed because his vision isn't elite and so he'll overlook the cutback in favor of trying to make the most of the run as designed. Sometimes that'll burn you.

And then sometimes that'll get you that 91 yard run where he just came flying downhill and hoped the hole opened for him. It did and he had the head of steam he needed to make that move and get trucking. He also did a perfect job on that 2nd and short run that got brought back because of the bullshit holding penalty on Kelce.

Williams brings some assertiveness to the running game that we desperately need.

[O.city]

I think Shady is still banged up a bit, he looked slow getting up yesterday.

There's still a place for him and his vision, but the ball security is an issue. I don't really think it's a problem the rotation they've got going.

[siberian khatru]

Shady with 6 snaps Sunday (sorry if Q)

[ThaVirus]

Originally Posted by dls6501

So beyond tired of people making comments like this. Why should we take out the 91 yarder? Did it not happen? Do we not know how averages work?

Just blows my mind. Sometimes, players need touches and big plays will happen. You know who used to be like this? LaDanian Tomlinson.

(Just because I know some people are idiots and cant understand that I am not comparing the two in total skill level, let me say I AM NOT COMPARING THE TWO IN TERMS OF HOW GOOD THEY ARE.)

LaDanian Tomlinson had plenty of games in his career where he had something like 20 total carries, 18 of said carries for 30 yards, 1 carry for 25 yards, and 1 carry for 65 yards and a touchdown.

Do you think Charger fans would bitch and say "oh well if you took out the two long runs, LT only had 30 yards on 18 carries"?!? No of f***ing course not. Sometimes, players make a big play if they are given a bunch of opportunities, even if said opportunities fail most of the time. Obviously, this didnt happen all the time with LT, but it did happen sometimes.

Again, not saying Damien is anything close to LT....but maybe, just maybe he is similar to him in this specific aspect. Feed him the ball and he might just break one for a gamechanging play.

It matters. Ideally you’d like to have the production be consistent. It’s difficult to keep your offense on the field when your running game is consistently only getting you 0-3 yard gains. It’s nice when that 90 yarder hits, but in some games you don’t get that (or in our case you abandon it altogether because you’re seeing no returns) and you’re worse off for it.

Kind of reminds me of Chris Johnson vs Jamaal Charles. Chris Johnson was the king of running for 0-4 yard gains for 19 carries then busting an 80 yarder to save the day. Meanwhile, Jamaal was the type to consistently churn out 4-8 yarders with an occasional 40+ yarder thrown in.

They’re both great, but give me the consistent guy over the boom or bust type any day.

[Gravedigger]

MIN 12 carries for 125 yards - 10.4 average
GB 7 carries for 30 yards - 4.3 average
DEN 9 carries for 7 yards - .8 average
HOU 1 carry for 6 yards - 6 average
IND 9 carries for 23 yards - 2.6 average
OAK 9 carries for 8 yards - .9 average
JAX 13 carries for 26 yards - 2 average

Let's not crown him King just yet fellas. Take out the 91 yard run and he's 11 carries for 34 yards.

In passing he's 17 for 21 on the year for 118 yards for a 6.9 yard average.

I'm glad he had that huge run, but we need to pull back on the recency bias a little when talking about Damien Williams. I know alot of you want to come to these old posts to say, "I told you so".

[Hoover]

Damien is our best best back, and McCoy should be used to compliment him.

I swear most people here base their opinions on stat lines and not by watching the games. Yes, Damien has been a disappointment until last week, but that's what you are going to get when you give a RB less than ten carries a game. Backs like him need opportunities to break one. I'm not saying he's Barry Sanders, but would bench Sanders after the second quarter because he hasn't popped one yet? Of course not. This kid can score from anywhere. Give him 15 opportunities a game and we will all love this kid again.

[O.city]

He does seem like he's running a lot harder the last few weeks. I think Duncan may be right, he had to have been hurt earlier in the year.

[CaliforniaChief]

I think the turning point was in the GB game last week after Shady's fumble. On that next drive, Damien ran with authority and drive. He showed both the ability to be a workhorse and a burner.

He's gotta be RB1 from here on out with a few creative plays for McCoy, preferably where he's about 10 yards away from any defensive player who might touch his right wing while carrying the ball.

[dls6501]

Originally Posted by ThaVirus

It matters. Ideally you’d like to have the production be consistent. It’s difficult to keep your offense on the field when your running game is consistently only getting you 0-3 yard gains. It’s nice when that 90 yarder hits, but in some games you don’t get that (or in our case you abandon it altogether because you’re seeing no returns) and you’re worse off for it.

Kind of reminds me of Chris Johnson vs Jamaal Charles. Chris Johnson was the king of running for 0-4 yard gains for 19 carries then busting an 80 yarder to save the day. Meanwhile, Jamaal was the type to consistently churn out 4-8 yarders with an occasional 40+ yarder thrown in.

They’re both great, but give me the consistent guy over the boom or bust type any day.

I agree with you that consistency is better. But I also value playmakers. And yes, your Chris Johnson example was better than my Ladanian Tomlinson one, but the point remains.

I'll take the consistent guy over the boom or bust guy. But what I am saying is that Damien still should get more carries so that the boom will eventually come. Because he is a playmaker and it will come if given the opportunities.

[dls6501]

Originally Posted by Hoover

Damien is our best best back, and McCoy should be used to compliment him.

I swear most people here base their opinions on stat lines and not by watching the games. Yes, Damien has been a disappointment until last week, but that's what you are going to get when you give a RB less than ten carries a game. Backs like him need opportunities to break one. I'm not saying he's Barry Sanders, but would bench Sanders after the second quarter because he hasn't popped one yet? Of course not. This kid can score from anywhere. Give him 15 opportunities a game and we will all love this kid again.

THANK YOU.

[Hoover]

Originally Posted by Gravedigger

MIN 12 carries for 125 yards - 10.4 average
GB 7 carries for 30 yards - 4.3 average
DEN 9 carries for 7 yards - .8 average
HOU 1 carry for 6 yards - 6 average
IND 9 carries for 23 yards - 2.6 average
OAK 9 carries for 8 yards - .9 average
JAX 13 carries for 26 yards - 2 average

Let's not crown him King just yet fellas. Take out the 91 yard run and he's 11 carries for 34 yards.

In passing he's 17 for 21 on the year for 118 yards for a 6.9 yard average.

I'm glad he had that huge run, but we need to pull back on the recency bias a little when talking about Damien Williams. I know alot of you want to come to these old posts to say, "I told you so".

Take out K. Hunt's long runs and his average was shit too I bet.

[ThaVirus]

Originally Posted by dls6501

I agree with you that consistency is better. But I also value playmakers. And yes, your Chris Johnson example was better than my Ladanian Tomlinson one, but the point remains.



I'll take the consistent guy over the boom or bust guy. But what I am saying is that Damien still should get more carries so that the boom will eventually come. Because he is a playmaker and it will come if given the opportunities.

Agreed. I think we all kind of overreacted a bit. As fans we just expect perfection all the time. You can’t just bench guys because they have a rough patch. That’s why Reid’s still giving Shady carries, still trotting Hardman and DAT (well..) out there on returns and why we went back to Damien after he averaged like 1 YPC for multiple games.

Damien is probably the worst pure rusher on the team, but he’s the best pass catching back we’ve got and apparently he’s the best at securing the ball by a wide margin as well.