Fantasy Football ADP Running Back Report: Jaylen Wright, David Montgomery are Top Risers

With the turn of the calendar into August, we are officially in fantasy football draft season! That means it is now time to keep an eye on FantasySP’s ADP Tool, to see who is moving up or down draft boards.

FantasySP’s ADP graph automatically keeps track of each player’s trend over the last seven days, and no position is more volatile this time of year than running back, so let’s take a look at this week’s biggest risers and fallers at the RB position:

Fantasy Football Running Back ADP Risers

Jaylen Wright, Miami Dolphins (-3.32)

Wright is the top riser among top 50 running backs over the last week, having climbed just over three spots in ADP. Three spots may not sound like much, but that’s a big move for just seven days, especially once we consider that there has been no particularly relevant piece of news to cause this change. 

On the other hand, there has been plenty of positive reporting about Wright coming out of Dolphins camp. The fourth-rounder out of Tennessee has impressed De'Von Achane as well, who said recently that Wright is “doing better than I was last year as far as camp-wise, picking up stuff pretty fast.” With 4.38 speed, Wright is also an obvious fit in Mike McDaniel’s high-powered offense.

With that said, I can’t get on board with Wright’s ADP, even before his most recent rise. As exciting as his speed and the Dolphins’ offense are, Wright is still a fourth-round running back who is third on his team’s depth chart (behind Achane and Raheem Mostert). It’s absurd that he is being drafted right next to Chuba Hubbard, who is going to start at least a handful of games for the Panthers while Jonathon Brooks returns from his ACL injury. Wright is a fine late-round dart throw, but his current price is too high given his situation.

David Montgomery, Detroit Lions (-2.30)

Montgomery’s total rise isn’t quite as large as Wright’s but it may actually be more relevant given his higher starting ADP (Montgomery is now the RB19 by ADP). Again, there’s no clear explanation for Montgomery's rise, especially given that his teammate Jahmyr Gibbs is also a big riser over the last week. 

However, I’m more on board with Montgomery’s rise than Wright’s. I have argued all offseason that Montgomery is being undervalued given his 2023 performance; more recently, FantasySP’s own Daniel Hepner made his own case for Montgomery.

If you don’t want to read the full article, here’s the short case for why to draft Montgomery: He was very productive last season, with Jahmyr Gibbs on the Lions’ roster, and fantasy managers seem overly confident in predicting a huge change in how Detroit splits its backfield touches. Even if Montgomery takes a backseat role behind the sophomore RB in 2024, he has top-five upside if Gibbs were to miss time. As his price rises, Montgomery is still a very solid backend RB2 pick. 

Fantasy Football Running Back ADP Fallers

Gus Edwards, Los Angeles Chargers (+3.75)

Unlike with our risers, I think there’s a pretty obvious reason why Edwards is falling: He wasn’t practicing. The Gus Bus was sidelined at the start of Chargers training camp after undergoing an undisclosed surgery over the offseason. In his absence, J.K. Dobbins saw most of the reps with the Chargers’ first-team offense, and we received mostly positive reports of his performance. Dobbins has risen himself by over three spots in a corresponding move to Edwards’ fall. 

However, Edwards has now returned to camp and immediately began splitting first-team reps with Dobbins. Given that Dobbins is less than a year removed from an Achilles injury, which come with a notoriously difficult and slow recovery process, Edwards should still be the favorite to lead this backfield. 

He’s not much of a pass-catcher, but in what promises to be a run-heavy offense under Greg Roman and Jim Harbaugh, Edwards could certainly rumble his way to backend RB2 numbers. He should especially benefit from high touchdown equity — he scored 13 rushing touchdowns for the Ravens last season, and double digits could well be on the cards for him again in 2024. I will happily take the discount on Edwards as hype for Dobbins pushes him down draft boards.

Najee Harris, Pittsburgh Steelers (+3.56)

Given Najee’s ADP is in the sixth round (he is the RB23 at 67 overall), this 3.6-spot drop is massive. At first, this seems like another case of one player’s ADP falling because another player on his team is generating buzz. Jaylen Warren, Harris’ backfield-mate in Pittsburgh, has received plenty of hype recently. But Warren’s ADP has actually also fallen over the last week (+1.58), so that may be a red herring. 

Perhaps the recent news that Justin Fields may start over Russell Wilson is the true culprit. Fields, a rushing quarterback, is certainly less good for the Steelers RBs’ fantasy outlooks than Wilson, a check-down king at this point in his career. But I’d take those reports with a grain of salt — it’s easy to get excited by Fields scoring touchdowns in training camp with Wilson sidelined, but all indications when these two joined the team were that Wilson would be the starter. 

With that in mind, I’m happy to buy the slight dip on Najee. I don’t necessarily love Harris heading into 2024, as Warren (who was more efficient in 2023) will likely continue to cut into his workload. But Harris will likely still finish as an RB2, with upside for more if Warren misses time, so I can’t hate his new RB23 pricetag.