1.) Chris Johnson- Tennessee Titants

Chris Johnson

Chris Johnson has been displaying some tremendous skills in the preseason so far and his ridiculous speed (4.24, 40) gives him that home run ability we all like. Also, consider that the Titans ran the ball more than any other team in the league last year and that the only thing standing in his way is the hefty Lendale White. White is like the Jared Lorenzen of running backs only much more talented. Johnson will see the field often as the lightning to White’s thunder and tho he may not get the ball at the goal line, the Titans are going to find ways to get him out into open space and that bodes well for a nice fantasy sleeper. Johnson is going somewhere in the 12-15 round range and with his tremendous upside he could turn out to be the best “sleeper” out there.

2. Ray Rice-Blatimore Ravens

Ray Rice

Given the status of McGahee’s balky knee, the fact that he came into camp overweight and out of shape, and the fact that Rice has been performing more then admirably when given his chances with the first team offense this preseason and you have the makings of a nice fantasy sleeper. Despite Rice’s fantastic preseason the Ravens have continued to state that McGahee will be the starting running back when the season opens, but Rice could factor in heavily should McGahee’s knee fail him and he is sure to be used during the game to take some of the workload off of Willis. A word to the wise, if you draft Mcgahee you better make damn sure to handcuff him with Rice in a later round or you could end up crying if and when Mcgahee goes down with an injury.

3. Ricky Williams-Miami Dolphins

Ricky Williams

In my book this guys has been an absolute stud in my annual fantasy pot head draft, but seriously Willimas has looked like a beast during training camp and the preseason and given Ronnie Browns shaky situation he could turn out to be the most productive back on the Dolphins… that may not be saying much but he is defintely worth a pick somewhere after the 9th round. Brown is coming back from a torn ACL an injury which usually takes more than a year to fully recover from and Williams may have finally realized that he’s a 31 year old dude and smoking weed all day doesn’t exactly pay the bills. The main reason I like Williams is that i just don’t like a running back coming back from an ACL tear and though Brown was lighting it up last year until the injury he hasn’t exactly been a stud in the past. Williams has been an excellent fantasy back in the league years ago and he doesn’t have the wear and tear that a running back of his age normally would. Im predicting a pretty nice season for Williams at least worthy of an RB 3 spot.

4. Kenny Watson-Cinncinatti Bengals

Kenny Watson

After years of being one of the most consistent and productive fantasy backs Rudi Johnson seems to have hit that dreaded wall that all backs run into at some point in their career. Johnson was injured for a number of games last year paving the way for Watson to take the reigns at RB and steal the show.Even when Johnson was on the field he averaged a dreadful 2.9 YPC. Watson on the other hand averaged 4.3 YPC and ran for 763 yards on 178 carries and scored 7 TD’s. Recently sources have stated that the Bengals are willing to shop Rudi for a “legitimate receiver” which means that they don’t believe he can get it done anymore and that they’re fairly happy with their options at running back. It could end up being a time share with Watson and the oft injured but talented Chris Perry if Johnson does get dealt, either way at the moment Watson actually looks to be the teams best running back and should be worthy of a late 13-15 round pick.

5. Derrick Ward/Ahmad Bradshaw-New York Giants

Sure enough as many people predicted Brandon Jacobs is a beast when he is on the field. The problem is that he never seems to stay on the field for a full season. Jacobs’ upright running style leaves him susceptible to taking a lot of big hits, especially to his lower body. Even if Jacobs does manage to stay healthy for an entire season it is looking more and more like the Giants will use a committee approach at running back. That means that either Derrick Ward or Ahmad Bradshaw will be sharing the workload with Jacobs and could turn out to be nice sleepers picks if Jacobs should go down with an injury.

Tags: ability, ACL, Ahmad Bradshaw, Ahmad Bradshaw-New, alignnone, Bengals, Brandon Jacobs, Brown, camp, caption, Chris Johnson, Chris Johnson- Tennessee, Chris Perry, Derrick Ward, draft, fact, Fantasy, field, giants, goal, injury, Jared Lorenzen, johnson, Kenny Watson, Kenny Watson-Cinncinatti, knee, league, Lendale, lightning, line, McGahee, miami, pick, preseason, range, ravens, Ray Rice, Ricky Williams, Ronnie Browns, round, Rudi, run, running, Sleeper, space, standing, stud, team, thing, tho, thunder, Titans, Titants, Watson, way, White, width, Willis, workload, year, York, YPC