Will Cam Newton’s trend of taking many hits finally catch up with him?

When it comes to fantasy quarterbacks, I think Cam Newton will be like Stephen Curry and be the unanimous No. 1 quarterback on everyone’s board. I am on record as being on that bandwagon, but the contrarian in me wants to find a reason not to take Newton as I believe in zigging if everyone else is zagging. For this reason, I am using Injury Science to see if Cam Newton has a kryptonite in his injury profile before I go all in.

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Last year I ranked Newton around the middle of the pack with my reliability rating. His injury risk was mostly based on his style of play as Newton was running the ball more than any other quarterback at the time and he was getting sacked more than all but two quarterbacks in the league. Although Newton’s game seems to have matured a good bit this past season, he continues to run the ball more than any quarterback and remains in the top half of the league with taking sacks.

These statistics are offset by the fact that Cam Newton is literally the size of a defensive end, and he appears to wear armor on the field to protect his torso. I think Cam Newton continues to be the “Freaky Talented” athlete that very rarely has to max out his talent, which is one of the things I find most impressive about him.

With this said, there is a kryptonite to Cam Newton’s game, and it may catch up with him this year. When you add up the amount of rush attempts with the number of sacks that Newton takes, it adds up to a combination of 10 rushes and sacks per game. Although Newton plays the position of quarterback, which carries the least injury risk on a football field; he is also doubling as a backup running back.

This is important because the running back position carries the absolute highest injury risk. This makes Newton a true gift and curse for fantasy owners, with the gift being the productivity of a hybrid and the curse being the threat of your most stable position becoming much less stable. When I see that he has only missed two games in five years with this style of play, I wonder if the law of averages is simply not in his favor for this upcoming season.

He has suffered an ankle injury in 2014 that required minor surgery and broke some ribs a couple of years ago in the preseason. The only time that Newton has shown himself to be vulnerable was when he was in that car accident late in the 2014 season and suffered multiple fractures. Overall, he has had a clean career when it comes to injury, despite his dual role as quarterback and goal-line running back.

One of the best methods to project these types of things is to have good comparables. With Newton being such an exceptional athlete, there is no real comparable player, but Donovan McNabb may be the closest. McNabb started his career relatively clean on the injury front but if you look at him from Year 6 and on, you will note that he only made it through one full season after his fifth campaign.

While I think this next comparison can be picked apart in many ways, Micheal Vick also showed us that a quarterback who runs so frequently is unlikely to move through his career unscathed. The last comparison that I would use is Ben Roethlisberger, whose career stats also show us that rush attempts and sacks usually lead to injury as a career progresses. All three of these examples hint that Newton will either lower those rushing and sack statistics, or he will start missing some games here and there.

The good news for Newton is that he seems to be slowly balancing his game with “Freaky Talented” and “Supremely Skilled” qualities which bode well for him avoiding injury. The more we see him manipulate the pocket and get the ball out fast, the less chance he has for injury.

On the other hand, we can continue to see a player that is the No. 1 goal line option and who continues to get sacked more than twice per game. This would very likely result in these statistics colliding with a quarterback who is now a veteran and needs to think about his health for a long career.

I don’t know that I could pass up Newton if the time is right to take a quarterback, but I will tell you that Andrew Luck is a strong consideration for me as he seems to have gotten all of his injuries out of the way last year. My guess is that the hype around Newton winning the NFL top 100 and the Super Bowl appearance last year will push Newton’s price too high for my liking, especially with the possible injury concern. On the contrary, look for many to sleep just a little bit on Andrew Luck, and expect the price to be just right for a player that can give you as much or more than Cam Newton, but with his injury-riddled season hopefully behind him.

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Dr. Eric Petty is a Physical Therapist who is taking his talents from the treatment room to help fantasy owners. You can find more of his work at his site, The Injury Report Doctor, and you can follow him @DrPettyIRD.