Fantasy Football Player Notes

Javonte Williams was limited to just 4 games in his second year after tearing his ACL, LCL and PCL in Week 4 against the Raiders. The injury may end up being a blessing in disguise as Williams may have struggled mightily in the Denver Broncos atrocious offense. Even before his injury, Williams ranked as the RB35 in points per game (9.0) despite ranking as the fantasy RB12 in expected points per game. And Williams' underlying metrics were still elite, as his 116.3 PFF elusive rating ranked first among all RBs with at least 45 carries. Considering the time frame of Williams' injury, the expectation should be that he is back by the start of the year, but the severity/complexity of his knee injury is eerily similar to J.K. Dobbins from the past year. Williams could easily come out of the gates sluggish, and the moves that Broncos have made this offseason reflect that narrative. They've added Samaje Perine and Tony Jones Jr. to the backfield.

Denver signed ex-Bengals running back Samaje Perine - 2 years, $7.5 million, $3 million guaranteed - after releasing Chase Edmonds (Buccaneers) and moving on from Mike Boone (Texans).

With Javonte Williams potentially delayed in return from his knee injury, I'd suspect that Perine (RB 46 ADP) picks up the slack to open the year if he stays in the Mile High City. The Broncos have zero other RBs of note currently under contract. Therefore, Perine has the chance to provide immediate fantasy value to start the year after carving out a role in the Bengals' offense alongside Joe Mixon last season. He served as the primary third-down back for the entire season.

And when Perine got the starting nod from Weeks 11-13, the 27-year-old went OFF averaging 23.6 fantasy points per game.

Perine is a legitimate threat to Williams' workload as he could easily earn the passing-down work after finishing last season 6th in PFF pass-blocking and 14th in RB targets.