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Justin Carter breaks down the performance of Breece Hall in Week 5 and evaluates the fantasy football upside of Hall going forward in the 2022 NFL season.
Welcome back to Tape Tells All, the weekly series where I look at film and data for something that happened in the NFL this week.
Today, I want to look at a rookie running back for the second week in a row. Last week, it was Houston's Dameon Piece. This week, it's Jets running back Breece Hall.
In Week 5, Hall finished with 18 carries for 97 yards and a touchdown, plus he caught two passes for 100 yards. Has Hall arrived? What should we think of him going forward?
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Background Information
The Jets drafted Breece Hall in the second round out of Iowa State. Pre-draft, Hall was widely expected to be the best fantasy rookie running back, but landing with the Jets threw a little wrench in that hype, as running backs on bad offenses usually have a limited ceiling, plus Michael Carter played pretty well at the end of last year.
And for the first three weeks, that was kind of the case, at least when it comes to Carter's presence. In Week 1, Carter had 10 carries and nine targets, whille Hall had six carries and nine targets.
But that's changed.
In Week 4, Hall had 17 carries and six targets, while Carter had just nine carries and three targets. Hall played 66% of the snaps, with Carter playing 44%.
Then in Week 5, Hall had 18 carries and two targets, while Carter had 10 and two, though Carter did find the end zone twice despite only having 21 rushing yards. Hall played 69% of the snaps, while Carter played 42%.
And then there's the "Jets offense will be bad" part of our concerns, which has looked wrong so far. Despite having to play multiple quarterbacks this season the Jets rank 12th in yards, though they're 21st in yards per play. The offense hasn't been amazing, but it's been fine, and fine is definitely a step up from what I expected would be one of the league's worst offenses.
So, the offense is better than expected, and while Michael Carter is still getting the snaps, Hall has worked his way into a position where he's the clear lead back. Good confluence of things there to help Hall's value.
Breece Hall's Week 5 Performance
Let's zero in on this week and see what Breece Hall did against the Dolphins: 18 carries for 97 yards and a touchdown, and two receptions for 100 yards.
Before we look at any film or advanced data from this game, some quick observations:
- Hall only got two targets, which is also what Carter got. Hall has usually been the more targeted of the two in the pass game, but this week, neither really got a big volume, though that's partly because the Jets had a big lead and Zach Wilson only needed to throw 21 passes.
- That big lead also led to a lot of opportunities in the run game. This Jets team won't be in that position every week. They were taking a Dolphins team that was down to its third string quarterback, which allowed the Jets to keep the ball on the ground.
Those are our caveats here. This isn't probably what a "normal" Breece Hall game will look like. He's had six or more targets in three of his other four games. I'd expect slightly fewer carries and a handful more targets usually.
But the overall number of touches shouldn't change much. The Jets got Hall 20 touches on Sunday. The form of those touches can shift, but I still expect him to be around 20 touches.
Turning our attention now to Hall's on-field play, let's start with his 79-yard catch that was so, so close to being a touchdown. Hall comes out of the backfield on a wheel route, which, in my opinion, is the best way to utilize a pass-catching back. Wheel routes are fun! You get a quick running back turning up field with a head of steam, and you can pretty easily find a soft spot in the defense on these routes. The Dolphins lose Hall here, and that allows him to get out in the open field once he catches the pass. From there, he zips down the sideline, where he's finally engaged by the defense around the 20.
And what happens there? Instead of going down on the play, he drags the defender with him as he barrels toward the goal line. Hall shows his strength here, twirling and chugging along. If it wasn't for another Dolphins defender flying in at the last second, Hall probably gets there!
It's an impressive play, and a potential winning game plan for the Jets: find a way to get the ball to Breece Hall in space.
In fact, according to PlayerProfiler, Hall leads all NFL running backs in yards per reception and is third in yards per route run. He's only run a route on 38.5% of snaps, but if that number goes up, that would be good news for the Jets, and for Hall's fantasy managers.
As for what Hall did on the ground:
Here he is finding a hole and getting toward the end zone. He takes this pitch back at the 11 and sweeps toward the right until he sees an opening, then he turns up field immediately and spurts through. Like on the play above, the defense engages him at the end of the play, but his momentum gets him over the goal line for the touchdown.
Above is his run chart from the NFL's NextGen stats. I love the versatility here. He had gains of 10-plus yards in basically every facet of the run game: two on outside runs to the left, one on an inside run to the right, one on an inside run to the left, and one on an outside run to the left. He lost yards on just one of his 18 carries, and 7 of the other 17 carries went for over five yards.
When Hall touched the ball this week, there was a good chance that something good was going to happen.
Breece Hall Fantasy Football Impact
So, what now for Hall? How does this game impact him from a fantasy perspective?
His stock was already going up after Week 4. Now, it's going up even more after this game. Get ready, Breece Hall managers, for just an absolute load of offers from people who think they're being clever by trying to trade for him.
If Hall's newly-established lead over Carter when it comes to touches is real, then he's a borderline RB1 going forward, and I think that by saying that, I'm being relatively measured on him. FantasyPros has a rest-of-season rankings that have him as the RB9 going forward, ahead of Leonard Fournette, Alvin Kamara and Aaron Jones. I'm not ready to go that far, but Hall is a must-start fantasy player now, every week. We knew this talent was there. Now, we're seeing the talent play out.
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