Step-back guys for 2016: The 6 NFL players due for a regression
Adrian Peterson, Larry Fitzgerald and Brandon Marshall are up against Father Time
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3 min read
The NFL is nothing if not a cyclical league.
Trends ebb and flow and players can peak and cascade with maddening frequency. Every year players who seem like sure-fire, can't miss picks in everyone's fantasy drafts end up being an albatross by Week 5, and all the while, players who whose stock seemed to be dropping end up stepping up and saving the season.
There's a fine line between progression and regression and veteran players throughout the league end up treading it each and every season. There will be players who bounce back and return to peak form, most often after getting fully healthy again after sustaining a significant injury. That is hardly the only mitigating factor, however. There will also be players who end up looking back on 2015 as the last impactful season of their NFL careers.
Here are six regression candidates I have my eye on:
Let's be honest: Cutler was hardly transformational in 2015, but he was functional and greatly cut down on his interceptions. Losing coordinator Adam Gase was a big blow, and he also lost Matt Forte and Martellus Bennett a year after losing Brandon Marshall. Falling into those old habits of trying to force too much could be a real problem in a contract year. Both of his potential starting receivers, though young, already are injury concerns.
It wasn't very long ago at all that Cutler was leading the league in turnovers and if Andrew Luck does have the kind of return-to-form year I expect and with the talent around Eli Manning (another leading INT culprit), Cutler might just be poised to regain his crown.
He is on the other side of 30 now and entering his 10th NFL season -- even though he only played one game in 2014. He has always defied the odds -- whether coming off surgery or otherwise -- but you have to wonder when Father Time starts nosing around the great.
Peterson remains the singular focus of opposing defenses and while I still expect him to be plenty productive, I just don't know that he pushes for 1,500 yards and runs away with another rushing title. When running backs hit the wall, they tend to hit it with a resounding thud. While I don't believe the wheels will fall of Peterson in 2016, I do believe he may slide enough to at least raise the question of how long the Vikings will continue to have him as the centerpiece of their franchise at the kind of salary he has been making.
Both of these guys looked like they found the fountain of youth in 2015. They were ageless and limitless and carried their teams for weeks on end. And they certainly train like demons and remain in tremendous shape, but both also benefitted greatly by rejuvenated seasons from their quarterbacks as well.
Will Carson Palmer stay healthy? And does Ryan Fitzpatrick re-sign with the Jets? And even so, will it be after a totally lost offseason? You have to wonder if at some point they start to backslide -- a la Vincent Jackson or, even in terms of the kind of nagging injuries that take hold at this point in careers, like Calvin Johnson. While I wouldn't discount either player's will and ability, it will also take a Herculean effort for them to duplicate their exploits from a year ago, when Marshall ranked fourth in the entire NFL in receiving yards and Fitzgerald finished ninth.
Both of these guys came out of nowhere a year ago to become two of the most dependable, valuable tight ends in the league. It was pretty astonishing. I'm not sure even these guys themselves saw it coming, and it would truly be something spectacular if either kept it up.
Baltimore signed Watson to stabilize the position after suffering some injuries and suspensions to its TE depth chart, but still seems to have a plethora of other options there, including Maxx Williams who was drafted in the second round (No. 55 overall) in 2015. Watson brings tremendous leadership and depth, but I just don't see him getting the kind of targets he received a year ago.
And Barnidge could end up having to try to catch balls from Cody Kessler by midseason on a team that doesn't seem to have the ability to run the ball or stop anyone on defense. In the end, I'd tend to bet that 2015 looks more like an anomaly than a beacon of what is to come for the journeyman.
