Texans Beat: RB Phillip Lindsay struggling this year

The failures don’t all fall on the offensive line. The Texans’ two qualified rushers, Mark Ingram and Phillip Lindsay, have both gained fewer yards than expected by Next Gen Stats tracking data. Lindsay has run 9.6 actual yards for every yard gained, which is league’s highest average by a wide margin. The second-least efficient running back, Las Vegas’ Kenyan Drake, has run 6.6 actual yards for every yard gained — three full yards fewer than Lindsay. This matches up with the eye test, as six of Lindsay’s 20 carries have not advanced past the line of scrimmage, with him often seeking to bounce runs outside only to find no hole.

Fantasy Impact: 

The Texans RBs aren't really a highly-desired play by most fantasy managers anyway, but this confirms the struggles. The story pointed out the team does face a lot of "eight-in-the-box" formations by defenses looking to stop the run, and those defenses have proven to be good against the run the rest of the season too. For a while this offseason, it looked like Lindsay would be the team's primary ball carrier but that hasn't happened and doesn't seem to be in the cards based on his early struggles.

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