Chris Rodriguez is poised to make the most of his second chance

Since early last year, there has been a relatively small contingent of fans and commentators who – even in the face of Brian Robinson’s remarkable return from senseless shooting injuries – were hoping to see more in the running game from Chris Rodriguez, Washington’s 2023 6th round draft pick out of Kentucky.

MattInBrisVegas and I were two of those most confident in his abilities at the time, with each of us taking the opportunity to sing his praises, and project his potential, before the 2023 season.

In May 2023, just after the draft, I wrote:

Rodriguez is a “bulldozing runner that churns out yardage in between the tackles,” and a player that I have a sneaking suspicion could quickly develop an outsized role in Eric Bieniemy’s offense in 2024, if not earlier.

For me, Rodriguez brings to mind Atlanta’s Tyler Allgeier, who had over 1,000 yards rushing last year in just seven starts – and who the Falcons seemed bafflingly intent of nerfing with the addition of Bijan Robinson.

From Matt, in September 2023:

Chris Rodriguez is a very good fit to the mold. He has prototypical size and athletic profile of a hidden gem RB. He was a highly productive running back in the SEC, despite lacking the elite speed, burst and elusiveness that teams seek in the early rounds. What he lacked in speed and elusiveness, he more than made up for with exceptional power and ability to stay upright after contact.

Of course, that doesn’t mean that he is destined to become this year’s Tyler Allgeier or Isiah Pacheco. What it does mean, is that he is precisely the type of late-round or undrafted RB who vastly exceeds expectations a little more than once every NFL season.

Whether he does or not may depend on who decides which players see the field on the Commanders’ offense. What excites me most about Rodriguez is that, in preseason action he looks like the same as he did in college. If he does get the opportunities, I would not be surprised if he overtakes Brian Robinson as the starter early in his rookie season due to his ability to gain more yardage per down.

Rodriguez’s rookie season was fairly unremarkable, other than a 58-yard, 2 TD outing against the Jets in week 15. He ended up totaling 247 yards on 51 carries (4.84 ypc), though he was more efficient than Robinson overall.

Going into the 2024 season, Rodriguez’s path to playing time became much more nebulous. Robinson was back, fully healthy, Austin Ekeler was added as a secondary RB with sterling credentials, and Jeremy McNichols impressed sufficiently in the pre-season to win the RB3 role. And, Rodriguez ping-ponged between waivers, the practice squad, and the active roster multiple times before getting a real shot once Austin Ekeler went onto IR with a concussion after playing the Cowboys in week 12.

Against the Titans, in week 13, Rodriguez had the best game of his pro career, putting up 94 yards on 13 carries (7.23 ypc) against one of the top run defenses in the league.

With Robinson only under contract for one more year, and Rodriguez unlikely to “survive” another trip to waivers, it’s incumbent that Washington’s coaching staff find out exactly what they have in the young back. I’d actually like to see him used more frequently in the passing game, particularly with Ekeler potentially out for the year. His bruising running style has lead many to believe he’s a “two-down” back, but that underestimates his capacity according to his college OC, Liam Coen, and others who have seen his versatility:

“There were some moments in training camp in 2021 where we had him on free release wheel routes, and he’s catching the ball off his body and behind him and over the shoulder. He’s got the hands. We actually tried to get him off the field on third down sometimes because he was carrying the load. We weren’t taking him off the field for any specific reason, but just to give him a blow.

He can handle all that stuff. He’s physical enough to block at the second level. He’s sturdy at the point of contact. And once he truly gets down Washington’s pass pro system, I can definitely see him being an all three down back.”

Career Rushing Summary

Rodriguez has been used sparingly in his first two seasons with the Commanders. In his rookie season, he was the third back in Eric Bieniemy’s pass-heavy offense and ended up playing 97 offensive snaps in 10 games. He also became a core special teamer and got snaps there in 13 games. In 2024, he initially lost the competition for the third RB roster position to Jeremy McNichols at final roster cut-downs. Since then he has been bouncing between the practice squad and active roster. In the last four weeks, with the other backs getting banged up, he has started to get playing time, and has made the most of his opportunities.

In two seasons, Rodriguez has taken 145 total offensive snaps in 13 games. He has made a total of 77 rushing attempts for 397 yds, for an impressive 5.16 yd/attempt average. He was only targeted twice as a receiver last season, catching both passes for 12 receiving yards. So there is not much to talk about yet in the passing game.

Rodriguez has been an extremely effective rusher in limited opportunities with the Commanders. Rushing Success Rate provides an overall measure of the effectiveness of a runner’s rushing attempts. It measures the percentage of runs that are a success for the offense. A run is a success if it picks up 40% of the yards to gain on 1^st down, 60% on second down, or 100% on third or fourth down. In two years with the Commanders, Rodriguez has achieved a rushing success rate of 58.4%. To put that number in context, in 2024, only 4 RBs with a minimum of 40 carries have higher rushing success rates (max: Carson Steele, Chiefs, 60.4%). One of those is CRod’s teammate, Jeremy McNichols, in 3^rd place at 60.0%.

Rodriguez has a downhill rushing style and runs with good contact balance and strength to run through contact and pick up extra yardage. As a rookie, he averaged 2.23 yards after contact per rushing attempt (YAC/att) in 51 total attempts. In 2024, he has improved that to 3.03 YAC/att in 26 attempts. Those figures put him in good company. This season, only three out of 67 RBs with a minimum of 40 rushing attempts have averaged more than 3.0 YAC/att: Isaac Guerendo (49ers, 3.5 YAC/att), Tank Bigsby (Jaguars, 3.5 YAC/att), and CRod’s teammate Jeremy McNichols (3.1 YAC/att). CRod’s other teammate, Brian Robinson Jr. isn’t far behind, either, in 11^th place at 2.5 YAC/att.

CRod’s career average of 2.45 YAC/Att puts him on a level with the 12^th to 13^th ranked RBs in 2024.

Rodriguez also breaks tackles at a fair rate. In two seasons with the Commanders he has broken 6 tackles, which equates to a broken tackle rate of 7.79%. That figure is equivalent to the 23^rd highest broken tackle rate among 67 RBs with a minimum of 40 carries in 2024.

Does CRod Have a Fumbling Problem?

In his rookie season, CRod lost a fumble in the Week 11 loss to the New York Giants. That was the only fumble in 79 touches in his young career, but it seems to have led to a perception among some fans that he has a problem with ball security. Should we be concerned?

One fumble in 79 touches equates to a fumble rate of 1.27%. To get an idea of where that sits among RBs, I had a look at the 64 RBs who had the most touches in 2023, to roughly approximate the league’s RB1s and RB2s (min 71 touches, max 339). 45/64 RBs fumbled at least once last season. Of the 19 that didn’t, 5 had fewer than 100 touches, and 11 had fewer than 160. Most RBs will eventually fumble if given enough touches, but there were 3 RBs with over 300 touches and no fumbles (Derrick Henry, Travis Etienne, Joe Mixon).

The median fumble rate of the 64 most utilized RBs was 0.74%, between De’Von Achane at 0.77% and Najee Harris at 0.70%. CRod’s career fumble rate of 1.27% sits between Miles Sanders, with the 14^th highest fumble rate in 2023 (1.28%) and Aaron Jones in 15^th place (1.16%). If we can assume that fumble rates remain fairly constant from season to season, which is probably reasonable, that places CRod at the top 23^rd percentile of lead- and second-backs in terms of fumble rate. His fumble rate is a little high so far, but not alarmingly so.

Now, before anyone draws any firm conclusions, there is a big caveat. Fumbles are rare events. In order to accurately measure the rate of occurrence of a rare event, you need to oversample the “event cycle” by several times. All that we know about CRod’s ball security at present is based on 1 fumble in 71 touches. He would have to get 5 to 10 times that number of touches to gain confidence that his fumble rate is really 1.27%. Once he does, we might discover that he fumbles more frequently or less frequently than he did in his first 71 touches.

Incidentally, Commanders’ fans may be interested to learn that the RB with the highest fumble rate in the sample from 2023 was Washington’s Antonio Gibson, at 3.54% of touches. In second place was former Redskin Samaje Perine (2.91%). And in seventh place was Brian Robinson Jr. at 1.87%.