The Saints are taking a host of running back prospects to training camp, and toss Shane Vereen onto that pile. They’re signing him to a free-agent contract today. I like the way he might fit into that offense.
New Orleans won’t have Mark Ingram, of course, for the first four weeks. He’s been suspended by the league. I think that played a role in the team signing Terrance West. They’ve also got Jonathan Williams, Trey Edmunds and Daniel Lasco competing for playing time in September.
But I think Vereen is different. I don’t think he’s so much related to Ingram. I see him as more of an insurance policy for Alvin Kamara.
Pass catching is huge with New Orleans running backs. The Saints complete more passes to that position than any other team almost every year. I expect Kamara will catch 80-plus balls, and that might be on the conservative side.
But none of their other running backs have that kind of receiving ability. Ingram has improved in this area, but he’s not a top-level receiving threat.
Enter Vereen. He’s been one of the league’s better third-down type backs. Between Danny Woodhead and James White, he held that role for New England. In his last game for the Patriots, he caught a game-high 11 passes to help them beat Seattle in the Super Bowl.
He’s been with the Giants the last three years, catching 59 and 44 passes in the 2015 and 2017 seasons. He missed 11 games in 2016 with a triceps injury. He’s only 29, so no real worries about him slowing down much, considering the way he’s used.
Vereen isn’t a big back. At 5-foot-10 and 205 pounds, he’s definitely a third-down type guy – he’s lean. That’s why I don’t view him as being particularly related to the Ingram situation. They’re not going to run Vereen between the tackles, and he’s not going to carry the ball at the goal line. He’s not a tackle breaker.
But if Kamara were to get hurt, I would think Vereen might be a top-20 running back in PPR formats while filling in, averaging 5 catches per game.
Over the past five years, only seven running backs have caught more passes.
| RUNNING BACKS RECEIVING (last 5 years) | ||||
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Player | No | Yards | Avg | TD |
| LeVeon Bell | 312 | 2,660 | 8.5 | 7 |
| Matt Forte | 287 | 2,347 | 8.2 | 12 |
| DeMarco Murray | 246 | 1,731 | 7.0 | 6 |
| Giovani Bernard | 230 | 2,060 | 9.0 | 8 |
| Darren Sproles | 225 | 1,879 | 8.4 | 5 |
| Theo Riddick | 224 | 1,854 | 8.3 | 14 |
| LeSean McCoy | 221 | 1,790 | 8.1 | 7 |
| Shane Vereen | 213 | 1,716 | 8.1 | 10 |
| Danny Woodhead | 200 | 1,629 | 8.1 | 13 |
| Devonta Freeman | 193 | 1,582 | 8.2 | 7 |
| Mark Ingram | 190 | 1,353 | 7.1 | 4 |
| Duke Johnson | 188 | 1,741 | 9.3 | 5 |
| Lamar Miller | 178 | 1,357 | 7.6 | 7 |
| Bilal Powell | 175 | 1,310 | 7.5 | 4 |
| James White | 161 | 1,413 | 8.8 | 12 |
| Jamaal Charles | 156 | 1,304 | 8.4 | 13 |
| Andre Ellington | 151 | 1,368 | 9.1 | 3 |
| Fred Jackson | 145 | 1,145 | 7.9 | 4 |
| Melvin Gordon | 132 | 1,087 | 8.2 | 6 |
| Kyle Juszczyk | 130 | 1,084 | 8.3 | 6 |
| Rashad Jennings | 130 | 1,015 | 7.8 | 2 |
| Charles Sims | 129 | 1,190 | 9.2 | 6 |
| Chris Thompson | 129 | 1,126 | 8.7 | 9 |
| Todd Gurley | 128 | 1,303 | 10.2 | 6 |
| Frank Gore | 128 | 1,041 | 8.1 | 7 |
| David Johnson | 122 | 1,403 | 11.5 | 8 |
| Dexter McCluster | 117 | 1,004 | 8.6 | 4 |
| Joique Bell | 110 | 1,153 | 10.5 | 1 |
—Ian Allan