Running backs go quickly in fantasy drafts, so by the fifth or sixth round the starters are gone and you're looking at backups with the potential to be something more. One possibility is Benny Snell in Pittsburgh -- though that doesn't make him a good one.
This ESPN article names Snell as a cut candidate, and I tend to agree. Bottom line is he isn't very good.
Snell was a fourth-round pick in 2019, and he fairly quickly surfaced as the No. 2 to James Conner. But the vast majority of times he got on the field he was pretty ineffective.
Sixteen times in his first two seasons, Snell has received at least 5 carries in a game. Yards per carry isn't everything, and some fault must be placed on the line, but Snell's numbers have been really bad in more than half of those games. In 9 of 16 contests, he's averaged under 3.0 yards per attempt. The NFL average is 4.4, so it's not just that Snell has been below-average. Under 3.0 is pretty awful.
In just a third (5) of those 16 games, Snell has made it up to 4.0. That's serviceable, but note that those games were against four lousy defenses (Giants, Chargers and Bengals twice) and the Ravens in a Week 17 game where Baltimore rested a lot of starters (and still won easily). No chance he'll create something on his own if he gets an opportunity behind what figures to be a lesser offensive line.
In the table, his non-terrible (yards per carry) games are in bold.
| BENNY SNELL GAME LOG (5+ ATTEMPTS) | |||||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Year | Wk | Opp | Result | Att | Yds | Y/A | TD |
| 2019 | 6 | at LAC | W 24-17 | 17 | 75 | 4.4 | 0 |
| 2019 | 8 | Mia. | W 27-14 | 5 | 13 | 2.6 | 0 |
| 2019 | 12 | at Cin. | W 16-10 | 21 | 98 | 4.7 | 0 |
| 2019 | 13 | Clev. | W 20-13 | 16 | 63 | 3.9 | 1 |
| 2019 | 14 | at Ariz. | W 23-17 | 16 | 41 | 2.6 | 0 |
| 2019 | 16 | at NYJ | L 10-16 | 7 | 14 | 2.0 | 0 |
| 2019 | 17 | at Balt. | L 10-28 | 18 | 91 | 5.1 | 1 |
| 2020 | 1 | at NYG | W 26-16 | 19 | 113 | 6.0 | 0 |
| 2020 | 3 | Hou. | W 28-21 | 7 | 11 | 1.6 | 0 |
| 2020 | 5 | Phil. | W 38-29 | 7 | 19 | 2.7 | 0 |
| 2020 | 6 | Clev. | W 38-7 | 6 | 17 | 2.8 | 1 |
| 2020 | 11 | at Jac. | W 27-3 | 7 | 15 | 2.1 | 1 |
| 2020 | 12 | Balt. | W 19-14 | 16 | 60 | 3.8 | 0 |
| 2020 | 13 | Wash. | L 17-23 | 8 | 5 | 0.6 | 0 |
| 2020 | 15 | at Cin. | L 17-27 | 18 | 84 | 4.7 | 1 |
| 2020 | 16 | Ind. | W 28-24 | 6 | 0 | 0.0 | 0 |
Snell also wasn't a factor as a pass catcher in those contests, for those imagining some cheap PPR production that has some of us willing to select Najee Harris. He caught 12 passes in those 16 games.
I like drafting backup running backs late, but Snell won't be one of them. Pittsburgh will have Najee Harris starting, and Kalen Ballage (who's not great either) looks like a better bet for the backup job. Not a given Snell will make the team, and pretty likely he'll do nothing even if he does.
--Andy Richardson