Buy or Sell: Chris Ivory

Chris Ivory
ADP: 82.1
RB: 29

The New York Jets were a bad team in 2014 and it cost coach Rex Ryan his job. Some would argue he may have given himself a better chance to stick around if he had played Chris Ivory more.

Despite being on the short-end of a timeshare, Ivory put up more than 700 yards rushing and scored five TDs, while averaging 5.2 yards per carry. With Chris Johnson gone, does Ivory show he can handle the full load by himself? Or will a new coaching staff find another backfield partner that will keep him from reaching the peak of his potential?

Buy: Vomhof

Chris Ivory finished last season as the RB18 despite the Jets’ insistence upon giving 155 carries to a past-his-prime Chris Johnson.

Now CJ’s gone—good riddance—and Ivory should have the backfield largely to himself. And, yet, he’s only going off the board in the eighth round as the RB31.

Let me put that into perspective for you. That means he’s going after two defenses (Seattle and Buffalo) and a smattering of running backs who are mired in timeshares, including Giovani Bernard, Rashad Jennings and Isaiah Crowell.

Really? REALLY?!

The fantasy community’s lack of love for Ivory is baffling. Last year was the first time the bruiser has ever averaged less than 4.6 yards per carry, and he still finished at a respectable 4.1.

He only carried the ball 198 times last year and 182 times the year before, so the 27-year-old has plenty of tread left on the tires. In fact, he should be able to take on additional workload—and it sounds like the Jets just might agree.

“He’s as advertised,” Jets head coach Todd Bowles said of Ivory recently. “We knew he was tough and he could pound it up in there. But he cuts well, he’s got good vision [too].”

And Bowles has even hinted at Ivory playing a bigger role in the passing game, an area where he has plenty of room for added value after catching just 18 passes last season.

I love Ivory’s no-nonsense style of play, and I really love his upside as a mid-round fantasy RB—especially if you decide to go “zero-RB” early while loading up on elite WRs, QBs and TEs.

Don’t get caught reaching for a committee back like Bernard or Jennings when there’s a better option like Ivory on the board a full round later.

Sell: Andy

I cannot attempt to refute anything John Vomhof has written here. Ivory is an underutilized back with the potential to be a very solid bell cow – or at least the better half of a timeshare – in the NFL. He was misused by last year’s staff and underutilized when he was in New Orleans, as well.

That said, what indications have you gotten that he’s going to be in a situation where that potential can shine through in 2015?

He’s on a bad team with a rookie head coach. The projected starting QB has already gotten his jaw broken – and had virtually no one on his team come to his defense. The new starting QB, for now, is Ryan Fitzpatrick, who has played for every team in the NFL at least twice. The offensive line is better at pass blocking than run blocking.

And this is still a bad team – and that means the Jets will be throwing the ball often – which is a bad thing for Ivory, because as talented as he is and as much potential as he has, he’s not shown much throughout his previous five years in terms of being a receiver.

So, while I would love for this to be the season in which Ivory emerges from the statistical abyss, I fear he needs to spend at least one more year toiling amid the chaos and mind-numbing ridiculousness that is the J-E-T-S, Jets, Jets, Jets, before he’ll get a real opportunity to show what he can do – preferably in a market that focuses more on playing decent football than on providing fodder for the back pages of the tabloids.

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