With the 2016 NFL regular season drawing to a close, now seems like the perfect time to take a look back at some of the players that have flown under the radar, despite putting up solid numbers.
Here are the 10 most underrated players in the NFL this season.
RB Jordan Howard, Chicago Bears
Ezekiel Elliott continues to dominate the headlines for rookie running backs, but Howard—a fifth-round pick out of Indiana University—has quietly put together a fantastic season of his own for the Bears.
Since taking over as Chicago’s lead running back in early October, Howard has had five 100+ yard games and scored six total touchdowns (one receiving). He’s rushed for at least 75 yards in eight of his 10 starts, while averaging 5.0 yards per carry and 11.1 per reception.
With three games to play, Howard ranks eighth in the NFL with 969 rushing yards. He’s on pace for almost 1,200 yards, despite having a limited role during the first month of the season.
Howard obviously isn’t going to match Elliott’s historic rookie season, but few outside Chicago realize how good he’s been for a bad Bears team.
RB David Johnson, Arizona Cardinals
It’s hard to look at Johnson, a blossoming star for the Cardinals, as being underrated at first glance. However, he managed to put together one of the most productive campaigns for an NFL player in recent history, and deserves recognition for that feat.
On Sunday, Johnson joined Edgerrin James (2005) as the only running backs to start a season with 13 straight games of 100 or more yards from scrimmage. On pace for 1,335 rushing yards, 917 receiving yards and 2,252 yards from scrimmage, Johnson represents the NFL’s most dangerous combination of running and receiving since LaDainian Tomlinson.
Where would the Cardinals be without him? Johnson currently accounts for 36.6 percent of Arizona’s total offensive output, and his 15 total touchdowns lead the NFL.
Johnson hasn’t been included in MVP conversations—mostly because the Cardinals have struggled in 2016—but he probably should be. No offensive player has been better than Arizona’s running back this season.
WR Davante Adams, Green Bay Packers
Adams’ 2015 season was so poor that some believed the former second-round pick was fighting for a roster spot during training camp. Still, Adams made the Packers’ final 53-man roster, setting the stage for a comeback season few saw coming.
After 13 games, Adams has 897 receiving yards and nine touchdowns. Both are career highs. He’s helped spark the Packers’ recent revival, with three 100+ yard performances and three touchdowns in the last five games. Adams kicked off Green Bay’s 38-10 rout of the Seattle Seahawks on Sunday with a 66-yard touchdown on the game’s opening drive.
With three games left, only three players have more receiving touchdowns than Adams (9): Jordy Nelson (12), Antonio Brown (11) and Mike Evans (10). Not bad for a player many wrote off ahead of 2016.
WR Kenny Britt, Los Angeles Rams
The Rams passing offense is the worst in the NFL by almost any measure, but don’t blame the struggles on Britt, who is enjoying a career resurgence as the go-to target in Los Angeles.
An eighth-year pro and a former first-round pick of the Tennessee Titans back in 2009, Britt is currently on pace for his first career 1,000-yard season. He ranks ninth in the NFL in both receiving yards and catches over 20 yards, despite playing with Case Keenum and rookie Jared Goff at quarterback. In fact, he has more receiving yards than players such as Demaryius Thomas, Jordy Nelson and Larry Fitzgerald this season.
Britt did have a bad drop during Sunday’s loss to the Atlanta Falcons, and his breakout season hasn’t been enough to save one of the NFL’s worst offenses. But he’s making the best out of a bad situation, which is a lot more than most of the Rams players can say in 2016.
WR Mike Evans, Tampa Bay Buccaneers
This elite receiver in Tampa Bay has hardly been mentioned, as most analysts and fans have focused on Antonio Brown, Odell Beckham Jr., A.J. Green and Julio Jones.
That will soon change. The Buccaneers are surging toward the postseason, thanks in part to the unstoppable connection between Evans and quarterback Jameis Winston. With three games still to play, Evans already has 80 catches for 1,100 yards and 10 touchdowns. He ranks third in the NFL in receptions and touchdowns, and fifth in receiving yards.
Evans still has yet to produce a big play in a clutch moment of a game. He’ll get a chance in Week 15, when the Buccaneers travel to the state he grew up in (Texas) to take on the Cowboys on Sunday Night Football.
QB Sam Bradford, Minnesota Vikings
The Vikings have struggled for long stretches on offense this season, but it’d be unfair to assign all the blame to an extremely efficient quarterback who has done an admirable job of holding all the disjointed pieces together.
Despite playing behind the league’s worst offensive line and having an unproductive running game, Bradford has managed to complete passes at a high percentage and avoid turnovers for an offense that simply can’t afford big mistakes. He ranks first in the NFL in completion percentage (71.2) and eighth in passer rating (98.2), and has had just one game with a passer rating under 80.0.
Sure, Bradford has been unable to consistently overcome Minnesota’s obvious roster deficiencies on offense by putting a large number of points on the board each week, but there aren’t many quarterbacks that could pull off that feat. Bradford deserves some credit for how well he’s handled the situation he’s been working against all season.
DE Brandon Graham, Philadelphia Eagles
You won’t find Graham among the NFL’s leaders in sacks, as his 5.0 sacks over 13 games ties him for 46th in the league this season. But the sack metric doesn’t do justice for the game’s most underrated pass-rusher.
According to Eagles public relations coordinator John Gonoude, Graham entered Week 14 with 60 combined sacks, knockdowns and hurries this season—trailing only Von Miller for the NFL lead.
It’s important to note that good pass-rushers are sometimes negated by a quick throw or scramble by the opposing quarterback. There’s obvious value in finishing the play with a sack, but Graham has proven capable of disrupting the passing game—with knockdowns and hurries—as frequently as any player in football this season.
LB Jadeveon Clowney, Houston Texans
As the No. 1 overall pick in 2014, Clowney was fully expected to enter the NFL and immediately wreak havoc as a pass-rushing force. Thanks to injuries early in his career and mediocre sack totals, Clowney now ranks as one of the more underrated defensive players in football.
Just ask Andrew Luck. Clowney’s strip-sack of the Colts quarterback late in the third quarter of the Week 14 matchup was a defining moment during the Texans’ 22-17 win. The victory put Houston in the driver’s seat of the AFC South.
Clowney only has 8.5 career sacks. But what he’s lacked in quarterback takedowns he’s made up for in disruptive plays, especially against the run—an area where he’s become nothing short of unblockable at times this season.
While Clowney might not be a franchise-changing pass-rusher like Von Miller or Khalil Mack, he’s still a dominant defensive player in his own right.
DE Danielle Hunter, Minnesota Vikings
Lost in the overall greatness of the Vikings’ defense is an emerging star at defensive end.
Hunter, a third-round pick last year, is flourishing in his second season—already having tallied 10.5 sacks in 13 games. He’s currently riding a five-game streak with at least a half-sack. Overall, Hunter has produced at least a half-sack in nine of the Vikings’ 13 games this season.
He ranks fifth in the NFL in sacks with three games to play. Only Von Miller, Vic Beasley Jr., Ryan Kerrigan and Khalil Mack have more.
There are many underrated players on Minnesota’s defense, including cornerback Xavier Rhodes, linebacker Eric Kendricks, nose tackle Linval Joseph and defensive ends Everson Griffen and Brian Robison. Hunter’s arrival as a stud pass-rusher should ensure Mike Zimmer’s unit stays among the NFL’s elite for years to come.
CB Janoris Jenkins, New York Giants
Giving cornerbacks big money in free agency doesn’t always work out in the NFL, but the Giants hit a home run with Jenkins.
Jenkins has three interceptions and 17 passes defended for the Giants this season. According to Nate Jahnke of Pro Football Focus, Jenkins is the only cornerback in 2016 that has allowed fewer than 500 receiving yards with at least three interceptions and nine passes defended.
The Giants cornerback was at his very best in Week 14, when he held Dez Bryant to just one catch. He also had an interception and forced a fumble in the game, and was in coverage when Dak Prescott failed to connect with Bryant on the Cowboys’ final offensive play of the game.
Jenkins, 28, has never been to a Pro Bowl. That should change this year.
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