It’s time to get excited about Jonathan Taylor again

Not long ago, Jonathan Taylor was a hot pick for fantasy football managers, a game-changer, a league winner. He was listed as the RB4 in his rookie year in 2020 and jumped to the RB1 slot in his second season. By the summer of 2022, Taylor was a celebrity, gracing the covers of football magazines and being the No. 1 overall pick in most leagues.

Since then, not much has gone right. An ankle injury held Taylor back for the 2022 season (11 starts, a mediocre RB36 finish) and his 2023 start was complicated by time on the PUP list and a lengthy contract lockout.

But let’s not forget Taylor’s exciting comeback last year. Taylor returned to our fantasy lives in October, bolstered by a contract extension and finally healthy again. He didn’t play until Week 7, but his explosiveness returned. In his final eight games, Taylor has 704 rushing yards and eight touchdowns. In the season finale against Houston, he rushed for 188 yards and a touchdown.

When you look at the running back roster for those 11 games, Taylor is the RB15 with a half-point PPR value. However, keep in mind that Taylor missed three games due to a thumb injury, limiting his point total. When you focus on the points-per-game rankings, Taylor jumps into the RB3 spot, trailing only Kyren Williams and Christian McCaffrey.

Blue Horseshoe was a blue-chip stock on the home stretch.

All fantasy arrows are aimed at Jonathan Taylor

Taylor’s global ADP is currently just outside the first round (somewhere in the 13th overall range), but Yahoo drafters are more optimistic. Taylor’s current Yahoo ADP tag is 10.5 overall, and he’s the fourth running back off the board. I welcome the aggressiveness in the Yahoo market. Hero RB is my preferred build (bringing back one anchor while strengthening the other positions), and Taylor has enough potential to be the best fantasy back in football this fall. I’d love to build my fantasy roster around Taylor and a handful of impactful wide receivers.

Taylor definitely has the infrastructure to succeed. The Colts’ offensive line is ranked in the top 10 on most notebooks. Indianapolis head coach Shane Steichen is considered an offensive wizard who knows how to put his influential players in positions to succeed (note the seven touchdowns Taylor has scored in his last six games). And Indy’s offense certainly has even more potential this season with the return of second-year quarterback Anthony Richardson.

Gardner Minshew was a respectable backup who kept the Colts competitive in Richardson’s absence last season, but his potential was always low. The Colts will likely be in the playoffs if Richardson takes a leap forward in year two. And we generally want our fantasy backs tied to winning teams and making as much of an impact as possible.

Taylor should get as much work as he can handle; the Colts have average running backs behind him in the lineup (Trey Sermon, Evan Hull). Richardson is athletic enough to take on some of the work at the goal line, but since Taylor will share little with his backfield mates, I’m not worried about the quarterback scoring a few points. With Taylor entering his 25th season, it’s time to be proactive.

If you get Taylor in the second round of your draft, you’ve committed highway robbery. But you have my approval to consider him somewhere in the second half of the first round.

The time is right for Taylor to dominate fantasy football again.