With Josh Jacobs on the NFL’s commissioner exempt list amid an ongoing legal case, fantasy football managers are left wondering what to do with the Green Bay Packers’ backfield.
MarShawn Lloyd, Chris Brooks
and newly acquired Kaleb Johnson make up Green Bay’s running back room, while Jacobs’ timeline to return — if he returns at all this season — remains very much in question.
The fantasy industry hasn’t completely punted on Jacobs.
His consensus ADP is 49.5, sitting at 39.9 on Yahoo and 59.7 on ESPN.
Even with that cloud of uncertainty over his availability, Jacobs is still being drafted within the first five rounds, with fantasy managers betting on a return in time for the fantasy postseason, if not well before.
That uncertainty creates value behind him.
Lloyd has a consensus ADP of 133.7 (Yahoo 110.2, ESPN 133), and that number is rising by the day.
Johnson checks in at 169.9 on ESPN, right ahead of Brooks at 170.2. Both have consensus ADPs in the 230s overall, and neither is currently ranked on Yahoo.
The three backs have combined for 495 rushing yards on 117 carries, 29 catches for 192 yards and one touchdown across 55 career NFL games, including the playoffs.
Experience is limited throughout the room, but no one is more of a mystery than Lloyd, who is widely viewed as the next man up in Green Bay.
We’ve seen almost nothing from the Packers’ 2024 third-round pick since an explosive final college season at USC, when Lloyd averaged 7.1 yards per carry and produced 1,052 yards from scrimmage.
In the NFL?
One game.
Lloyd rushed for 15 yards on six attempts and caught one pass for three yards in a Week 2 win over the Colts in 2024.
Injuries have persistently followed since.
But Lloyd is positioned as the frontrunner for early-season carries following a productive preseason, which makes it important to consider what else is available around him in fantasy drafts.
An ADP of 133.7 has Lloyd at RB42, in the company of Aaron Jones, Chris Rodriguez, Woody Marks, Tyler Allgeier and Mike Washington Jr.
If Jeremiyah Love and Ashton Jeanty are limited early, that could create opportunities for Allgeier and Washington in Arizona and Las Vegas, respectively.
But everyone in that neighborhood is stuck in a timeshare at best.
Lloyd might not be.
That’s the appeal.
The risk, of course, is everything we don’t know.
We don’t know whether Lloyd can stay healthy. We don’t know whether he can handle anything resembling a featured workload. We don’t know how quickly Johnson will work his way into the offense. We don’t know how Green Bay will divide passing-down and goal-line work.
And, most importantly, we don’t know when Jacobs will return.
That’s why Lloyd is a player I’m happy to draft at his current price but unwilling to chase several rounds ahead of it.
We can’t simply assume a Tier 1, workhorse role for a guy who didn’t even fit that description in college, no matter how fast the Lloyd hype train chugs along in the days leading up to Week 1 in Minnesota.
Overdrafting him in the fifth, sixth or seventh round would be an overreaction given all the different ways this pick could go sideways.
Heck, the Packers could watch this committee underachieve for a game or two and sprint to sign a veteran off the street.
But in the 10th round?
Now we’re talking.
At that point in a fantasy draft, we’re looking for upside rather than certainty, and few running backs available that late have a clearer path to meaningful early-season touches.
Lloyd shouldn’t be drafted like Jacobs’ replacement is a role he’s already won for the season.
He should be drafted for the chance that it becomes exactly that.
That makes Lloyd one of my favorite upside swings around his current ADP — and explains why there might be no more sought-after player on waivers in leagues that drafted before Jacobs landed on the exempt list.
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This article originally appeared on USA TODAY: Where to draft Packers running back MarShawn Lloyd in fantasy football
