You will hear some chatter about Chris Carson and fumbles. It was a little bit of an issue last year. He fumbled 7 times, and he lost 4 of them. But it’s not anything that I’m worried about. At all.
Carson historically has had very good hands. In his other busy NFL season, he fumbled only 3 times (losing 2).
This is kind of league-wide trend. Running backs don’t fumble like they used to. Coaches do a better job of working on ball security and decision-making.
If you look back at the ‘70s and ‘80s, you see lots of fumbles from Hall of Fame running backs. Franco Harris and Tony Dorsett both fumbled 90 times in their career. Walter Payton finished at 86, and Eric Dickerson at 78 fumbles. Those days are long gone.
I ran some league-wide numbers. In general, running backs fumbled about three times more often in the ‘70s as they do today. They’ve gone from about a fumble every 40 touches in the early ‘70s to a fumble about every 120 handles today.
On the figures below, I looked at all running backs who had at least 100 touches in each of those seasons. (I’m not counting a stone-handed fullback who finished the season with 3-5 carries and a fumble.). I’m looking only at those regular ball handlers, then totaling up all carries and catches and fumbles.
In only six of those seasons have running backs fumbled on fewer than 1 percent of their touches, and all of those seasons have come in the last seven years. The best four years have been the last four years.
I’m not saying Carson is a can’t-miss pick. But if he doesn’t work out, it’s very unlikely to have anything to do with fumbles.
| FUMBLE RATES, LAST 50 YEARS | |||
|---|---|---|---|
| Year | Run-Rec | Fumble | Pct |
| 1973 | 10,918 | 290 | 2.66% |
| 1975 | 11,031 | 287 | 2.60% |
| 1971 | 9,462 | 243 | 2.57% |
| 1976 | 11,861 | 296 | 2.50% |
| 1970 | 8,147 | 199 | 2.44% |
| 1981 | 11,974 | 287 | 2.40% |
| 1972 | 10,102 | 239 | 2.37% |
| 1978 | 13,371 | 308 | 2.30% |
| 1977 | 11,878 | 270 | 2.27% |
| 1974 | 9,827 | 223 | 2.27% |
| 1982 | 5,056 | 113 | 2.23% |
| 1983 | 12,328 | 275 | 2.23% |
| 1979 | 12,927 | 286 | 2.21% |
| 1984 | 11,877 | 256 | 2.16% |
| 1990 | 9,767 | 206 | 2.11% |
| 1980 | 12,293 | 259 | 2.11% |
| 1986 | 11,229 | 232 | 2.07% |
| 1988 | 11,363 | 233 | 2.05% |
| 1985 | 12,457 | 247 | 1.98% |
| 1987 | 7,982 | 149 | 1.87% |
| 1989 | 10,640 | 198 | 1.86% |
| 1991 | 9,739 | 158 | 1.62% |
| 1992 | 10,189 | 165 | 1.62% |
| 1995 | 11,217 | 163 | 1.45% |
| 1993 | 10,430 | 148 | 1.42% |
| 1999 | 10,839 | 146 | 1.35% |
| 2000 | 11,328 | 152 | 1.34% |
| 1994 | 11,039 | 147 | 1.33% |
| 1997 | 11,430 | 150 | 1.31% |
| 1996 | 11,024 | 142 | 1.29% |
| 2003 | 12,395 | 158 | 1.27% |
| 2009 | 11,753 | 149 | 1.27% |
| 2002 | 12,368 | 151 | 1.22% |
| 2001 | 11,178 | 136 | 1.22% |
| 2004 | 11,636 | 136 | 1.17% |
| 2010 | 11,745 | 137 | 1.17% |
| 1998 | 11,021 | 124 | 1.13% |
| 2012 | 10,890 | 121 | 1.11% |
| 2015 | 10,587 | 115 | 1.09% |
| 2008 | 12,124 | 130 | 1.07% |
| 2006 | 12,649 | 135 | 1.07% |
| 2007 | 11,844 | 125 | 1.06% |
| 2005 | 12,111 | 123 | 1.02% |
| 2011 | 11,523 | 117 | 1.02% |
| 2013 | 10,992 | 106 | .96% |
| 2014 | 10,371 | 98 | .94% |
| 2016 | 11,214 | 100 | .89% |
| 2019 | 10,809 | 94 | .87% |
| 2017 | 11,118 | 95 | .85% |
| 2018 | 10,845 | 81 | .75% |
—Ian Allan