2026 AFC East run game preview
The Patriots breakaway rush upside may be unrivaled
Over the past week and change I have detailed the basics of the new plus/minus run block grading system and reviewed many of the league wide metrics this system tracked in the 2025 season.
Next up is the first of an eight-article series with spin it forward previews of every NFL team’s 2026 ground game, broken down by division. This edition covers the AFC East.
The format
Each team preview will start with an overview of the club’s current run game situation.
Step one is detailing the team’s carry division type. There are four carry division types. These are:
Bell cow: One back hoards nearly all of the backfield work. The primary backup usually gets very little work sans an injury to the starter.
Lead/alternate: The lead back will usually get somewhere between 65 to 80 percent of the work. The alternate back gets most of the rest of the work.
Platoon: This division splits the work fairly evenly between two backs. In some cases there is a 1A who gets roughly 50-55 percent of the work and a 1B who gets 45-50 percent. The work can also be divided into thunder and lightning roles. The thunder back takes on the hard hitting carries (short yardage, red zone, closer carries when the offense is trying to save the game), while the lightning back handles more open field work (rushes between the 20s) and pass catching downs.
Running back by committee (RBBC): This is a rarely used setup where the backfield carries are divided fairly evenly between three or more backs.
Next up is matchup points. This system measures the upcoming season’s projected matchup difficulty on a 1-100 scale, with higher being better for the offense. This point scale is largely based on the 2025 run defense metrics and related spin forward elements, which makes this scale different from many standard matchup measurements.
Last up is returning offensive line starters. This is based on comparing the primary 2025 starters listed at Pro Football Reference with this year’s depth charts (either on the team sites or at Ourlads.com, a definite go-to for up to the minute depth charts).
The review will then display each team’s 2025 offensive rush metrics, followed by the 2025 metrics for any running back on the roster who had 100 or more planned rushes. These metrics were detailed in the aforementioned introductory articles of this series. Most are self-explanatory, with the main exception being that the term FFB stands for fantasy football.
Each review then moves into answering the big run game questions for every team.
Now let’s get started!
Buffalo Bills
Carry division type: Bell cow
Bell cow: James Cook
Primary backup: Ray Davis
2026 rush defense matchup points: 38
Returning offensive line starters: 4
What impact will the retirement of offensive line coach Aaron Kromer have?
Kromer isn’t as widely known as someone like Jeff Stoutland, but the Bills 2025 blocking numbers suggest he should have been. Buffalo’s 51.6 plus blocking rate last year was first in the NFL by a 1.5-point margin.
Pat Meyer, who has been an NFL offensive line coach for the past nine seasons, is taking Kromer’s place. Meyer coached the Steelers offensive line in 2025. That group was only 15th in plus blocking rate last year (42.2 percent, or 9.4 points behind Buffalo) but did rank 11th in breakaway blocking rate, a number that speaks well for his coaching skill.
Meyer will benefit from the fact that the Bills have better run blocking talent than his Steelers squad possessed last year. This is in part because Buffalo returns four offensive line starters.
The issue here is when a squad leads the league in a metric by a big margin, it suggests that a stat regression is very likely. The somewhat unfavorable schedule won’t help matters.
Even with those negative factors, I expect Buffalo to remain in the top five in plus blocking rate because of the returning talent, Meyer’s solid track record and because Joe Brady, who is a very good run play caller, is still calling the plays.
Can Josh Allen continue his incredible touchdown scoring pace?
Allen has scored 12+ rushing touchdowns in three straight seasons. Only 15 players in NFL history have done that and Jalen Hurts is the only other QB to do that. Allen has as many 12+ touchdown seasons as some of the greatest running backs of all time, including Walter Payton, Barry Sanders, Terrell Davis, Edgerrin James, John Riggins, Marshawn Lynch, Priest Holmes and Marcus Allen.
What makes this achievement even more incredible is that only four players have ever posted 12+ rushing touchdowns in four consecutive seasons. That list is LaDainian Tomlinson (a league record six straight), Shaun Alexander (5), Derrick Henry (four, a current streak) and Adrian Peterson (4).
So, can Allen join that four consecutive season list?
He does have a bit of an unfair schedule advantage because he gets 17 games to post 12+ touchdown totals in. Most of the RBs listed above tallied their achievements in 16-game campaigns.
Another thing in Allen’s favor is that James Cook is only 5-foot-11 and 190 pounds. That relatively slender frame is why Allen has been and probably will still be the Bills go-to closer on rushing plays in close. This was certainly the case last year and it led to Allen scoring eight touchdowns on planned inside the 5-rushes last season.
The main impediment to a recurrence is if Allen will get the same caliber of run blocking he received last year? Allen received plus-caliber blocking on 30 of his 38 planned rushes in 2025, which equates to a ridiculously high 78.9 percent plus blocking rate. That number is all but certain to fall, and maybe by a significant amount.
The saving grace could be scramble plays. Allen scored three rushing touchdowns on scramble plays in 2025 and has the potential to score even more than that. This is why even though many of these trends point towards Allen falling short of a 12+ TD total, I’d say he’s apt to make it four in a row.
Miami Dolphins
Carry division type: Bell cow
Bell cow: De’Von Achane
Primary backup: Jaylen Wright or Ollie Gordon II
2026 rush defense matchup points: 86
Returning offensive line starters: 3
What is Malik Willis’ fantasy scoring ceiling?
The best rushing fantasy quarterbacks will average five or more points per game on rushing plays. Willis had only one start last year, that being the Week 17 matchup versus Baltimore, but he showed his fantasy scoring upside here by racking up 16 rushing points in that contest.
That’s not the only impactful rush metric Willis tallied in 2025. He averaged 10 yards per carry on plus blocking plays. To be fair, it was only on six rushes, but that double-digit YPC total illustrates how explosive Willis can be in that area. He also notched a 7.4-yard average on nine scrambles.
The Dolphins have the least talented set of pass catchers in the NFL, so new head Jeff Hafley and offensive coordinator Bobby Slowik will be going all out to establish the ground game. This could include many variations of read option calls where Willis runs the ball. If Willis, who is listed at 6-foot-1 and 225 pounds, is able to stay healthy under that rush volume, he could get 100+ rushes and rack up 6-7 rush PPG against a rush defense schedule that has seven favorable matchups.
To spin this forward, let’s go with a 6.5-PPG average on a 17-game schedule. Now let’s say that Willis is able to post 150 pass yards, one touchdown and one interception per game. That’s a net of eight points per game. Add those two together and it’s 14.5 PPG. Multiply that by 17 and it’s 247 points, which is borderline QB1 territory.
This is not to say that Willis will end up as a borderline QB1. Injuries can happen when one is hit that often and the Dolphins may not be able to lean on the run as much as they would like. If Miami is successful here, however, Willis can significantly outperform his current low-end QB2 ADP.
What is the expected impact of Willis’ rushing on De’Von Achane’s ground production?
Willis could also mimic Josh Allen in the area of claiming a lot of goal line carries. Could that have a negative impact on Achane’s fantasy numbers?
It’s possible, but not probable. Here’s why.
Achane is listed at only 5-foot-9 and 191 pounds. That frame hasn’t prevented Achane from ranking eighth in scrimmage plays over the past two years, but he has only six touchdowns on 34 inside the 10-carries in that span. That’s tied for the second lowest rushing TD volume among players with 30+ carries in that area.
This is why Ollie Gordon II and Jaylen Wright both scored more inside the 5-rush TDs than Achane last year. It also shows why Willis isn’t likely to siphon much of Achane’s goal line rush value, because that value is already limited.
New England Patriots
Carry division type: Platoon
Platoon 1A: Rhamondre Stevenson
Platoon 1B: TreVeyon Henderson
2026 rush defense matchup points: 55
Returning offensive line starters: 4
Can the additions of A.J. Brown and Romeo Doubs help the Patriots give Rhamondre Stevenson and TreVeyon Henderson more breakaway opportunities?
This is the proverbial million-dollar question for fantasy managers. Henderson and Stevenson ranked first and second, respectively, in breakaway YPC last year, but they both suffered from the Patriots No. 27 ranking in breakaway blocking rate.
The odd part of this is that New England was 12th in good blocking rate and 13th in excellent blocking rate. Those number indicate this is a very adept run blocking group overall and the breakaway element is the only thing that needs upgrading.
This may be a secondary but very notable reason why New England added A.J. Brown and Romeo Doubs. Brown is listed at 6-foot-1 and 226 pounds, while Doubs is 6-foot-2 and 204 pounds. That’s a notable size upgrade over a 2025 Patriots roster that had only one wide receiver over 200 pounds and only one wideout listed at 6-foot-1 or higher (which in both cases was Mack Hollins).
If Brown and Doubs are highly successful at crack blocks on safeties closing in to stop potential breakaway rushes, it should dramatically increase the Patriots breakaway blocking rates. That would mean the sky is the limit when it comes to long rushing gains for Stevenson and Henderson. It’s a factor of note in fantasy drafts, especially in the case of Stevenson, who may be vastly undervalued at his current eighth-round ADP in 12-team leagues.
New York Jets
Carry division type: Lead/alternate
Lead back: Breece Hall
Alternate: Braelon Allen
2026 rush defense matchup points: 66
Returning offensive line starters: 4
What’s the skinny on Aaron Glenn wanting to turn this backfield into a “three-headed monster”?
Jets head coach Aaron Glenn said this offseason that he wants to split carries in the New York backfield. His idea is to turn this into a “three-headed monster” setup with Breece Hall, Braelon Allen and Isaiah Davis dividing the carries.
It may sound odd considering that Hall tallied a career high 1,065 rushing yards last year, but before we dismiss this out of hand, let’s take a moment to look at this from Glenn’s point of view.
We’ll begin with the fact that the Jets ranked in the top eight in plus, good and excellent blocking rates last year. For New York to do this with an offense that had a very limited passing game speaks well for this platoon’s run blocking talents. Keep that in mind when noting that the Jets return four offensive line starters from last year’s group.
Combine those trends with New York adding tight end Kenyon Sadiq in the NFL Draft and Dylan Parham in free agency (who could be a blocking upgrade at left guard) and having a somewhat favorable schedule and it says the Jets can have a lot of run blocking success. New York’s passing game should also be much better with Geno Smith under center and Omar Cooper Jr. and Sadiq as new talented aerial targets.
That’s a formula for a very successful ground game, yet to get the most out of this rushing attack, New York will need more from Hall. He ranked 22nd or worse in good, excellent and breakaway YPC in 2025. Wear and tear could be part of the problem since Hall is one of only seven RBs with 260+ scrimmage plays in each of the past three years.
Glenn almost certainly doesn’t expect Hall to post Jahmyr Gibbs-like numbers, but he may be thinking that Hall can notably improve his YPC production on a lower carry volume. It may just be a matter of giving the 6-foot-1, 235-pound Allen and the 6-foot-1, 220-pound Davis a good portion of the thunder carries and saving Hall for the lightning work between the 20s. That would be a partial carry over from last year when Hall had only two inside the 5-rushes.
Splitting work like this could also keep Hall fresh for his pass catching assignments. That’s a big upside area for him, as Bijan Robinson was the only running back with a higher YPR last year (min 35 receptions).
The first caveat here is that Glenn talked about splitting carries prior to the 2025 season. The net result of that in Weeks 1-3 was 46 scrimmage plays for Hall versus 16 plays for Allen. Allen was then injured in Week 4 and out for the year, so the split carries idea went out the window. The second caveat is that Glenn is still one of the best running backs on a yards per play basis.
The net result is likely to be that Hall ends up with a lead back’s work level and Allen and Davis split the alternate role. That will hold up as long as Hall still produces superb per play numbers. If or when that pace declines, this could turn into a platoon with Hall being the 1A and Allen/Davis splitting the 1B work.