When considering recent years in the NFL, I seem to have come across a trend. Every year the NFL has an MVP – and most years it has a surprising candidate who either wins MVP or is in the discussion later in the season.
Since 2014 the MVPs have been: Rodgers, Newton, Ryan, Brady, Mahomes, and Jackson. The surprising candidates I would say are 2014 Romo, 2015 Newton and Palmer, 2016 Carr and Prescott, 2017 Wentz, 2018 Mahomes, and 2019 Jackson.
The trend I have come across is that these players have seemed to noticeably drop off the following year. I decided to do some research and see how accurate that was, the results were actually surprisingly blatant.
Format: pass yds – TD/INT ratio – fantasy ppg – record – win%
2014
MVP: Rodgers
2014: 4381 – 38/5 – 25.6 – 12-4 – .750
2015: 3821 – 31/8 – 22.2 – 10-6 – .625
Surprise candidate: Romo
2014: 3705 – 34/9 – 21.8 – 12-3 – .800
2015: Only played 4 games, 16.4 – 3-1 – .750
2015
MVP & Surprise candidate: Cam
2015: 3837 – 35/14 (10 rush TDs) – 28.5 – 15-1 – .938
2016: 3509 – 19/14 (5 rush TDs) – 21.2 – 6-8 – .429
Surprise candidate (2): Palmer
2015: 4671 – 35/11 – 23.9 – 13-3 – .812
2016: 4237 – 26/14 – 21.3 – 6-8-1 – .433
2016
MVP: Ryan
2016: 4944 – 38/7 – 25.7 – 11-5 – .688
2017: 4095 – 20/12 – 18.7 – 10-6 – .625
Surprise candidate: Carr
2016: 3933 – 28/6 – 22.5 – (injured final 2) 12-2 – .857
2017: 3496 – 22/13 – 18 – 6-9 – .400
Surprise candidate (2): Dak
2016: 3667 – 23/4 – 21.2 – 13-2 – .867
2017: 3325 – 22/13 – 20.4 – 9-7 – .562
2017
MVP: Brady
2017: 4576 – 32/8 – 22.5 – 13-3 – .812
2018: 4355 – 29/11 – 21.8 – 11-5 – .688
Surprise candidate: Wentz
2017: 3296 – 33/7 – 25.1 – (Injured final 3) 11-2 – .846
2018: 3074 – 21/7 – 22.5 – (Injured final 5) 5-6 – .455
2018
MVP & Surprise candidate: Mahomes
2018: 5097 – 50/12 – 30.9 – 12-4 – .750
2019: 4031 – 26/5 – 24.2 – (Injured 2) 11-3 – .786
2019
MVP & Surprise candidate: Lamar
2019: 3127 – 36/6 – 30.9 (1206 rush yds) – 13-2 – .867
As you can see, the trend is obvious. Not a single player improved upon their pass yards, TD/INT, or fantasy ppg and only one player improved upon their win% (Mahomes 2018 & 2019).
Okay cool, so what does this all mean?
Simply put, if all these trends are at all reliable we can expect Lamar Jackson to regress next season in both real football and fantasy football.
There is no doubt he’s a special player but this is just what happens after a season like his. Do not draft him in fantasy expecting him to produce equally as well as he did this season. Do not predict the Ravens to win 87% of their games.
He’s an outstanding player, but all basic pattern recognition is saying regression.
