A serious knee injury to Stevan Ridley means the New England Patriots will rely on Shane Vereen and Brandon Bolden in the running game, giving each running back’s fantasy football value a boost for the rest of the season.
Ridley suffered a torn ACL and MCL on Sunday against the Buffalo Bills. Ridley is a good back but has had multiple fumbling issues in New England, which frequently left him in Bill Belichick’s doghouse.
Vereen is the more accomplished back of the two. The 25-year-old back from Cal has been in the Patriots’ offense for four years and knows the system. He is a versatile, change-of-pace type of back who thrives in their passing game. Vereen has not carried the ball more than 9 times in any game this season, though between rushing attempts and receptions, he has topped out at 13 touches in a game. We expect his amount of touches to go up by a few in light of the Ridley injury, though we will never expect to see him carry the load.
Bolden is in his third season out of Ole Miss and hardly touched the ball prior to Sunday. After Ridley’s injury, Bolden ended up seeing six carries and rushing for 10 yards. He averaged 4.9 yards per carry each of his first two seasons in the league, so we expect him to do much better than he has this season. We also expect him to start seeing a lot more action splitting Ridley’s carries with Vereen.
