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ESPN Ranks 49ers RB Christian McCaffrey 5th Among NFL Running Backs

A year ago, Christian McCaffrey was considered the best running back in the NFL. Then, 2024 happened.
Grant Cohn|
Nov 10, 2024; Tampa, Florida, USA; San Francisco 49ers running back Christian McCaffrey (23) warms up before a game against the Tampa Bay Buccaneers at Raymond James Stadium. Mandatory Credit: Nathan Ray Seebeck-Imagn Images
Nov 10, 2024; Tampa, Florida, USA; San Francisco 49ers running back Christian McCaffrey (23) warms up before a game against the Tampa Bay Buccaneers at Raymond James Stadium. Mandatory Credit: Nathan Ray Seebeck-Imagn Images | Nathan Ray Seebeck-Imagn Images

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A year ago, Christian McCaffrey was considered the best running back in the NFL. Then, 2024 happened.

Now, it's unclear if he'll ever be elite again. Running backs have a notoriously short shelf life, meaning they age quickly. Once they lose a step, they're done. And McCaffrey certainly looked like he lost a step last year.

And yet, ESPN polled NFL executives, coaches and scouts, and they ranked McCaffrey fifth among NFL running backs heading into the 2025 season.

"Durability is the one thing holding McCaffrey back," writes ESPN's Jeremy Fowler. "He has missed 10 or more games in three of his past five NFL seasons.

"'He's a great player, but he's always had durability issues, even in college,' an NFL personnel executive said. 'He's an elite trainer and takes great care of himself. He's just not a big body and will lose a step eventually.'

"A return to 2023 form would put McCaffrey back in the MVP conversation. When he's healthy, he always produces.

"In fact, McCaffrey has four seasons with at least 1,800 scrimmage yards and 10 touchdowns. The only players with more are all Hall of Famers: Tomlinson, Marshall Faulk, Emmitt Smith and Walter Payton (five each)."

Fowler makes great points. But of those four running backs he listed, only Payton had a season after the age of 28 with a least 1,800 scrimmage yards and 10 touchdowns. The other three running backs began to slow down and lose their effectiveness at 29.

McCaffrey just turned 29 in June. He might be able to stay healthy this year, but he probably won't be in the MVP conversation like he was a couple years ago considering he has 2,013 career touches in the NFL.

Durabiliy isn't his biggest issue. Age is.

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Grant Cohn
GRANT COHN

Grant Cohn has covered the San Francisco 49ers daily since 2011. He spent the first nine years of his career with the Santa Rosa Press Democrat where he wrote the Inside the 49ers blog and covered famous coaches and athletes such as Jim Harbaugh, Colin Kaepernick and Patrick Willis. In 2012, Inside the 49ers won Sports Blog of the Year from the Peninsula Press Club. In 2020, Cohn joined FanNation and began writing All49ers. In addition, he created a YouTube channel which has become the go-to place on YouTube to consume 49ers content. Cohn's channel typically generates roughly 3.5 million viewers per month, while the 49ers' official YouTube channel generates roughly 1.5 million viewers per month. Cohn live streams almost every day and posts videos hourly during the football season. Cohn is committed to asking the questions that 49ers fans want answered, and providing the most honest and interactive coverage in the country. His loyalty is to the reader and the viewer, not the team or any player or coach. Cohn is a new-age multimedia journalist with an old-school mentality, because his father is Lowell Cohn, the legendary sports columnist for the San Francisco Chronicle from 1979 to 1993. The two have a live podcast every Tuesday. Grant Cohn grew up in Oakland and studied English Literature at UCLA from 2006 to 2010. He currently lives in Oakland with his wife.

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