Quinshon Judkins — Week 3: Eighteen Carries, Stopped on Fourth

21 to 18, Browns, one oh five left, fourth and one at the Carolina 15, Carolina out of timeouts. Cleveland went for it, and Quinshon Judkins ran up the middle and lost two. −2.4 expected points added — expected points added is what a play was worth given down, distance and field position — and −16.7 points of win probability, the chance of winning the game after the play against before it, the costliest Browns snap of the day by that measure. The three snaps before it were eight yards for Judkins, one yard for Judkins on second and two, and nothing for Deshaun Watson on third and one. Carolina took over at its own 17 with a minute one left, reached its 42, and Ronnie Hickman's interception ended the game.

The line: 18 carries, 70 yards, no touchdown, two first downs, five of the 18 successful, −3.9 expected points on the carries; two targets, two catches, nine yards. The carries went three, four, two, nothing, nine, six, three, one, 11, two, four, three, two, three, 10, eight, one, −2. 11 before halftime for 45 yards, seven after for 25. The 11, his longest, was the first snap of Cleveland's touchdown drive late in the second quarter, from the Carolina 40 after Carolina failed on fourth and one; he added two and four on that drive, the four to the Carolina six, three snaps before Harold Fannin's fourth-down touchdown. The 10 was second and five at the Carolina 38 with 10 24 left in the fourth, to the 28, on the drive that ended in the field goal that put Cleveland back ahead 13 to 12. A four-yard run in the first quarter came back on an illegal-formation flag. The catches were nine yards on the first snap of a second-quarter field-goal drive and a no-gainer from Shedeur Sanders with two 29 left in the game, on the one snap Watson missed.

Cleveland called 23 designed runs: 18 for Judkins, four for Watson, and one for Raheim Sanders, a 17-yarder on that touchdown drive. 18 carries and 70 yards are both his most this season, after 12 for 33 12 for 21. Dylan Sampson has been on injured reserve since the fifteenth with a knee injury, per NBC Sports.

Back in June the preview called Judkins a real workhorse: a rookie season built on volume across 14 games in a lead role, with a ceiling that depended on the offense around him. Week 1 was 12 carries for 33 yards and nothing longer than five. Week 2 was 12 for 21, and a stop for no gain on fourth and one before halftime. Sunday brought the most carries and yards of the three, the longest run of the three, and a second straight week stopped on fourth and one, this time with the game on it. Three games: 42 carries, a hundred 24 yards, just under three a carry. The workload half of the read keeps holding and the yards are arriving slowly. Cleveland is home to the Steelers on Thursday the first.

_Data via nflverse._