Tony Pollard

More episodes

• Camp · Aug 23, 2026Aug 23, 2026

  Tony Pollard Camp Update — August 23: Double-Digit Runs on the Champions

  Back from a soreness absence on Wednesday, Tony Pollard scored an early red-zone touchdown and broke at least two runs of ten to fifteen-plus yards in Friday's joint practice against the Seahawks. The lead job looks exactly like it did before he sat.

• Camp · Aug 16, 2026Aug 17, 2026

  Tony Pollard Camp Update — August 16: First Drive, First Touchdown, Same Job

  Pollard capped Tennessee's opening eleven-play, ninety-five-yard preseason drive with a five-yard touchdown run and caught a red-zone score from Cam Ward in the joint practice. The volume-first lead role from the June read is exactly where he left it.

• 2026 PreviewJun 15, 2026

  Tony Pollard 2026 Season Preview — a workhorse with a workhorse's mileage

  Pollard played all 17 games and averaged 10 half-PPR points per game, finishing as the RB24 on a season built almost entirely on volume and availability rather than efficiency or touchdown variance. His 95.3% availability rate from 2021–25 confirms durability as the one consistent input, which is exactly the kind of foundation that tends to carry between seasons.

  ▾

  0:002:49

  1x

  1515

  Your episode · 2:49

  Show notes & transcript

  Tony Pollard quietly handled 275 touches and ran for a thousand yards last season — and finished outside the top-20 backs per game anyway. He's the thirtieth running back off the board, which is about right for a high-volume, low-ceiling veteran. The Muffed 2026 preview.

  The 2025 season was all volume, little juice: 242 carries for a thousand 82 yards but only five rushing touchdowns, +33 catches — 10 points a game, RB30 per game, though the workload pushed him to RB24 in total. The signature was a 25-carry, a hundred 61-yard, two-touchdown grind against Cleveland in Week 14. A true lead back's snap count on a bad offense.

  The arc is past its peak: a 14-three-a-game career year back in 2022, then 11-five, 11-three, and now 10 flat. The volume has held; the efficiency and the explosiveness that made 2022 special have not.

  What the data says: he's a career-year-seven back, the band where our aging rule docks production, and his 10-points-a-game output reflects it — a lot of low-value carries on a low-scoring team. The one mild positive is the touchdown rate: five scores on that volume is low, a number with modest room to climb. But there's no edge here in either direction — it's a workhorse role at a workhorse-role price.

  The situation, per the reports, has a whole new regime attached: Brian Callahan — whose "more evenly distributed backfield" plan the old version of this preview quoted — was fired back in October; Robert Saleh took over in January, and Saleh calls Pollard and Tyjae Spears his "bellcows," with Pollard expected to lead the room. Spears stood out at OTAs for a second straight spring and is in a contract year of his own; the draft added Penn State's Nicholas Singleton in round five, though he's coming off foot surgery and being brought along slowly. Pollard turned 29 in April, in the final year of his deal, with no extension urgency from the team. The volume that floors his value is the same volume a two-bellcow plan wants to share.

  The price: pick 80, the thirtieth back. Verdict: NO CALL — a high-floor, low-ceiling workhorse priced right where that profile belongs. The counter both ways: the 275-touch role is a real floor if Spears doesn't cut in much, and five touchdowns has room to grow; but the age, the efficiency decline, and a bad offense cap the upside. Fine as a volume play, no edge to chase.

  September watch: the carry split with Tyjae Spears — the one thing that erodes the floor; and Singleton's arrival once the foot clears, the wildcard behind them. If he's one of your guys, this show exists for your whole roster — every player, every week, all season.

• 2025 ReviewMay 11, 2026

  Tony Pollard 2025 Season in Review

  ▾

  0:002:50

  1x

  1515

  Your episode · 2:50

  Show notes & transcript

  Tony Pollard finished 2025 as the number 23 running back in total PPR scoring and the number 30 running back in PPR per game. That gap tells you most of what you need to know — Pollard played all 17 games and accumulated, but the weekly output rarely moved the needle. He was the lead back on a 3-14 Titans team that ranked thirtieth in offensive expected points added and third-percentile on third down. The workhorse on a unit that couldn't stay on the field — that environment defined his fantasy year more than anything Pollard himself did or didn't do.

  Now let's dig into the numbers. Pollard ran it 242 times for 1,082 yards and five rushing touchdowns, adding 33 catches on 41 targets for 206 yards and no scores through the air — 10.9 PPR per game. This was a steady-volume profile with one spike, not a boom-or-bust line. The efficiency story is sharper than the counting line: Pollard finished plus 112.7 in rushing yards over expected, or plus 0.5 per attempt, 20-fifth among qualified runners, and he did it with 23 percent of his carries facing stacked boxes of eight or more defenders. He was creating yardage the blocking didn't give him on a Titans run game that ranked thirtieth in yards per carry as a team. The problem was ceiling. Pollard cleared 12 PPR just three times all year — weeks three, 14, and 15 — and finished under 10 PPR in nine of 17 games. An 8 percent average target share kept the receiving floor thin, and with only five rushing scores, zero through the air, and a team that converted just half its scoring drives into touchdowns, the touchdown equity simply wasn't there.

  That one spike came in week 14 at Cleveland, and it's the play that captures the season. First and 10 from the Titans' own 35, up 7-3 in the first quarter, Pollard took a handoff right end and ran 65 yards for a touchdown — worth plus 5.3 in expected points and the longest play of his year. He added a 32-yard touchdown run later in the same game and finished with 161 rushing yards, two scores, and 28.1 PPR — by far his best fantasy day. When the blocking gave Pollard a crease, he produced like a top-15 back. He just didn't get those creases often enough on a Titans offense that couldn't sustain anything.