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Nick Chubb to Start Year on PUP List
Nick Chubb will miss the first four games of the season on the PUP List thanks to his knee injury, making Jerome Ford the starter.
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Nick Chubb (knee) is expected to begin the year on the PUP list, ruling him out for at least the first four games of the 2024 season, ESPN's Adam Schefter reports.
Chubb suffered a torn ACL, MCL and meniscus while also suffering damage to the medial capsule of his left knee against Pittsburgh on Sept. 18 last season. It's a uniquely challenging injury that ended Chubb's season and required two surgeries — one to repair the medial capsule, meniscus and MCL on Sept. 29, and then a second surgery to repair the ACL on Nov. 14.
The unusual severity of the injury made it difficult to project Chubb's recovery timeline, especially since the second surgery had to wait until mid-November. The need to space out the two surgeries stalled the recovery clock to nearly one month after the actual injury was suffered, and that left Chubb in a race against time with Cleveland's Week 1 game against Dallas on Sept. 8. By leaving him on the PUP list, Chubb is now out the first four games. The question of how soon Chubb might return to the field remains unclear, however, even beyond the certainty of missing those first four games.
Chubb suffered a similar injury to the same knee while playing college football at Georgia in 2015, though the injury was notably different for at least a few reasons. With that 2015 injury Chubb somehow did not tear the ACL, but he did tear the MCL, PCL and LCL while suffering unspecified cartilage damage. Whether or how much Chubb's most recent injury was worse than the 2015 injury isn't obvious and the 2023 injury may well be worse by some measure, but Chubb's 2015 injury was also uniquely devastating at the time. Despite suffering that injury Oct. 10, 2015, Chubb played Week 1 (Sept. 3) of the 2016 season, running for 222 yards and two touchdowns on 32 carries.
Chubb made a triumphant and improbable return from that injury, and the hope is that he might still do the same from his 2023 injury, but there remains a risk that Chubb misses more than those first four weeks. Chubb is 28 and turns 29 on Dec. 24, so the recovery process will almost certainly be less favorable than when Chubb was 20 years old in 2015.
Chubb's return to the field remains without a clear timeline. The Browns have expressed a tone of general optimism around Chubb throughout the recovery process and even up to this point, but the Browns either don't know when he'll be back or haven't said if they do know. The second possibility would be much more reassuring, but if the Browns truly still don't know when Chubb might be back then it's difficult to see how he would have a realistic chance of returning as soon as eligible in Week 5 (Oct. 6).
The last tangible bit of news with Chubb otherwise was arguably an Instagram video posted July 15 that showed Chubb squatting at least 558 pounds, done with a Tsunami bar that potentially made the weight resistance more like the resistance at a higher weight with a normal bar. Chubb has otherwise reportedly been doing field workouts on the side of Browns practices since at least July 27, but the nature and significance of those workouts haven't been clarified.
Cleveland Backfield Without Chubb
Monday's announcement made formal that Chubb will miss at least the first four games of 2024, and with that it all but made official that Jerome Ford will be Cleveland's starting running back for at least that duration. The Browns also have D'Onta Foreman and Pierre Strong on hand at running back, along with the inactive Nyheim Hines (NFI), who's trying to return from the off-field ACL injury he suffered last summer.
While Strong might sprinkle in some snaps and while Hines might be a factor for the Browns at some point in 2024, the most likely approach without Chubb appears to be Ford as the starter and passing-down back with Foreman as a power and short-yardage specialist, perhaps including in the red zone.
Ford operated in a similar setup last year, running for 813 yards and four touchdowns on 204 carries (4.0 YPC) while catching 44 of 63 targets for 319 yards and five touchdowns on 602 snaps. In last year's case the Browns implemented this usage model with Kareem Hunt playing the short-yardage and power specialist role. For as long as Chubb is out, the 2024 model might be the exact same but with Foreman stepping in for Hunt. Hunt hovered around Flex viability in fantasy football while poaching short-yardage touchdowns last year — nine on 135 carries, with 12 of those attempts occurring within five yards of the goal line.
The Browns likely continue to see Ford (5-foot-11, 210) as more of an in-space back than a grinder between the tackles, and his 602 snaps last year is already a strong total that won't be easy to improve upon, but if Ford can hold off Foreman a little bit more than he held off Hunt in 2023 then Ford could be a strong fantasy value in 2024, especially early in the year. If Foreman takes up the exact same role as Hunt then Ford will still be useful in most fantasy formats, just probably more like a flex play than the RB2-type upside Ford would have if he could snatch some of those nine touchdowns Hunt stole last year.
Conclusion
It's not clear when Chubb will return, and at the very least he's out the first four games.
If Chubb can return in 2024 and be anywhere near his customary level then he would likely begin to reestablish his grip on the starting running back role in Cleveland in a hurry. As mentioned, Chubb took 32 carries and ran for more than 200 yards in his first 2016 game back from his 2015 season-ending knee injury. Chubb might be as hard of a worker as any player in NFL history, and his longstanding commitment to freakish physical fitness may pay off again in the form of another improbably triumphant return from an injury that would fell any mortal.
For however long Chubb is out, Ford should be a starter-level fantasy asset in almost any league format. Ford would ideally be deployed in more like a flex role, but he might be just good enough to pass off as a fantasy RB2, especially if you're strong at your other positions. Ford might be a good fit for the Hero Running Back draft strategy, for instance, eking out RB2 production at more like a RB4 or RB5 draft cost. Promising as Ford appears going into 2024, there remains a chance that Foreman busy as a power specialist and steals some of the rushing touchdowns in Cleveland much like Hunt did in 2023.
