2012 NFL Fantasy Football Rankings: Running Backs

Author:
Braden Gall
Aug 15, 2012 9:00 AM EDT

In this story:

The 2012 NFL Fantasy Season is officially here. Mock drafts abound. Rookie round-ups are complete. Bye week cheat sheets are everywhere. The creative juices are flowing with hysterical team names. Positional rankings are popping up everywhere. And the ever-important Athlon Sports 2012 Big Board, the most accurate consensus top 150 list of fantasy footballers on the web, continues to take shape.

New to our Big Board is NFL.com's initial NFL fantasy rankings as we have expanded from seven lists to eight. We also added a "Previous" column to indicate the previous ranking. Athlon, with special help from FantasyRundown.com, will continue to broaden and deepen its trademark consensus Big Board and positional rankings all summer long.

CBS:CBSSports.com (Updated: 7/13/12)
PFF: ProFootballFocus.com (Updated: 6/26/12)
ESPN:ESPN (Updated 6/20/12)
FFT:FFToolbox.com (Updated 7/15/12)
Y!: Yahoo! Sports (Updated 6/23/12)
NFL: NFL.com (2012 Debut)
FOX: FoxSports.com (Updated 5/31/12)
AS: Athlon Sports (Updated 7/1/12)

Updated: 9:00 a.m. CT, July 18, 2012

Athlon Sports Fantasy Football Positional Rankings: Running Backs


Rank	Previous	Top 150	Player:	Team	CBS	PFF	ESPN	FFT	Y!	NFL	FOX	AS
1.	1	1	Arian Foster	HOU	1	1	1	1	1	1	2	1
2.	2	2	Ray Rice	BAL	2	2	2	2	2	3	3	2
3.	3	3	LeSean McCoy	PHI	3	4	3	3	3	4	4	3
4.	4	6	Maurice Jones-Drew	JAC	6	11	5	6	7	7	7	6
5.	6	7	Ryan Mathews	SD	8	3	12	5	5	9	11	13
6.	5	9	Chris Johnson	TEN	9	7	9	10	8	11	10	9
7.	7	14	Darren McFadden	OAK	12	27	30	12	16	19	15	14
8.	9	17	Matt Forte	CHI	22	33	18	15	15	16	19	12
9.	8	18	Marshawn Lynch	SEA	11	37	17	17	18	27	14	15
10.	10	20	DeMarco Murray	DAL	18	16	21	18	22	25	18	34
11.	11	24	Trent Richardson	CLE	17	29	36	14	9	22	41	33
12.	14	25	Adrian Peterson	MIN	27	19	28	21	21	30	36	22
13.	13	26	Jamaal Charles	KC	49	23	24	16	25	29	28	17
14.	12	27	Steven Jackson	STL	20	21	31	23	37	31	25	36
15.	15	34	Fred Jackson	BUF	33	52	34	34	32	44	21	38
16.	16	37	Michael Turner	ATL	21	96	37	33	35	43	27	21
17.	17	39	Ahmad Bradshaw	NYG	25	41	44	31	45	45	40	46
18.	20	43	Darren Sproles	NO	41	56	43	35	40	47	47	44
19.	18	46	Frank Gore	SF	62	79	38	44	52	42	31	20
20.	19	47	Reggie Bush	MIA	57	47	51	38	42	56	43	45
21.	21	57	Roy Helu	WAS	67	87	42	39	61	61	57	48
22.	24	59	Shonn Greene	NYJ	66	68	58	50	70	58	63	55
23.	26	60	Doug Martin	TB	54	60	83	43	38	54	88	68
24.	23	61	Beanie Wells	ARI	43	94	62	46	77	55	61	58
25.	22	63	BenJarvus Green-Ellis	CIN	45	115	52	47	65	60	70	54
26.	25	64	Willis McGahee	DEN	70	73	50	73	79	62	54	49
27.	27	72	Jonathan Stewart	CAR	88	89	54	56	69	68	82	65
28.	28	75	Isaac Redman	PIT	77	117	72	67	73	81	75	64
29.	33	78	Jahvid Best	DET	101	75	70	91	85	64	77	69
30.	30	79	Donald Brown	IND	97	63	95	96	82	92	80	75
31.	31	81	Mark Ingram	NO	113	102	78	90	92	69	87	51
32.	29	82	DeAngelo Williams	CAR	100	-	67	74	78	80	72	66
33.	32	83	James Starks	GB	96	81	92	60	90	85	99	88
34.	34	85	C.J. Spiller	BUF	89	83	81	79	89	88	115	78
35.	36	90	Peyton Hillis	KC	86	99	88	98	88	94	107	90
36.	35	95	Michael Bush	CHI	95	-	76	84	97	87	86	93
37.	37	99	Stevan Ridley	NE	84	123	75	-	101	75	100	76
38.	39	100	Ben Tate	HOU	107	-	65	119	94	95	102	77
39.	40	104	Toby Gerhart	MIN	94	-	90	105	117	93	117	89
40.	38	105	LeGarrette Blount	TB	103	109	121	117	119	120	76	100
41.	42	111	Pierre Thomas	NO	105	107	119	132	107	108	105	130
42.	43	112	David Wilson	NYG	127	125	97	134	105	98	139	91
43.	41	113	Mikel Leshoure	DET	79	-	-	115	96	106	110	116
44.	45	118	Felix Jones	DAL	110	112	102	-	127	121	113	114
45.	44	131	Daniel Thomas	MIA	131	-	111	-	133	143	101	129
46.	46	133	Ryan Williams	ARI	115	-	-	136	112	147	128	117
47.	47	134	Shane Vereen	NE	125	-	-	114	123	131	138	133
48.	49	136	Ronnie Hillman	DEN	122	104	-	131	113	-	-	-
49.	51	137	Bernard Scott	CIN	140	121	116	-	-	137	-	115
50.	48	143	Mike Tolbert	CAR	129	-	127	-	142	-	132	131
51.	53	—	Rashard Mendenhall	PIT	132	-	-	-	148	127	147	135
52.	50	—	Tim Hightower	WAS	-	-	-	-	125	128	-	136
53.	55	—	Mike Goodson	OAK	120	-	143	-	141	-	-	143
54.	54	—	Joseph Addai	NE	-	-	100	-	-	-	-	-
55.	56	—	Jacquizz Rodgers	ATL	-	-	-	-	106	-	-	149
56.	62	—	Joe McKnight	NYJ	-	118	-	-	-	-	-	-
57.	60	—	Cedric Benson	FA	-	-	-	-	-	-	133	139
58.	58	—	Evan Royster	WAS	138	-	-	-	-	-	143	-
59.	52	—	Brandon Jacobs	SF	-	-	-	-	-	-	135	-
60.	57	—	Rashad Jennings	JAC	-	-	-	-	-	-	-	137
61.	61	—	Isaiah Pead	STL	-	-	-	-	150	-	-	140
62.	63	—	Kevin Smith	DET	-	-	141	-	149	-	-	-
63.	67	—	Javon Ringer	TEN	-	-	-	-	-	-	-	144
64.	UR	—	Jonathan Dwyer	PIT	-	-	145	-	-	-	-	-
65.	68	—	Kendall Hunter	SF	-	-	-	-	-	-	148	-