Yac Football

Henry is a two-down volume back going in the RB12 range at age 32. In 2025 he ran for 1,595 yards and 16 touchdowns on 307 carries, second in the league in rushing yards, and he was the only back over 30 to hold a featured role all season. The 2026 case is scheme. Baltimore replaced Todd Monken with Declan Doyle and a run staff out of Atlanta, and they run outside zone as their base, which is the concept Henry has always graded best on. More direct handoffs from Lamar Jackson also cut the read-option mesh points that used to slow him at the exchange.

The reason to hesitate is age and mileage. He enters the year with 2,860 career carries, and the 2025 contact numbers all slipped: a career-low 0.14 forced missed tackles per rush, yards before contact down about three-quarters of a yard, three fumbles after one across the prior two seasons. Analysts expect carries to drop from 307 toward 200-250, and there's no passing-game floor to cushion a slow stretch, since Justice Hill owns the third-down and receiving work and Henry caught 15 balls all year. Whether he returns RB1 value comes down to how much of the volume holds and whether the outside-zone burst is still there at 247 pounds.

Backfield

Justice Hill

Designated pass-catching back; owned 75% of third-down snaps in 2025.

3RD-DOWN

Hill, 28 and in a contract year, is the only receiving back on the roster and handles pass protection. He played just 10 games in 2025 after a neck disc injury put him on IR from Week 13. His health decides whether Henry ever sees three-down games or stays a strict two-down grinder.

Rasheen Ali

RB3 in 2025: 10% snap share, 7 carries for 24 yards.

DEPTH

Ali is fighting to hold the third spot against rookie Adam Randall this camp. Minimal standalone value behind Henry and Hill.

Adam Randall

Fifth-round rookie, 6-3/232, converted WR from Clemson.

ROOKIE

Randall ran for 814 yards and 10 touchdowns at Clemson in 2025 and was worked into the screen game alongside Henry during June minicamp. He's a camp challenger to Ali for the RB3 role, not a threat to Henry's carries.

Run Blocking

Baltimore reworked the interior, losing a top-five PFF center in Linderbaum and guard Faalele, then spending a first-round pick on guard Ioane, whose 0.7% blown-block rate led his draft class, and adding Simpson on a three-year, $30M deal. The 2025 run splits leaned hard right: 6.50 yards per carry at right guard and 8.73 at right tackle against 1.57 at left guard. Ledford's outside-zone design, built on lateral flow, is meant to get Henry to the edge and away from those weak-side interior gaps.

Playcall

Doyle and Ledford install outside zone as the base after Monken's power and counter-heavy 2024-25. The scheme runs more under center (48% vs 36%), more play-action (32% vs 24%), more pre-snap motion, and drops the fullback. Minter has said the run menu will be personnel-driven with outside zone primary and gap wrinkles, and that he wants Henry taking direct handoffs to take pressure off Jackson rather than the read-option mesh Henry led the league in last year at 470 uses.

Pass Game

This is a run-first offense that gave Henry no passing role in 2025: 21 targets, 15 catches, 51st among backs. Justice Hill absorbs the checkdowns and third-down routes. The one new wrinkle is that Doyle worked Henry and rookie Randall into screen routes during June minicamp, the first receiving usage in the deployment. Whether it carries into live games is unproven, so treat any PPR contribution as upside rather than baseline.

Scheme Fit

Outside zone is his best concept

Zone-scheme playcallers

Direct handoffs replace mesh delays

Contact metrics slipping

No passing-down role

Interior line reworked

Key Variables

Carry volume in the new scheme: 307 in 2025 against a projected 200-250 for 2026. The RB1/RB2 line sits near 275; below it touchdown regression bites, above it the age-32 cliff data becomes the binding risk.
Does the outside-zone burst survive at 247 pounds and age 32? The 91.9 career grade is built on 2016-2024 tape, and the 2025 contact metrics suggest the lateral burst is fading. His first zone-heavy camp is the read.
Justice Hill's neck recovery. Healthy, he keeps Henry a two-down back with no receiving floor; if he misses time, Henry inherits three-down volume and weekly RB1 upside.
Touchdown dependence. Sixteen scores carried the 2025 line; at 200-220 carries with regressed efficiency, the scoring floor drops toward 8-10 and the weekly ceiling narrows.

Fantasy Range

Bull

RB6

Doyle's outside zone restores the historical big-play rate: 250 carries at 5.5+ ypc and 12-14 touchdowns, 2024-level efficiency at lower volume.

Base

RB12

Around 240 carries, low-double-digit touchdowns, minimal receiving; a touchdown-dependent RB2 that meets his ADP.

Bear

RB24

Carries fall to 200-220, touchdowns regress to 8-10, and the age cliff shows; roughly 900 yards with no PPR cushion.

Health

His one structural injury is a 2021 Jones fracture in the right foot (plate and five screws, nine games missed). Since then he's played three straight 17-game seasons with no soft-tissue pattern. A May OTA knee-to-knee collision was a brief scare that he walked off the same practice. The real question is cumulative wear at 2,860 career carries, not any single mechanism; he spends roughly $250K a year on body maintenance to manage it.

Watch the August padded practices for whether the June screen-game usage is real: if it sticks he has a PPR floor worth the RB12 tag, and if it disappears treat him as a touchdown-dependent RB2 and let someone else pay ADP.

Derrick Henry