After seven years with the Green Bay Packers, Aaron Jones will presumably close out his career with the Minnesota Vikings. Last season, Jones was still effective, but he was hampered by a lingering hamstring injury. Can he still be an impactful fantasy football asset, and what does his 2024 projection look like?
Aaron Jones’ 2024 Fantasy Outlook
- Fantasy points per game: 14.4
- Rushing Yards: 1,024
- Rush TDs: 3.2
- Receptions: 55
- Receiving Yards: 404
- Receiving TDs: 4.5
These are PFN’s consensus projections, correct as of August 14. The most up-to-date projections can be found in our Who Should I Draft Tool.
Should You Draft Jones This Year?
Jones is easily one of the toughest players to figure out this season. He’s spent the entirety of his career with the Packers in a system that we were able to project. Now, a whole host of variables are thrown into the mix.
For starters, Jones will be 30 years old before the season ends. The record of 30-year-old running backs being impactful in fantasy is not great.
To be fair, though, Jones didn’t exactly show signs of decline last season…at least not in terms of his performance. Father Time is undefeated, but the manner in which he secures his victories can vary.
For some players, Father Time comes for their talent. We’ve seen this most recently with guys like Dalvin Cook and Leonard Fournette. At their advanced ages, they can no longer play NFL-caliber football.
For others, it comes for their bodies. This happened to guys like A.J. Green, Julio Jones, and Michael Thomas. Long before their skills declined, their ability to stay on the field was taken from them — which appears to be the main risk with Jones.
From 2019-2022, Jones played at least 14 games every season. Last year, he played in just 11, and he was really only fully healthy for four of them.
Most concerningly was the way in which Jones struggled to stay on the field. He strained his hamstring in Week 1, and it lingered for three months. On multiple occasions, he thought he was ready to return, yet he wasn’t. That’s a troubling development for a soon-to-be 30-year-old.
On the season, Jones averaged 12.3 fantasy points per game. It was the worst season of his career outside of his rookie year. Jones’ 4.6 yards per carry were a career low, and his 11.9% target share was a major step down from his career average.
Jones had been an RB1 in each of the previous four seasons, but over that span, his touchdown total had decreased every year. Last season, it bottomed out at just three.
It’s very difficult to assess Jones’ overall profile because the metrics don’t reflect the actual ability of the player. His evaded-tackles-per-touch rate was 18% (30th in the league), and just 3.5% of his runs went for 15+ yards (38th).
Those are bad numbers, but they can mostly be explained away by the injury. After all, Jones closed the season with five consecutive 100-yard efforts on the ground (including the NFL playoffs). He sure didn’t look like a player with any declining skills.
Now, Jones finds himself in Minnesota. His offensive situation going from Jordan Love to Sam Darnold/J.J. McCarthy is significantly worse. And he’s unlikely to handle a three-down workload, with Ty Chandler proving quite effective last season.
Jones is a player for whom my projections are quite different from the PFN consensus.
I have Jones in a near-even split with Chandler, carrying the ball 188 times for 890 yards and 4.7 touchdowns. I do still project him to be the primary receiving back, hauling in 46 receptions for 353 yards and 1.8 touchdowns. That all comes out to 12.34 fantasy points per game, which places him at RB28.
After initially being well below consensus on Jones, I wound up moving him to RB19, which is also ADP. I’m fine with drafting him in specific situations where he’s a value and you need an RB. But, in general, I am looking at other positions when Jones’ name starts creeping up the list of top available players.