No respect for Yeldon. That's hilarious to me. He's the most unheralded star I've seen in a while. Even among our own fan base all the the talk this offseason has been about King Henry (and rightfully so after his Sugar Bowl performance), but still...I think we'll see a more determined TJ Yeldon this season.
For me and I'm sure a lot of people it comes down to the critical fumbles. Well not just that but total fumbles period.
Let's look at some stats for career fumbles by our Saban era star RB's:
Mark Ingram fumbled 1 time each in 2008, 2009, and 2010 = 3 Total fumbles in 3 Seasons
Trent Richardson fumbled 2 times in 2009, 4 times in 2010, and 1 time in 2011 = 7 Total Fumbles in 3 Seasons
Eddie Lacy fumbled 2 times in 2010, 1 time in 2011, and 3 times in 2012 = 6 Total Fumbles in 3 Seasons
TJ Yeldon fumbled 3 times in 2012, and 5 times in 2013 = 8 Total Fumbles in 2 Seasons
He's played one less season than MI, TR, and EL and has more career fumbles and is statistically on pace to have 12 in 3 years which would be 4 times more often than Mark and basically Twice as often as either Richardson or Lacy.
It's a BIG problem and hurts his image to us fans and outsiders. Fair or not it seems like the fumbles always come at the absolute worst time too. He could have 175 yrds in a game but it be for not with a costly fumble. It's bothersome and he has to clean it up.
He's a great player and I'm hoping he absolutely explodes this year. If he rushes for over 1,500 yards 15+ TD's and has no more than 2 fumbles then he will prove everyone wrong and will be in the Heisman discussion as a Top 5 guy. For right now though being around #15 seems more than fair.