On The Move: Breaking Down D'Andre Swift on the Eagles
The Philadelphia Eagles are widely believed to have won the 2023 NFL Draft, but for fantasy managers the most significant part of Philly’s weekend was trading for D’Andre Swift, and breathing life into his fantasy potential.
Swift is entering his fourth NFL season, and while he’s been a very relevant fantasy RB, he has never broken out and been a true RB1. His struggles to stay on the field have hurt him, but a lot of his difficulty hitting his ceiling lays at the feet of the Detroit Lions, who never felt comfortable making Swift a workhorse despite investing a high second-round pick in him. Now, Swift is joining the Eagles, an offensive powerhouse and a roster built for him to explode.
As stated earlier, Swift has been a strong producer. He has averaged 4.6 yards per carry in his career (5.5 last season) and never scored fewer than seven touchdowns in a season. Swift has proven his value in the passing game, catching 46 or more passes in all three of his NFL seasons and totaling 350+ receiving yards. He has also proven himself to be a strong pass blocker, displaying a three-down skillset should any team be brave enough to deploy him that way. And while he developed a reputation as a “pass-catcher” because of how the Lions used him – and fed short-yardage/goal line work to Jamaal Williams last year – Swift has a nose for the end zone, logging 15 career rushing TDs inside the 10-yard line.
Swift is now joining an offense where he is the clear-cut RB1. The Eagles signed Rashaad Penny, a talented RB who gets hurt even more than Swift does, to a small deal that doesn’t even guarantee he will be on the roster when Week 1 rolls around. They also have Kenneth Gainwell and Boston Scott around, solid players who haven’t made enough of an impression for the Eagles to commit to them. That depth at the position likely means that Swift still isn’t going to see elite workhorse volume, but that’s alright, since he’s thrived his whole career on efficiency. Swift has put up those touchdown numbers, and eclipsed 850 scrimmage yards in all three seasons, while only receiving double-digit carries per game once (11.6 attempts per game in 2021). Swift also has big play potential, posting three career scores of 40+ yards, two of them of the receiving variety. The Eagles noticed his hyper-efficiency, and made a move to pair him with the NFL’s third-best run blocking line per PFF. The Eagles mashed teams in the trenches, grading as Football Outsiders’ No. 7 line in Power Success (% of runs on 3rd or 4th down two yards or less that got a 1st down or TD), succeeding 75% of the time in those situations. These guys are road graders, and they just upgraded the guy running behind them.
Miles Sanders was a very good running back, but Swift is simply better in just about every way. Swift graded as a better rusher, albeit slightly, per PFF, and was a far superior receiving and pass-blocking back. The Eagles’ offense is going to revolve around QB Jalen Hurts, and the dynamic WR duo of A.J. Brown and DeVonta Smith, but Philadelphia recorded the third-most rushing attempts in football in 2022. Of course, a lot of those were Hurts, but Swift has a chance to put up prime Alvin Kamara stats behind this loaded line and with supreme pass-catchers soaking up defensive attention.