There were a lot of reasons to throw cold water on the New England running game — Rhamondre Stevenson, especially — one month ago.
Through the first 13 weeks of the season, he ranked 51st among running backs in yards after contact (2.82). Since then, though, he ranks first (7.34).
It’s been a dramatic turnaround for Stevenson, who has returned to playing like one of the game’s top running backs over the last month. Since the team’s Week 14 bye, Stevenson ranks second among running backs in expected points added and first in success rate.
If he can keep up his hot play, that would go a long way toward helping the offense bounce back. Still, despite his 128 all-purpose yards, it’s noteworthy that Stevenson only got 10 carries last Sunday.
“We’ll evaluate that and kind of see where it is,” Vrabel said when asked whether Stevenson should have gotten the ball more. “Again, we were able to stay balanced. Some of those checkdowns, I felt like, were part of the idea. Those guys were going to take some of the (deep) stuff away.”