Damien Williams to Bears, James White returns to Patriots as free-agent running back market thins; Leonard Fournette re-sign with Bucs next?

On Tuesday, SportsLine gave odds on where free-agent running back Todd Gurley might sign. The Chicago Bears and New England Patriots can surely be knocked off that list after the Bears signed Damien Williams and the Patriots re-signed James White on Wednesday. That leaves Gurley, Leonard Fournette, Adrian Peterson, Frank Gore, Le'Veon Bell, Duke Johnson and Tevin Coleman as the primary tailbacks still on the market.

White had been linked to the Super Bowl champion Bucs to reunite with Tom Brady, but White will stay with New England on a one-year, fully-guaranteed $2.5 million contract. White doesn't offer much as a runner – never really has – as he carried 35 times for 121 yards and two scores in 2020. He always has been terrific catching the ball and had 49 grabs for 375 yards and a TD last year. Those numbers are all down, but the Pats' offense was largely terrible a year ago under QB Cam Newton – who is also back.

That White did re-sign with New England increases the likelihood that Fournette re-ups with Tampa Bay after his spectacular playoff performance. However, the Bucs are very tight up against the cap after re-signing defensive tackle Ndamukong Suh and giving left tackle Donovan Smith an extension Wednesday. Thus, Fournette may not get much of a raise on the $2 million he earned in 2020, especially considering Tampa Bay still has Ronald Jones II as its primary tailback. Peterson also has made noise about signing with Tampa to chase his first Super Bowl ring. 

White perhaps should have been named MVP of Super Bowl LI in the stunning comeback win over Atlanta for New England when he rushed for two scores, including the winner in overtime, caught 14 passes for 110 yards and a TD, and also had a two-point conversion, but he lost out to Tom Brady.

An argument also could be made that Williams could have been MVP of Kansas City's Super Bowl LIV comeback win over San Francisco as Williams rushed for 104 yards and a touchdown and caught a TD pass, but Patrick Mahomes won MVP.

Williams opted-out of last season because of COVID-19 concerns regarding his mother's Stage 4 cancer. He will play in 2021, but the Chiefs chose to release him. Going to the Bears makes a lot of sense as Williams knows Matt Nagy's offense from Kansas City and current Bears offensive coordinator Bill Lazor held the same role in Miami from 2014-15 when Williams was there.

In the 2019 regular season, Williams rushed 111 times for 498 yards and five touchdowns, all of which were career highs. He also caught 30 balls for 213 yards and two more touchdowns. Chicago had laughable depth behind David Montgomery in 2020 when Tarik Cohen went down after three games with a season-ending injury. The Bears prefer to use Cohen largely as a receiver regardless.

From a fantasy standpoint, though, this hurts Montgomery big-time as he blew up at the end of last season with such a huge workload. Only four NFL running backs had more total opportunities than Montgomery last season when combining carries and pass targets. He carried 247 times and was targeted 68 more in the pass game. Williams and Cohen will massively cut into those numbers, especially in the passing game.

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