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PITJulius Chestnut (RB, TEN) — 2026 evaluation
Player facts: age 25 (born 2000-10-26 — turns 26 in October 2026; Sleeper players export, 2026-07-07), 5'11"/228 (Sleeper, 2026-07-07), Sacred Heart (FCS), 2022 UDFA (Wikipedia, fetched 2026-07-08), entering NFL year 5. Re-signed with Tennessee on a one-year contract, 2026-03-17 (Wikipedia; Yahoo Sports / Today in Nashville re-sign coverage, 2026-03-18). On the 90-man roster as of July 2026, jersey #36 — verified via Sleeper feed (2026-07-07) and tennesseetitans.com roster page (fetched via search 2026-07-08).
Verdict — AVOID (high confidence)
Chestnut is a core special-teamer, not a fantasy running back: in 2025 he played 315 special-teams snaps (60–70% ST share most weeks) against just 40 offensive snaps all season (data/stats/2025/snap_counts.csv, pulled 2026-07-07). He sits fifth or sixth in his own backfield — behind Tony Pollard, Tyjae Spears, R5 rookie Nick Singleton, and in an open fight with Michael Carter and Kalel Mullings for the last RB roster spot (atozsports depth-chart questions, June 2026; SI OTA 53-man projection, 2026-06). He fails all three handcuff-value requirements (rb.md §7): succession is maximally unclean (two backs with real claims ahead of any contingency), the offense is a 6.5-win-total, 26th-ranked-RBWR unit, and the starter's fragility flows to Spears/Singleton, not to him. This is the low-standalone / low-contingent "roster clog" quadrant — AVOID at any meaningful pick, and at a free price the pick is still strictly dominated by any backup with a live contingent path. Market line: the market prices him at zero (mock-undrafted) and the market is right; this AVOID adds only that the waiver-tier dart is dead capital — he carries genuine final-cuts risk on top of the no-path role.
Bull case
- Sticky roster skill: core-four special-teamer (315 ST snaps, 17 ST tackles in 2025) whom the staff re-signed in March — ST value is the most durable path onto the 53, which keeps him one injury-cluster from real touches at all times.
- Fresh legs + size: 25 years old, ~48 career touches, 228 lbs, and a 4.6 YPC flash on the 2024 sample (22 carries) — if catastrophe strikes the top three, he's a plausible short-yardage committee piece.
- Clean slate: the new Saleh/Daboll regime has no draft-capital attachment to Carter or Mullings either — the RB4 battle is genuinely open, and Singleton's foot (Feb 2026 Jones-fracture surgery) is not yet a fully closed question.
Bear case
- No path: fifth/sixth in the pecking order with two capable backs plus a drafted rookie ahead of him; even a Pollard injury re-splits to Spears/Singleton — he fails every element of the handcuff test (fragile starter → not his contingency; good offense → 6.5 win total; clean succession → the opposite).
- Four-year usage verdict is in: 40 offensive snaps, 11 carries, 0 receptions in 2025; offensive snaps declining year-over-year while ST snaps rise — the NFL has typed him, and UDFA capital bought no forcing function.
- He may not make the team: beat coverage has Carter as the RB4 "for now" — a realistic 20th-percentile outcome is a waiver claim elsewhere or the practice squad, i.e., zero fantasy games at any usage.
Projection & comps
Bottom-up is trivial at this usage tier (team inputs from data/team-profiles/TEN.md, built 2026-07-07: ~62 plays/g, ~26 rush att/g, RBs ~22–23 of them, Pollard/Spears/Singleton claiming effectively all of it):
| Scenario | Path | Line | PPR (assumed) |
|---|---|---|---|
| Floor (20th) | Loses the RB4 battle at final cuts, or makes the 53 purely for special teams | 0–3 carries | 0 |
| Median (50th) | Makes the 53 as RB4/ST core; sporadic short-yardage/garbage work (his 2025) | ~12 car, ~45 yds, 1–2 tgt, 0 TD | ~5 |
| Ceiling (80th) | An injury above him buys 2–3 weeks of committee scraps (his 2024) | ~25 car, ~100 yds, ~4 rec, 1 TD | ~25 |
- TDs anchored to xTD ≈ 0: no goal-line role — inside-10/inside-5 usage effectively zero in 2025 (bounded by 11 total carries; exact split UNVERIFIED); Pollard held the goal-line job (TEN profile, 2026-07-07).
- Games-played risk: high — driven by roster-cut risk, not injury: beat coverage has Carter "getting the final running back spot for now" with Chestnut and Mullings fighting for it (atozsports, June 2026). A 20th-percentile outcome is zero games of fantasy-relevant usage.
- No provider xFP exists at this usage tier (UNVERIFIED); usage-implied expectation ≈ 0.3 PPG (13 weighted opportunities across 16 games, 2025 local data).
- External projections: data/projections/ not populated as of 2026-07-08 — nothing to sanity-check against.
Comp seasons (role/profile): Julius Chestnut 2024 (22-102-0, 13.3 PPR — his own best season); Craig Reynolds DET 2023–24 RB3 seasons; Patrick Taylor GB 2022–23 (ST-core RB4); Trayveon Williams CIN 2022–23; Ty Montgomery NE 2022. All land in the 0–40 PPR band — the range above is consistent.
Usage profile (rb.md §2 table — 2025, 16 games; data/stats/2025/*.csv pulled 2026-07-07)
| Metric | Value | Band | Read |
|---|---|---|---|
| Snap share | 40 offensive snaps all season (~3.6%; weekly max 14%) | Concern (order of magnitude below the <40% line) | Not an offensive player; 315 ST snaps is the actual job |
| Opportunity share | 13 of ~421 TEN RB opportunities ≈ 3.1% (11 car + 2 tgt) | Concern | Behind Pollard 64% carry share, Spears 19% |
| Weighted opps/g | 1.0 (11 + 2.5×2 over 16 g) | Concern | vs ≥13 minimum viable |
| High-value touches/g | ≤0.13 (2 tgt; inside-10 carries UNVERIFIED, bounded ≤11 total) | Concern | Zero scoring engine |
| Inside-5 carry share | ≈0% (UNVERIFIED exact; Pollard owned goal-line — TEN profile) | Concern | No TD access |
| Third-down snap share | Not in local tables — UNVERIFIED, bounded near zero by 40 total off snaps | Concern | No passing-down trust |
| Routes/g · RP | UNVERIFIED (no charting rows); bounded trivial — 2 targets, 0 receptions in 2025 | Concern | No receiving role, no PPR lever |
| xFP | No provider value (UNVERIFIED); usage-implied ≈0.3 PPG | Concern | — |
2024 for trend (data/stats/2024/, pulled 2026-07-07): 22 car, 102 yds (4.6 YPC), 3 tgt, 2 rec, 84 off snaps, 12 games, 4.9% carry share — his career-best season was 13.3 PPR points. The trend is flat-to-down: offensive snaps fell 84 → 40 year-over-year while ST snaps rose 226 → 315.
Efficiency (§5): below every qualifying threshold — zero rows in ngs_rushing.csv either season (RYOE UNVERIFIED / unqualified); MTF, YAC/att UNVERIFIED. Career 43 carries, 154 yards = 3.6 YPC (Wikipedia career totals + local CSVs, 2026-07-08). Nothing here changes a volume verdict anyway — and there is no volume.
Pedigree (prospect-pedigree.md): UDFA capital = "screens require demonstrated NFL usage first" — four seasons, none demonstrated; capital's predictive power expires by year 3 regardless. FCS pedigree is real but stale: 2021 AFCA/AP FCS first-team All-American and NEC Offensive Player of the Year at Sacred Heart (Wikipedia, 2026-07-08); FCS dominance requires athletic confirmation (RAS ≥8) — RAS UNVERIFIED, and moot at year 5. College receiving vs the 40-reception three-down signal: UNVERIFIED, also moot. Age/workload: 25 with ~48 career pro touches — fresh legs, but freshness without a role is not an asset.
Context (data/team-profiles/TEN.md, built 2026-07-07)
- New regime: Saleh HC / Daboll OC (play-caller), year 1 — all 2025 roles nominally void, but the 2026 backfield pecking order is already re-established post-OTAs: Pollard (lead, age-29 contract year, 242 carries in 2025) → Spears (passing downs, "great at OTAs") → Singleton (R5.165, Jones-fracture rehab, "moved up to third") → Carter vs Mullings vs Chestnut for RB4 (SI OTA 53-man projection 2026-06; atozsports June 2026; Kuharsky depth chart 2026-06-16 via TEN profile).
- Game script: 6.5 Vegas win total (BetMGM, verified 2026-07-07) → mild negative lean; ~26 rush att/g projected. Irrelevant at Chestnut's usage tier — he doesn't have a script-sensitive role because he doesn't have a role.
- O-line: 26th in RBWR (ESPN, 2026-01-06), two interior camp battles — again only relevant in the deep-contingency branch.
- Committee 2×2 placement (rb.md §7): low standalone (0.3 PPG usage) × low contingent (a Pollard injury re-splits to Spears + Singleton; even a two-injury cluster likely adds Carter/Mullings to the mix) = roster clog. Contract confirms it: one-year, RB-depth money, re-signed for special teams — "the team told you the plan" (§9). Re-sign coverage cited his 17 special-teams tackles in 2025, not his rushing (Yahoo Sports / Today in Nashville, 2026-03-18).
Tripwires
- Camp/preseason role signal: Chestnut takes first/second-team offensive reps or leads preseason backfield touches with starters — re-run.
- Two of Pollard/Spears/Singleton out simultaneously (injury or trade) for multi-week terms — re-run the contingency branch.
- Final cuts: Chestnut waived (voids this eval — off-roster) — or conversely both Carter and Mullings cut while Singleton's foot regresses (elevates him to clean RB3/4; re-run).
- Pollard traded (age-29 contract year on a rebuilding roster) — re-run the whole backfield.
Sources
- data/stats/2025/ rushing, receiving, weekly, snap_counts, ngs_rushing (no qualifying rows); data/stats/2024/ same — nflverse via nflreadpy, pulled 2026-07-07 (REG only)
- data/raw/sleeper/players_2026-07-07.json — age, size, college, years_exp, team, depth_chart_order 6
- data/adp/adp_ffc_2026-07-07.csv — absent from FFC top-286; appended sleeper-searchrank row with empty ADP (2026-07-08) = mock-undrafted basis
- data/team-profiles/TEN.md (built/verified 2026-07-07) — regime, backfield hierarchy, win total 6.5 (BetMGM 2026-07-07), RBWR 26th (ESPN 2026-01-06), plays/pass-rate projections, Kuharsky depth chart 2026-06-16
- Wikipedia — Julius Chestnut (fetched 2026-07-08): career totals 43 car/154 yds, 2022 UDFA, FCS All-American 2021, re-signed 1yr 2026-03-17
- Yahoo Sports / Today in Nashville — Titans re-sign RB Julius Chestnut, 17 ST tackles in 2025 (2026-03-18, fetched via search 2026-07-08)
- SI.com Titans — OTA-based depth chart / 53-man projection: Singleton third, Carter RB4 "for now" (2026-06, fetched via search 2026-07-08)
- atozsports — Titans offensive depth chart questions: fourth-RB battle Carter/Mullings/Chestnut (2026-06, fetched via search 2026-07-08)
- methodology/league-settings.md — half PPR + 6pt pass TD confirmed 2026-07-08 (this eval's frontmatter uses the batch "PPR (assumed)" basis; delta noted in scoring note)
- Pro Football Reference — attempted, HTTP 403 (2026-07-08); career totals cross-checked via Wikipedia + local CSVs instead