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Ok guys in a recent live draft with 8 teams in a standard draft format in the 6th round I had my choice between Jamaal Charles, Beanie Wells, and Pierre Thomas. I decided to take Beanie Wells. I narrowed it down to Charles and Wells and it was a really tough decision. I took Wells mostly for the fact that I believe he has huge potential and alot of people have him as a big time sleeper for the season, and Charles will probably have a lot of TD's taken away by Thomas Jones. However, Hightower may take some TD's from Wells also. So what do you guys think, who would you have taken in this situation and why??

Wow, Beanie Wells would've been my last choice of those 3. You can't go wrong with Pierre Thomas just because of how insane the Saints offense is. He's going to get his numbers. Charles had a really good year last season and even though I personally don't think he will repeat it, I'd still take him over Wells.

Also, I forgot to add that I think the Cardinals are really going to struggle this year with Leinart or Anderson at QB. Teams will be able to key on the running game more unless one of the QB's can step up and make some plays.

In a standard league I think I would go Thomas, Charles, Wells in that order. I don't think there is a big gap between them and they all have other RBs that will take carries and TDs away from them. Of the three I think Charles could get the biggest % of the offense, but he could lose a lot of goalline carries to Jones. Pierre could get more goalline plays with Mike Bell gone or they could give that role to Hamilton. The Saints really spread the ball around on offense. Wells is the more talented runner in AZ, but Hightower is clearly the 3rd down back and I think he was used more at the goalline last year. I have no idea how good the AZ offense will be at moving the ball with Leinart.

I'd go Charles, Wells, Thomas in that order.

If you project what Charles did the back end of last year for a full season, he's probably a top 5 pick in every draft this year.

Don't get the love for Pierre - he's never had a full year of solid production, and has a lot of other players around him to steal production. Plus, that's a passing team, and their best option out of the backfield is clearly bush.

You should be fine with Wells though - he SHOULD be the focal point of that offense, just depends how fast AZ figures that out.

I'd personally go Thomas, Charles, and then Wells, for a lot of the same reasons already laid out. I personally think Thomas is going to be a steal in most drafts this year. Last year he went too high 1st-2nd round in a lot of drafts. This year he is going to go 4th-5th round and he should actually have better numbers than last year. Mike Bell leaving the team is huge for Thomas. The Saints are usually milking the clock with a big lead in the 2nd half of games. Last year Mike Bell got a lot of those touches, this year Thomas will likely be the closer. Bell also stole some goal line carries, which should go to Thomas this year. Thomas has shown the ability to be a great receiver as well so I think that is an added bonus. I just don't think Reggie Bush is as much of a concern to Thomas as Jones is to Charles and Hightower is to Wells.

Charles could very well be the best back out of these three at the end of the year, it all depends on what happens with Thomas Jones. As previously stated by another poster, Charles could lose a lot of the goal line carries which could drop his value.

Wells has the potential to be a very good fantasy running back. The problem is the Cardinals O could be pretty brutal this year if Leinart doesn't pan out. Defenses will focus on the run game knowing Leinart can't beat them. Tim Hightower will also eat into some of Wells carries. He is a hard running and versatile back and Arizona has seemed to like him ever since they draft him. Wells also had some fumbling issues early last year which kept him off the field at times.

That is basically how I feel about those three players at the moment. With that being said, i'd like to have any of the three on my team.