College Football: Early favorites for 2017 Doak Walker Award

College football released its annual preseason watch list for the Doak Walker Award, given to the nation’s top running back.

Everyone loves a good running back who can slice through defenses, run over opponents when he needs to and run a 4.4 40-yard dash, but those aren’t easy to come by. College football has had its fair share of star running backs over the years and last year provided a few major names.

While Leonard Fournette and Dalvin Cook dominated running back headlines in 2016, Texas’ D’Onta Foreman took home the hardware.

On Thursday, college football released the 2017 watch list for the Doak Walker Award, given annually to the nation’s top running back.

So that begs the question of who should be considered the favorite? If I were to make an early prediction, I’d choose Derrius Guice of LSU. While Penn State’s Saquon Barkley is going to be a popular choice this year, I think Guice has what it takes to bring home the award.

If you look at his numbers from last season, you’d understand. Sure, Barkley racked up over 1,400 yards but Guice had 1,387 yards, 15 touchdowns and an incredible 7.6 yards per carry average all while splitting reps with Leonard Fournette — a first-round draft pick in 2017.

Those two aren’t the only big names on the list, though. Josh Adams (Notre Dame), Nick Chubb (Georgia), Royce Freeman (Oregon), Kamryn Pettway (Auburn), Myles Gaskin (Washington), Bryce Love (Stanford), Ronald Jones II (USC), Bo Scarbrough (Alabama), LJ Scott (Michigan State), Mike Weber (Ohio State) and Ralph Webb (Vanderbilt) also require attention.

Next: Top 5 Biletnikoff Award favorites for 2017

As mentioned earlier, Foreman of Texas won last year’s Doak Walker Award while Derrick Henry won in 2015 and Melvin Gordon took home the hardware in 2014. Other big names to win the award were Ricky Williams, Ron Dayne, LaDainian Tomlinson, Larry Johnson and Reggie Bush. Who’s next?