Premium Content
Sign Up
Fantasy Football: How 2025 NFL Draft’s running back class stacks up in stable metrics
2RYDHB8 Arizona State running back Cameron Skattebo (4) runs against California during the first half of an NCAA college football game in Berkeley, Calif., Saturday, Sept. 30, 2023. (AP Photo/Jed Jacobsohn)
By
- It’s Ashton Jeanty world, the rest of this year’s running back class is just living in it: While there are some other strong running back prospects, nobody quite measures up to the Boise State product.
- Iowa’s Kaleb Johnson didn’t pop in these metrics due to being just a one-year starter: Johnson’s 2024 season was a much different/better story than his 2023, which kept him from rising too far up these ranks.
- 2025 NFL Draft season is here: Try PFF’s best-in-class Mock Draft Simulator and learn about 2025’s top prospects while trading and drafting for your favorite NFL team.
Estimated Reading Time: 13 minutes
With the NFL offseason officially underway, so is the 2025 NFL Draft season. Plenty of fantasy football general managers are building out their rookie draft boards for dynasty purposes.
Looking at how each position stacks up against one another from an analytics standpoint is just one of the many tools to consider during the evaluation process. This series focuses purely on the key stable metrics that translate more often than not from college to the NFL. It’s a way for dynasty managers, and fantasy managers, in general, to get familiar with this year’s rookie class.
A few notes about how this series will work:
- Rankings are based entirely on how these players performed in PFF’s stable metrics over the past two seasons.
- Athletic ability and size are not taken into account for this process. Again, this is just one of many evaluation tools to consider.
- This list includes all 27 running backs from the PFF big board, plus two additional names, but does not provide any weight to projected draft capital, competition level, or their overall ranking, though that context will often be provided.
TOP-10 RUNNING BACKS IN PFF RUSHING GRADE SINCE 2023
| Running Back | Rushing Grade | Rush Attempts |
| Ashton Jeanty, Boise State | 99.6 | 592 |
| Jordan James, Oregon | 95.7 | 341 |
| Damien Martinez, Miami | 95.0 | 355 |
| RJ Harvey, UCF | 94.2 | 456 |
| 94.0 | 535 | |
| Jacory Croskey-Merritt, Arizona | 93.7 | 201 |
| Devin Neal, Kansas | 93.3 | 421 |
| Tahj Brooks, Texas Tech | 93.3 | 579 |
Right off the bat, the consensus top running back in this class, Ashton Jeanty leads the way, as he will in many of these stable metric categories thanks to a historic 99.6 combined rushing grade over the past two seasons. Jeanty has delivered more rushing yards (3,939) and more rushing touchdowns (43) over these last two seasons than any other back in this year’s draft class.
