Rookie running back Jarquez Hunter could be the Rams’ sleeper pick of 2025
Kyren Williams has been the best day three draft pick at running of the last 10 years. Did the Los Angeles Rams strike it rich on day three again with Jarquez Hunter? Sean McVay obviously thinks so and the Rams could be splitting up their backfield reps as soon as this year.
Hunter, a fourth round pick out of Auburn, will have every opportunity to be a playmaker for the Rams from Week 1 and on.
McVay on Hunter
The Rams head coach called Hunter “who I want” in the green room just prior to L.A. selecting him with the 117th overall pick.
“There’s no question that’s who I want,” McVay said to Rams’ general manager Les Snead in a video shared to X. “… I didn’t think we’d be able to get him today unless we did that. That was my top player for today.”
“We’ve loved your tape for a long time. You’re our kind of guy,” McVay told Hunter after drafting him.
McVay also praised Hunter as a “home run hitter” after he was secured by the Rams.
“(Hunter) can hit home runs for you, too. When you give him a vertical seam, he’s got the ability to run away from you. Some of the metrics that we have on him are really impressive…Les and his group had a real appreciation for him, and then once the coaches laid eyes on him, there was a collective buy-in,” said McVay in the immediate aftermath of the 2025 NFL Draft.
Hunter rushed for 1,201 yards in 12 games last season and he averaged 6.4 yards per carry, which is also basically the same as his four-year career average of 6.3 yards per carry. He has been extraordinarily consistent in that regard, plus he could add value as a receiver out of the backfield.
He was a more efficient runner in college than teammates Kyren Williams and Blake Corum, although it is impossible to compare players in such different situations. Still, inside and outside the tackles, Hunter was consistent across the board:
Jarquez Hunter college splits inside/outside the tackles with Kyren Williams and Blake Corum pic.twitter.com/3lAqYYAAvo
— Football Insights (@fball_insights) May 26, 2025
Corum would be an example of a running back who did not challenge Williams for playing time as a rookie, and he was drafted in the third round in 2024, but that does not mean that a different pick at a different time couldn’t produce different results.
Just as Williams himself surprisingly took and secured a job away from a former second round pick in Cam Akers.
Williams as the top day-3 running back
No day three running back of almost the past 10 years has had a better season than Kyren Williams had in 2024. These are the top seasons by running backs (by rushing yards) who were drafted on day three since 2017:
- Kyren Williams, Rams: 1,299 yards (in 16 games) in 2024
- Chris Carson, Seahawks: 1,230 yards in 2017
- Chuba Hubbard, Panthers: 1,195 yards in 2021
- Carson: 1,151 yards in 2018
- Williams: 1,144 yards (in 12 games) in 2023
Kyren Williams holds 2 of the top-5 spots.
However, many of these top day three running backs did not have long NFL careers. Carson’s was marred by injury. Two day three picks from the 2016 draft — Jordan Howard and Jay Ajayi — were one-hit wonders. The most sustained success in this grouping would be Aaron Jones, a four-time 1,000 yard rusher who is going into his ninth season despite being a fifth round pick in 2017.
Where will Kyren Williams fit in after two mondo productive seasons in the last two years?
Because the Rams have drafted Corum and Hunter in the past two years, that’s a situation that L.A. has prepared for as if he might not be able to sustain that success. Maybe he will. Maybe the Rams will extend Williams and he’ll have seven or eight years at the top of the depth chart.
But the team has high hopes for Hunter and is unlikely to be giving up on Corum after one year. If there’s one team that seems able to find a gem running back on day three, it’s probably the Rams.
