Fantasy Football ‘25: The hardest players to rank

The Fourth of July holiday weekend has come and gone, and I hope yours was fun. I spent part of mine putting together my first set of Fantasy Redraft Rankings and Tiers for 2025. Priorities! It’s fun taking that first pass each summer, and I’ll be sharing rankings for each of the major fantasy positions in the coming weeks.

Every year, there are players who give me fits. I struggle to settle on a reasonable draft ranking for certain guys because of the wide range of their possible season-long outcomes. If any of these players really hits, and ends up performing at or near his ceiling, he could be a great value who solidifies your team. On the opposite end, since lots of them are early- to mid- round players, gambling a valuable pick on one or more of them could kneecap your squad if things go south.

The reasons for the wide range of outcomes vary from player to player, and as training camp and the preseason unfold, the analysis should get easier. But for now, these are the players that have me scratching my head. If you have a player to add, feel free to mention him in the comments.

You can access all of my preseason fantasy football content here. Recent articles include the biggest fantasy question for each NFL team, random thoughts, and more.

Note 1 – There are players whose early-season availability is in question, which makes them hard to rank. For example, Christian Watson, Anthony Richardson, and Stefon Diggs. We’ll learn more about them as training camp and the preseason unfold. Thankfully, the number of players that fall into this category is very small this season. Richardson is particularly hard to rank because we don’t know if he’ll win the Colts’ starting job, or keep it. At the same time, his rushing upside is tantalizing.

Note 2 – Any fantasy stats or rankings shown are for Half Point PPR, are on a fantasy points per game (FPPG) basis, and don’t include the final week of the season. Expert Consensus Rankings (ECR) are current and are also Half Point PPR.

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Quarterback

I already mentioned Richardson. Here are a few more QBs that I had trouble ranking:

Patrick Mahomes (ECR: QB6).

I wrote this about Mahomes in my AFC Questions column: “From a fantasy standpoint, something has changed. In his first five seasons as KC’s starter (2018-2022), Mahomes was the QB1 twice, never finished outside the Top-5 quaterbacks, and never averaged less than 21 FPPG per game. In each of the last two seasons, Mahomes was “only” a borderline Top-10 quarterback who averaged 18.3 and 18.4 FPPG.”

Mahomes appears to have entered a phase of his career where he’s still the best QB in the NFL, but no longer elite for fantasy purposes. His ECR represents the midpoint of his likely range of finishes (QB1 to QB12). The Andy Reid offense is still there, and the receiving weapons are good, but unless the defense takes a big step back and forces the offense to go full throttle, I think even QB6 feels rich. The flip side is feeling dumb when Mahomes rips off a 5,000-yard, 40-TD season – which absolutely could happen.

Jared Goff (ECR: QB14) and Jordan Love (ECR: QB17).

Quarterback is deep these days, and once you get past the top tier or two, not much differentiates the next dozen or so players. You could tell me that Dak Prescott and Drake Maye (current ECRs: QB15 and 16) will finish as Top-10 QBs, and I’d believe you. I wouldn’t be shocked if Tua Tagovailoa or Bryce Young (current ECRs: QB 22 and 23) finished as QB1s. You get the picture. But of the quarterbacks in this big range, Goff and Love were the hardest for me to rank.

Goff finished as the QB7 last season, and he’s led a Top-4 NFL offense for three years running. He’s got playmakers who can turn short passes into TDs. He’s got a solid offensive line. However, he lost his brilliant offensive coordinator, his center retired, the Lions run it when they get close, and their defense is unlikely to be completely decimated with injuries again in 2025, so shootouts should be less common. I don’t know how high to rank Goff.

Love presents different questions. He showed flashes of fantasy gold (4,000+ yards and 32 TDs) in 2023, but last season he was more of a low ceiling/high floor player than a clear QB1. He’s got a truckload of competent pass catchers, but nobody elite (more on that below). His rushing stats also dropped from a serviceable 50-247-4 in 2023 to a nonexistent 25-83-1 in 2024. He was drafted as a Top-8 or so QB last season (but finished as the QB13), and I think he’s again a borderline QB1 at best, unless he gives us more of the 2023 version, and more rushing.

The other two starting qusrterbacks in the division (Caleb Williams and J.J. McCarthy) weren’t all that easy for me to rank, either.

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Running Back

Christian McCaffrey (ECR: RB7)

I’ve discussed the uncertainty surrounding CMC several times already, so I won’t belabor it. No player has a wider range of potential outcomes in 2025 than the 2019 and 2023 RB1, who was the consensus No. 1 overall pick last season and then played just four games. He’s now entering his age 29 season, so the tread on the tires matters. McCaffrey at the 1-2 turn (or even a little later if he slides) could have league winner written all over it, if he can stay healthy AND if the 49ers give him his normal workload. Those are big “Ifs”, and maybe the lower leg ailments are now chronic, and it’s the beginning of the end for a phenomenal talent. Remember Terrell Davis? Todd Gurley? Le’Veon Bell? It can sometimes end abruptly for workhorse running backs. As I did my RB rankings, I wrote and then erased McCaffrey’s name multiple times along the way.

Isiah Pacheco (ECR: RB28)

Pacheco will be cheaper to draft in 2025, after he disappointed as a consensus second or third round fantasy pick last season. Pacheco missed most of the 2024 season with injury, but he was off to a very slow start before he got hurt. Kareem Hunt replaced him and is still there. Neither back is particularly explosive or shifty, and it’s a little hard to project the split between those two and whoever else the Chiefs use. I want to rank Pacheco higher given the offense he plays in and the potential lead role, but I’m gun shy.

Omarion Hampton (ECR: RB20), R.J. Harvey (ECR: RB 23), TreVeyon Henderson (ECR: RB26), and Kaleb Johnson (ECR: RB27).

I’m listing these four promising rookies together not because they’re similar players, but because they find themselves in somewhat similar situations. Each has a shot to lead his team’s backfield in snaps and touches, but they’re all rookie running backs, who are often brought along somewhat slowly, in part because they aren’t trusted in pass protection right away. Hampton and Henderson were both taken in the first 40 picks of the NFL draft and are the more exciting players from a skillset standpoint, but they could face stiffer competition for touches (Najee Harris and Rhamondre Stevenson have both been lead backs the past few seasons).

Harvey and Johnson both appear to face lighter competition for touches (although watch out for J.K. Dobbins in Denver), but aren’t as skilled or explosive. It’s a really strong rookie class of RBs, but they won’t all hit in year one, and some of them will end up disappointing fantasy managers. These four, plus Quinshon Judkins (ECR: RB25), are tightly bunched in the rankings, which reflects the fact that a lot of rankers, like me, aren’t exactly sure what to do with them.

Travis Etienne (ECR: RB 34)

The good news is that Etienne won’t cost you much, in what is likely his last shot to be the guy in Jacksonville. 2024 was a season to forget, and his efficiency and usage were terrible. Now he’s not only competing with Tank Bigsby, but the Jaguars also added rookie Bhayshul Tuten (fourth round, Virginia Tech). On the plus side, Etienne is decent in the passing game, and new Head Coach Liam Coen should have a positive influence on the entire offense and had great success with Tampa’s running backs the last few seasons. I had trouble ranking everyone in the Jacksonville backfield, and while I’m on the topic, in Dallas’s too.

Photo by Logan Bowles/Getty Images

Wide Receiver and Tight End

Tyreek Hill (ECR: WR14) and Jaylen Waddle (ECR: WR28)

Hill and Waddle were among the most disappointing players in all of fantasy last season, as the Greatest Show on Surf came crashing down like a big wave. There are some valid excuses, as Tua missed six games with his third concussion and other injuries, and in the case of Hill, he was playing through a painful wrist injury. Still, Hill’s production was essentially halved from the year before, while Waddle put up career lows in catches, yards, and TDs in his fourth season. Both were expensive to draft, and therefore hard to bench.

This is the lowest that Hill has been ranked since 2017, but I get it. His reception, yardage and TD totals were his lowest in five years, and he’s 31. He remains among the fastest players in the game, but it’s possible that he’s lost half a step. Still, he’s Tyreek freaking Hill! Waddle and Hill have these things going for them: The Dolphins could be awful defensively and chasing points all season, Jonnu Smith (111 targets last season) is gone which should further funnel targets to Hill/Waddle, and Miami doesn’t have proven wide receivers or tight ends beyond those two. A bounce-back is likely for both, but how big will it be? That’s the ranking dilemma.

Travis Hunter (ECR: WR31)

The NFL’s first two-way player in decades is hard to rank because at the moment it’s unknown how much he’ll play on defense, and if that will eat into his snap share on offense. He joins second-year star Brian Thomas, Jr. in what should be an improved offense, but this feels like a case where the hype might push the price higher than it should be – in Non-IDP leagues anyway. I expect his ADP to be higher than this. Hunter is a gifted player who lands in a good situation, but as we saw with Marvin Harrison, Jr. last year, not all highly drafted rookie WRs hit the ground running, and Harrison wasn’t learning the defense too.

Chris Godwin (ECR: WR32)

Godwin was leading the NFL in receptions and was second among WRs in FPPG when he was lost for the season with a dislocated ankle, in Week 7. That’s not the kind of injury that should slow him too much to start this season, but he’s also 29, and this isn’t his first big injury. The Bucs used a first round pick on Emeka Egbuka, a year after using a third rounder on Jalen McMillan, so they’re clearly planning for the future. I want to believe Godwin can step right back into an elite target share alongside Mike Evans, but I’m hesitant to rank him that way.

Jerry Jeudy (ECR: WR36) and David Njoku (ECR: TE7)

Who is the Browns’ quarterback? The answer is probably that several throwers will start games, but how that breaks down is going to have a big impact on where I’d want to draft these two players, plus Cedric Tillman. If you told me that Joe Flacco will start 12-15 games, I’d have a much better sense of where to rank these productive players. But the Browns also brought in Kenny Pickett and drafted two rookie QBs. The result of that maneuvering? A rankings quagmire.

A few other bigger-name WRs that I had trouble ranking: Marvin Harrison, Jr., Stefon Diggs, D.J. Moore and Rome Odunze, Deebo Samuel, and for the second straight year, all of the Packers’ and Bills’ receivers (and TE Dalton Kincaid).

Travis Kelce (ECR: TE7)

Another Chief! Sorry about that. Kelce is no longer in the top tier of tight ends, and at age 35, he is probably near the end of the road. He did catch 97 passes last year, but his 823 yards was a career low outside of his rookie year when he basically didn’t play. The Chiefs are trying to preserve him during the regular season, knowing how much he still can help them when it matters most, in the playoffs. It feels a bit like Gronk’s final seasons in that regard. I had a hard time figuring out how far to drop Kelce (or put another way – where I’d be comfortable taking him).

That’s my list. Keep it here for more content, including my rankings and tiers (coming soon!).