RADIO
Dan Fornek's 2025 early-round fantasy football running back busts. His top RBs to avoid include: Saquan Barkley, Christian McCaffrey, Josh Jacobs, Kyren Wiliams, and James Cook.
2024 was a resurgent year for the running back position. Three backs (Saquon Barkley, Jahmyr Gibbs, and Bijan Robinson) all averaged over 20 fantasy points per game. Another two (Derrick Henry and Alvin Kamara) averaged over 19.
In total, 17 running backs averaged 15.0 fantasy points per game. Since 2013, there have been just two other seasons with more than 12 running backs surpassing that mark (2019 and 2021) with a minimum of 12 games played.
Their success has led to running backs being pushed back up in fantasy football drafts. However, moving up running backs who had success in 2024 could lead to an influx of highly drafted running backs who bust in 2025. Who are the biggest early-round picks at risk of busting? Check it out below.
Editor's Note: Steer clear of costly draft mistakes with RotoBaller’s expert Fantasy Football Bust analysis. We break down overvalued players, potential letdowns, and risky ADPs to avoid, so you can build a smarter, safer roster.
Saquon Barkley, RB, Philadelphia Eagles
ADP: 2.6, RB1
Saquon Barkley’s first season with the Eagles was pure domination. The veteran running back immediately became the focal point of the offense, carrying the ball 345 times for 2,005 yards and 13 rushing touchdowns while adding 33 receptions (on 43 targets) for 278 yards and two touchdowns.
“Saquon Barkley won’t be a difference maker”
16 Carries
94 YDS
3 TD
pic.twitter.com/4x4wBmbDo2— The Swoop Scoops (@TheSwoopScoops) September 7, 2024
Unsurprisingly, Barkley enters 2025 as the top running back being drafted and a player routinely taken with the first overall pick. That makes complete sense. The Eagles still have an elite offensive line and a mobile quarterback who can occupy defenses. On the surface, Barkley is set to have another massive season.
So, why does he top the list of early running back busts?
Last season, Barkley handled over 500 touches between the regular season and the playoffs. That is a massive workload for any running back, much less one who has played 16 games in a season just three times in seven years. Barkley (and the Eagles) also had a shorter offseason to recover thanks to their Super Bowl victory.
Barkley has an immense talent in an offense that is perfectly built to maximize his explosive running ability. We saw that play out in real time in 2024. However, 2024’s production has nothing to do with 2025’s fantasy points.
There is considerable risk drafting a running back in his age-28 season coming off a 500-touch workload. Be wary of drafting him with the first (or second) pick in fantasy drafts, given that risk.
Christian McCaffrey, RB, San Francisco 49ers
ADP: 10.7, RB5
Christian McCaffrey was the unquestioned 1.01 in fantasy drafts last season after a prolific season in 2023. McCaffrey had 272 carries for 1,459 yards and 14 rushing touchdowns while adding 67 receptions for 564 yards and seven receiving touchdowns.
McCaffrey has been an elite fantasy producer when he’s healthy. He has five career seasons with at least 16 games played. In those seasons, he AVERAGES 228 carries, 1,104 rushing yards, nine rushing touchdowns, and 91 receptions for 766 yards and five additional receiving scores.
Unfortunately, 2024 was not one of those healthy seasons. McCaffrey missed the first eight games of the season with Achilles tendinitis. He eventually returned for four games but produced just 50 carries for 202 yards and 15 receptions for 146 yards before a sprained PCL ended his season.
McCaffrey seems to be healthy entering 2025, which has led his ADP to slowly creep up from a second-round pick to a back-end first-round pick.
Given his career production, the rise makes sense. However, a lost 2024 season shows that we have a few different paths for McCaffrey to fail.
For one, his body could finally be broken down going into his age-29 season. McCaffrey is not a gigantic physical specimen like Derrick Henry, and his body has taken a lot of punishment (1,871 touches) in his eight-year career.
Another path to failure lies in the fact that the 49ers may work to protect McCaffrey’s health to navigate a 17-game season, knowing his importance to winning. San Francisco can pull back on his workload with a young, explosive running back (Isaac Guerendo) or a more physical complement (fifth-round pick Jordan James) to lessen the stress on his body.
If McCaffrey is fully healthy and can handle his historical workload, he will be a steal as the RB5 in fantasy drafts. However, 2024 showed that his career of high-volume workloads may finally be catching up.
That is a fine gamble to take outside of the first round, but there are just too many talented players in the first to NEED to take the chance on another banged-up season from McCaffrey.
Josh Jacobs, RB, Green Bay Packers
ADP: 24.6, RB10
Josh Jacobs was stellar in his first season with the Green Bay Packers. The veteran running back played 17 games while logging 301 carries for 1,329 yards and 15 rushing touchdowns. He also added 36 receptions for 342 yards and a receiving score.
I'd simply hand the ball off to Josh Jacobs 25+ times a game pic.twitter.com/Eq4yJAkPhb
— Eli Berkovits (@BookOfEli_NFL) May 19, 2025
As a result, Jacobs is being drafted as the RB10 in early fantasy drafts, routinely going off the board around the 2/3 turn. Based on 2024, that makes a lot of sense. However, like Barkley, there are risks in trusting a running back coming off a prolific workload.
2024 was the third time in Jacobs’ career that he logged over 300 touches in a season. Both times he’s hit this benchmark, he’s struggled the following season to stay healthy.
Jacobs handled 306 touches in 2020 with the Raiders (273 carries and 33 receptions). The following season, he was limited to just 14 games and had just 217 carries (he did increase his passing work to 54 receptions).
In 2022, Jacobs logged the biggest workload of his career, handling 393 touches (340 carries and 53 receptions). The next season, he played just 13 games and averaged a career-worst 3.5 yards per carry.
Jacobs can certainly operate as a workhorse running back, but like any football player, there is a point where his body struggles to maintain that production year after year. The Packers will hope that 2024 third-round pick MarShawn Lloyd can stay healthy to spell Jacobs in his second season. If not, Emanuel Wilson (114 touches) and Chris Brooks (47 touches) may be leaned on again.
Jacobs’ production is heavily reliant on handling a bulk of the carries and his ability to score touchdowns. He can still be an RB1 in 2025, but it wouldn’t be shocking if the Packers tried to conserve his touches until later in the season, given his importance to the offense.
Kyren Williams, RB, Los Angeles Rams
ADP: 33.3, RB12
Many have been warning about Kyren Williams’ downfall for multiple seasons. However, those people have been wrong time and time again.
Williams was expected to see a lesser workload in 2024 after the Rams used a third-round pick on Michigan running back Blake Corum (and due to offseason injury issues). Instead, Williams logged career highs in carries (316), rushing yards (1,299), and rushing touchdowns (14). However, Williams was far less efficient as a runner (4.1 yards per carry) and receiver (4.1 yards per reception) in 2024.
3 TDS FOR KYREN WILLIAMS
WINNING FANTASY CHAMPIONSHIPS pic.twitter.com/IzfycuCri3
— JPAFootball (@jasrifootball) December 31, 2023
Over the last two seasons, Williams has averaged 272 carries for 1,222 yards and 13 touchdowns. He’s also added 33 receptions, 194 receiving yards, and 2.5 receiving touchdowns per season in that same span. That’s pretty elite production for a 2022 fifth-round pick with limited size (5-foot-9, 194 pounds) and speed (4.65 40-yard dash).
Williams is once again being drafted as an RB1 in 2025, coming off the board with the 33rd pick in fantasy drafts as the RB12. However, once again, we have reasons to be wary of his price tag.
The veteran running has shown that he can handle the rigors of heavy workloads through his first two seasons, but he is still a smaller back handling the tough yards. Williams doesn’t offer much in the passing attack, which means he is consistently grinding in the trenches.
Not only do the Rams have Corum behind him to soak up carries (potentially) in 2025, but they also traded up in the fourth round to draft another running back, Auburn’s Jarquez Hunter, in 2025.
Hunter offers a similar size (5-foot-9, 204 pounds) to Williams and Corum (5-foot-8, 205), but he has a level of speed (4.44 40-yard dash) that the other two backs don’t offer. Over his final three collegiate seasons, Hunter handled 450 carries for 2,778 yards and 22 touchdowns while adding 56 receptions for 497 yards and three receiving scores.
Adding a player like Hunter gives the Rams a new dynamic in the backfield compared to 2024, where Corum’s skill set is more of a direct replacement for Williams in case of an injury. That added variable makes it harder to trust his status as an RB1.
James Cook, RB, Buffalo Bills
ADP: 41.8, RB14
James Cook finally showed what he could be if allowed to score touchdowns, logging 16 rushing scores in 2024 after having just four in his first two seasons. We also know that touchdown production is volatile from year to year, making it unlikely that Cook will replicate that performance in 2025.
JAMES COOK GIVES THE BILLS AN EARLY LEAD #BillsMafia pic.twitter.com/srOcbwZLsQ
— Hammer DAHN (@HammerDAHN) September 13, 2024
Beyond that, there are other reasons to question James Cook’s current ADP as the RB14 in fantasy drafts. For one, Cook seems positioned to hold out until he secures a new contract extension that will put him among the league’s highest-paid running backs. The Bills seem far less likely to budge on that at this point.
There are also some other concerning indicators about Cook’s role in 2025. Cook saw his carries (207), rushing yards (1,009), targets (38), receptions (32), receiving yards (258), and receiving touchdowns (two) drop from 2023 to 2024. He’s also seen his yards per touch decline in every season (5.3 in 2024).
Buffalo has Josh Allen to take on the short-yardage and red-zone carries. That, combined with the returns of Ray Davis (113 carries for 442 yards and three touchdowns as a rookie) and Ty Johnson (18 receptions for 284 yards and three touchdowns), could split the snaps in this backfield in many ways.
Cook was awesome in 2024, but anticipating him leading the NFL in rushing touchdowns again is a dangerous game to play.
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