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Who should I draft for fantasy football in 2025? Fantasy football outlooks for Emeka Egbuka, Matthew Golden, Travis Hunter and our expert draft advice.
Emeka Egbuka Fantasy Football Outlook
Egbuka was selected with the 19th overall pick in the first round of the 2025 NFL Draft by the Tampa Bay Buccaneers. Tampa's offense was elite last season, with quarterback Baker Mayfield throwing for 4,500 passing yards and 41 touchdowns, both career-high marks by significant margins.
Of course, part of this success was due to the schemes of offensive coordinator Liam Coen, who's now the head coach of the Jacksonville Jaguars. Still, Mayfield is at least a solid quarterback, and the team has a good offensive line to lean on. We should expect a productive passing game, though maybe not to the level of last season.
Egbuka hype has reached a fever pitch recently. With Chris Godwin (ankle), the team's slot receiver from last season, likely to miss at least four games to start the season, and second-year pro Jalen McMillan (neck) set to miss extended time, Egbuka seems poised to step into a big role early on.
Chris Godwin: still on PUP
Jalen McMillan: expected to miss around half of the regular seasonEmeka Egbuka's ADP is currently 97.8... will it continue to go up? pic.twitter.com/gSS4QwZekG
— Yahoo Fantasy Sports (@YahooFantasy) August 19, 2025
The combination of this and his good draft capital should cause his ADP to skyrocket. Still, it's important not to get swallowed up in the hype and try to get a realistic idea of what should happen. Egbuka has plenty of college experience, so that won't be an issue, but he doesn't have the athleticism to separate vertically against NFL corners.
I've never been a fan of Pro Day 40-yard dashes because they're hand-timed, and generally run by players who know they could hurt their draft stock if they ran a laser-timed 40 at the combine. Egbuka had almost zero wins on vertical routes that didn't feature busted coverage by the defense in college.
It's hard to see him playing outside and winning consistently as a result. He'll thrive most in three-receiver sets where he can play in the slot and has more room to maneuver around the field. WR Mike Evans is indeed aging, but he still showcased excellent separation abilities last season. He's still a dominant wideout.
Emeka Egbuka icy https://t.co/X5236gENqu pic.twitter.com/uSalSbo4GP
— Jacob Gibbs (@jagibbs_23) August 20, 2025
Fantasy managers, in general, tend to get selectively hyped about players they want to succeed after they've decided to invest heavily in them. I have concerns about Egbuka's ability to consistently separate against NFL competition. He's a fundamentally sound route-runner, but on film, he lacks any kind of elite burst.
He's 6-foot-1, so he's not a huge target and doesn't have a size advantage over most cornerbacks. He can make tough contested catches, but throwing the ball into tight windows tends to lead to more turnovers as well. The opportunity he'll have is undeniable, though.
I think we should pump the brakes a bit. He isn't about to take over the WR1 role for the Bucs. As Godwin works his way back, we could see Egbuka's production diminish later in the season. And Evans is the better receiver here. The sky-high ceiling many people envision for Egbuka might not be there.
Matthew Golden Fantasy Football Outlook
Golden, drafted by the Green Bay Packers in the first round of the 2025 NFL Draft, is another player that many fantasy managers envision as immediately having explosive production in the NFL. He'll be on a team with a productive passing offense -- at least when starting quarterback Jordan Love is healthy and not playing through major injuries -- and a team that doesn't have major talent at WR.
Reports out of camp have been positive, but that's usually the case when a player isn't absolute garbage (see Kaleb Johnson), so it's not much of a surprise. Golden's production profile in college is a bit of a red flag, though. Before the injury to his teammate, WR Isaiah Bond, Golden simply didn't put up big numbers.
Isaiah Bond just signed with the Cleveland Browns. He was a likely Round 2 draft pick before sexual assault allegations pushed him to UDFA
When healthy, last year, Bond was more productive than teammate and Round 1 WR Matthew Golden pic.twitter.com/otIWKZTvfy
— Scott Barrett (@ScottBarrettDFB) August 14, 2025
This is undeniable. The statistics back it up. Of course, Texas suffered from poor quarterback play at the hands of Quinn Ewers, who was awful, but Golden also had poor efficiency metrics. Again, you can blame that on Ewers, and I wouldn't be opposed to that.
But I think he cannot run traditional wide receiver releases. We see this all over his film. Texas head coach Steve Sarkisian put him in motion a lot to mitigate this, I believe. And he doesn't have a suite of moves to beat press coverage. He's forced to hand-fight to break free.
I think this will be a limiting factor to his production in the NFL. Keep in mind, Packers head coach Matt LaFleur excels at scheming his guys open. The problem with this is that it leads to an offense with a heavily diluted target distribution. Golden managers will be frustrated with his overall target volume, according to my analysis.
Travis Hunter Fantasy Football Outlook
The Jacksonville Jaguars traded up to the No. 2 overall pick to select wide receiver and cornerback prospect Travis Hunter after his Heisman-winning 2025 college campaign. While there are many questions about how much time he'll spend on both offense and defense, keep in mind who the head coach of the team that drafted him is.
Liam Coen is absolutely an offensive-minded coach who's well-respected around the league and has a history of engineering elite passing attacks. One of the most valuable roles in all of fantasy football is Coen's slot receiver role, which helped the aforementioned Godwin and Cooper Kupp have massive seasons.
Rich Eisen asks Liam Coen to put a number on the number of snaps for Travis Hunter on offense and he says “80% of snaps or so” pic.twitter.com/NuzcE8B9D1
— Davis Mattek (@DavisMattek) August 5, 2025
It's been obvious ever since he was drafted that Coen wanted him to be heavily involved in the passing game. Why else would an offensive coach draft him? The rumors about him being primarily a defensive player don't make much sense. And more recent news indicates he'll play... primarily... on offense!!!
"And yes (Travis Hunter) will be the two-way star they intend him to be
full time on offense. Ease in on defense. And earn more reps as the season goes on"
— Josh Norris (@JoshNorris) August 20, 2025
I've been a big proponent of Hunter being worth the No. 1 overall pick in rookie fantasy football drafts this season. There was a time when you could draft him in Round 2, of course, but that quickly changed after his draft capital was revealed. I hope you took my advice and drafted him with second-round picks!
Either way, Coen doesn't get enough respect from fantasy managers. His offense looked functional last season, even when both Godwin and Evans were injured. On film, there were countless reps of Coen scheming his receivers wide open. Expect more of that in 2025 with the Jaguars.
Trevor Lawrence is notoriously known for targeting the slot receiver:
Christian Kirk - 2022 (3rd in slot snaps / 15th in targets)
Evan Engram - 2023 (1st in slot snaps / 1st in targets)Both finished top 11 at their positions.
This is a Travis Hunter / Liam Coen Tweet.
— Snoog's Fantasy HQ (@FFSnoog) August 13, 2025
And Coen's offenses heavily targeted the slot receiver. The slot receiver for the Jaguars this year is likely to be Hunter, having taken five slot snaps of the 10 total offensive snaps he played in his first preseason game. It's hard not to see the upside for a player who has as much talent as Hunter.
Hunter has incredible control of his body and can make absurd catches while his body is contorted in different ways. He's a great route-runner, with a positive route success rate on 100% of the types of routes charted by the well-respected WR evaluation website Reception Perception.
Reminder that Travis Hunter is likely to get a Liam Coen slot role, known for producing league winning per-game production, and was lauded by Matt Harmon's Reception Perception, with positive success rates on every style of route he charted. Hunter is too cheap in redraft. pic.twitter.com/HoguAjdj3G
— JohnJohn Analysis (@JohnJohnalytics) August 20, 2025
Of all the players on this list, Hunter is the most talented and arguably in the best situation. I believe he's in the best situation despite being set to take plenty of offensive snaps. So I absolutely love the upside here.
Who Should I Draft in Fantasy Football?
Hunter is the easiest pick to make for me. He's the only supremely talented athlete on this list, easily was the most productive of the receivers here in his final season in college, and didn't even game-plan with the WRs in college -- he was a cornerback playing receiver, and has an even higher ceiling than he's shown.
Of course, there will be concerns with his durability. The NFL is a brutal league. But you can't predict injuries, and you would much rather have a player who can put up elite numbers while on the field. Hunter is the best receiver on this list and the best athlete as well. This is a no-brainer.
It's wild that Egbuka's ADP has been pushed up so high. He's not in the same tier as Hunter.
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