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John's fantasy football sneaky RB candidates for 2026 drafts. His top values, draft targets, and sleeper picks, including Cam Skattebo, David Montgomery, and more.
Can you feel the electricity of fantasy football draft season in the air? You could cut it with a knife. Awesome, right? Months of preparation boil down to the small handful of drafts you really care about, and it's my job to get your running back plan in perfect working order. Especially in some of these wild home league drafts where you need to expect the unexpected, being familiar with viable backup plans never comes in handy enough.
While we're only addressing running backs outside the top 40 overall today, let me be very clear on my RB strategy. Yes, I'm part of the sheepish masses touting the importance of a true RB1 in the first two rounds all offseason. As backfield committees become increasingly prevalent, fewer players provide a reasonable expectation for 300+ touches. For reference, only 12 RBs eclipsed 295 total opportunities.
Once that low-supply position is filled, options stay open to take any path we choose. Conversely, miss out, and there's nothing worse than that sinking feeling of chasing a position the entire draft. So, let's assume somewhere in the top-24 picks we paid up for a premium back with league-winning upside, and pick it up from there.
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My Current Top-12 RB Ranks
- Jahmyr Gibbs, DET
- Bijan Robinson, ATL
- Ashton Jeanty, LV
- James Cook III, BUF
- Kenneth Walker III, KC
- Jonathan Taylor, IND
- Chase Brown, CIN
- De'Von Achane, MIA
- Christian McCaffrey, SF
- Omarion Hampton, LAC
- Saquon Barkley, PHI
- Breece Hall, NYJ
Sneaky Fantasy Football RB1s
With a workhorse RB secured, I'm approaching the rest of the draft with a wide-open mind and letting the rest come to me. Divvying the position into wide tiers with a focus on value helps. I start by identifying the few players with RB1 upside throughout the draft into three tiers: sneaky RB1s (ADP ~40-60), solid RB flex targets (ADP ~60-80), and then late values (ADP 100+).
Cam Skattebo, NYG (ADP 41)
Face facts. Anytime you're drafting RBs in this environment outside of the top two drafting rounds, players will have warts. So, what are we looking for in a potential RB1 finish?
If we're boiling it down to a combination of volume, pass-catching ability, and goal-line touches, then Cam Skattebo is an optimal pick in a healthy season.
It took the wild rookie out of ASU all of one game to usurp Tyrone Tracy Jr. for NYG's starter job, and he'd easily be going in the second round if not suffering a severe season-ending right ankle dislocation, fibula fracture, and deltoid ligament rupture in Week 8 against the Eagles last season. Ouch.
Yes, an injury that gruesome causes concern, but for all intents and purposes, he's healthy right now. We've seen the backflip to prove it. And not for nothing, no one can reliably predict injuries -- just ask the millions of people who faded Christian McCaffrey going into 2025.
Anyway, Skattebo stands a chance to be that RB to take a leap up boards next year if the stretch between Weeks 2-7 was any indication. Ranking as the NFL's overall RB8 during that time frame (including two top-5 weekly finishes), Skattebo checked all the aforementioned boxes by combining volume (19.5 touches/game) with receiving prowess (22.6% target/route), plus literally all the goal-line work (95% goal-to-go snaps).
Name your worries surrounding Skattebo, and I'd likely echo them. I get it. The thing is, the fantasy RB market has never been more competitive, and we have to pick our poison. At least Skattebo's projections will include all of the Giants' goal-line TDs, which is more than we can say for some of the other backs at a similar price.
No backflips but Cam Skattebo looked all the way back in his few carries over the weekend. pic.twitter.com/L0rP47QIVW
— Ryan Paganetti (@RyanPaganetti) August 17, 2026
David Montgomery, HOU (ADP 52)
Another far-from-attractive profile with easy RB1 potential rests with the newest Texan, David Montgomery. Again, you won't be finding any glitz or glamour in this pick -- just good old-fashioned fantasy points.
Already labeled as a team leader by coaches, HC DeMeco Ryans was quoted on the SiriusXM NFL show saying, "I see David as a number one back. He's a really good runner; he's always been a runner whenever he touches the ball. Strong, runs low, runs behind his pads."
A reliable runner couldn't come soon enough for Houston -- which, despite a very old-school, defensive-heavy team identity, still failed miserably at the ground attack in 2025. The Texans finished 2025 firmly as a bottom-5 running unit, scraping the bottom of the league's barrel in EPA/attempt (-0.10), yards/carry (3.9), yards after contact/rush (2.51), and success rate (34.7%).
Seems like there's only one direction to go from there, with Montgomery as the new focal point of the offense.
Purposely omitted the Texans' poor offensive line play, famously responsible for the most QB hits in the league last year. General manager Nick Caserio spent the offseason bolstering the trenches by extending Ed Ingram, signing Wyatt Teller, plus drafting Keylan Rutledge (Round 1, pick 26) and Febechi Nwaiwu (Round 4, pick 106).
Granted, the moves haven't vaulted this unit to the top of any mainstream charts, but I believe looking back we'll find it was graded entirely too low.
Remember, the Texans failed to produce a single top-5 RB weekly finish all last year, with just a single top-10 performance in Week 4. Speaking of Woody Marks, of all 49 RBs with 100+ carries, Houston's incumbent posted the second-worst yards per carry (3.6), fourth-lowest yards after contact per rush (2.59), and fifth-lowest rate of carries to gain zero or fewer yards (23.0%).
Long story short, while Montgomery may not be a spring chicken, he's still significantly better at every phase of the game than Marks -- and he should play a pivotal role in the offense, independent of game script. Sometimes boring wins championships.
Solid Fantasy Football RB Flex Targets
Is anything more comforting once the fur starts to fly than knowing your RB1 duties are handled? Nope. Can't stress the name of the game enough at that point: patience and getting your price.
Remember, even if we swing and miss on this second tier, all hope's not lost. As static as the top end of the position can be, I'd argue the exact inverse for the bottom.
No roster slot or positional rank in this game of ours changes with more fluidity than RB2. Don't be afraid to push the envelope, stacking pass-catchers and onesies (QB/TE) if necessary before shelling out more draft capital than you should.
Jadarian Price, SEA (ADP 64)
Winning team? Check. First-round draft capital? Check. Pathway to immediate playing time? Check. So, why is the drafting public getting cold feet on Jadarian Price?
Beats me, and I couldn't possibly care any less. Honestly shocking to get access to a potential workhorse back in the sixth round, particularly in this tough RB environment -- but I'm not looking a fantasy gift horse in the mouth. Without any meaningful NFL snaps to go off, all analysis remains subjective. Fine, except that's all baked into the cost.
I'd understand more trepidation if Zach Charbonnet posed a threat to Price's early usage, but he tore his ACL in the NFC Divisional Round. Yes, this January! To me, any expectations for an impactful return at all, let alone in September, should be filed under irrational exuberance.
Sorry, not sorry. Seattle is coming off the league's third-highest rush rate (50.0%) with no one but George Holani to compete for a pretty substantial workload. Holani may have earned trust and some postseason snaps in 2025, but let's be honest -- we're talking about a UDFA with 24 career regular-season touches.
Aside from the small workload, Holani has never gained more than 13 yards from scrimmage in any of his 33 career touches (including playoffs). And now we're expecting him to overtake the lion's share of work from a first-rounder? Highly unlikely.
To me, Price is among the easiest picks to see being mispriced if we could fast-forward to the end of the year -- RB talent plus opportunity on a winning team doesn't come along too often nowadays.
Jaylen Warren, PIT (ADP 73)
Poor Jaylen Warren. First, it was Najee Harris. Then, it was Kenny Gainwell. Now, it is Rico Dowdle. Every year, the Steelers seem to bring someone in to foil any dreams of what Warren could achieve if given a massive workload. Nevertheless, not every draft pick needs to swing for the fences -- doubles from the middle rounds win championships just as often.
Warren has suited up for at least 15 games in each of the last three seasons, finishing as the league's RB22 in that span. Currently going off the board as the RB29, you don't need much imagination to see how this pick profits.
Sure, Dowdle signed on with Pittsburgh to presumedly soak up some baseline work between the tackles. What's being lost in the shuffle, if you ask me, is the enormous amount of opportunities opened in the pass game alongside Aaron Rodgers, who's become allergic to taking hits in his old age.
Pittsburgh finished the season second in running back target rate (24.0%), as well as total targets, behind only San Francisco, which absolutely peppered Christian McCaffrey out of the backfield all year. For the record, the Steelers' 124 RB targets were still roughly 10% ahead of the rest of the field -- it's a potential PPR goldmine.
Now with Gainwell out of the way, Warren stands to step into his role as the dominant pass-catching back. Now, ask yourself if you think Rodgers' league-leading 2.52 seconds/throw is going to change.
It's not -- the instant there's any sort of compromise up front, the ball's coming out immediately to Warren. Not sure I'm comfortable rolling all season with him as my RB2, but as far as a flex play/bye week replacement goes, few picks stand out in the same way.
JAYLEN WARREN
📺: FOX pic.twitter.com/VZhYufGFWl
— FOX Sports: NFL (@NFLonFOX) September 14, 2025
Fantasy Football 100+ ADP RB Value
Blake Corum, LAR (ADP 101)
Outside of pick 100, I'm generally hoping to have my starting RBs locked and loaded. However, whether or not that's the case, I find myself constantly circling Los Angeles' Blake Corum.
Priced as a clear backup to Kyren Williams (RB15, ADP 31), he could and should be going in front of other split-work RBs like Chuba Hubbard. Instead, Corum regularly falls into the eighth round despite playing for the league's highest-scoring team.
Face the new reality: everyone's in a committee. It's just a matter of degree, and nobody consolidates touches around a single pair of RBs like HC Sean McVay. Did you know Williams and Corum accounted for 448 of the Rams' 459 touches in 2025?
Yes, that's an absurd 98% for all the math majors out there. Whether or not you think Corum's late-season utilization surge will bleed into 2026, he still stands to provide an extremely solid weekly floor, with potential for an easy top-7 weekly projection if there's an injury ahead of him.
Blake Corum into the end zone and the @RamsNFL extend their lead! 🙌
📺: FOX pic.twitter.com/jTh2DNCkeo
— FOX Sports: NFL (@NFLonFOX) December 14, 2025
My Best-of-the-Rest Running Backs
- Jordan Mason, MIN (ADP 113)
- Chris Rodriguez Jr., JAX (ADP 136)
- MarShawn Lloyd, GB (ADP 167)
- Dylan Sampson, CLE (ADP 173)
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