Christian McCaffrey - 2025 Fantasy Football Busts and Overvalued Draft Picks

Christian McCaffrey is a potential fantasy football bust and overvalued draft pick for 2025. Read the fantasy football outlook and draft advice for the San Francisco 49ers running back.

RotoBaller Ranking (half-PPR): RB6

Fantasy Draft Analysis:

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.

Another path to failure lies in the fact that the 49ers may prioritize protecting McCaffrey’s health to navigate a 17-game season, given his importance to winning. 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.

CHRISTIAN MCCAFFREY 65 YARDS TO THE HOUSE pic.twitter.com/TPh0E1ruyQ

— NFL Fantasy Football (@NFLFantasy) September 10, 2023

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.

- Dan Fornek

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