Fantasy Football: Are we buying or selling the hype on some of the buzziest names going into Week 1? Matt OkadaSeptember 2, 2025 at 10:42 PM Preseason? Done. Training camp? Done. Fantasy football drafts? Done ... or finishing this week, if you prefer living on the edge.
- - Fantasy Football: Are we buying or selling the hype on some of the buzziest names going into Week 1?
Matt OkadaSeptember 2, 2025 at 10:42 PM
Preseason? Done. Training camp? Done. Fantasy football drafts? Done ... or finishing this week, if you prefer living on the edge. Between free agency, the NFL Draft, months of beat reports and dozens of preseason "highlights," the final "values" for every player have been set. But some of them moved quite a bit over the summer, and some expectations are much higher now than they were the last time you checked.
So here is a fantasy stock report on the most noteworthy hype trains of the 2025 offseason — a precursor to the weekly column I'll be writing here at Yahoo every Tuesday throughout the season! Are we all aboard ... or proceeding with caution? Enjoy, and good luck in the 2025 fantasy season!
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Honorable Mentions
Before we get to the true hype machines of the summer, there's a hefty list of late risers worth flagging for early-season waiver wires. These players went undrafted in most leagues, so if you've got room on the bench — or if you can make room — consider tucking one away. Ollie Gordon II (Dolphins), Woody Marks (Texans) and Dylan Sampson (Browns) are three intriguing rookie running backs on unhealthy, unsettled depth charts. The way things are trending now, all three should be in the mix for early-season work and could play themselves into fantasy relevance out the gate. Speaking of rookies, wideouts Isaac TeSlaa (Lions) and Dont'e Thornton Jr. (Raiders) have been the darlings of the "diehard" fantasy community recently. With impressive preseasons and absurd athletic profiles, both receivers are packing sneaky upside if they can earn significant targets.
On the flip side, "Ol' Reliable" Keenan Allen has been a sudden late riser after signing back with the Chargers in early August — he has an established rapport with Justin Herbert and will likely join Ladd McConkey at the top of the target pecking order in Los Angeles. And if you're looking for a tight end to stash, Chig Okonkwo is one of the biggest risers of the last couple weeks, as something of a post-hype sleeper. He's reportedly found chemistry with rookie QB Cam Ward and could very easily be the No. 2 option in this offense behind only Calvin Ridley.
Spoiler alert: I've snuck extra names into almost all of these top "five" but they're thematic! (Please don't snitch to my editors).
5. TreVeyon Henderson & Omarion Hampton, Patriots & Chargers, RBs
Our first duo features the rookie running backs who cracked the top-four rounds of drafts by the end of August. Omarion Hampton was there a little longer, following his first-round NFL draft selection and Najee Harris's infamous July 4th eye incident. The reports around Harris's recovery have remained oddly blurry, and Hampton settled into the third round as a result. Meanwhile, TreVeyon Henderson saw a major August spike thanks to flashy performances in the preseason and unending positive reports out of camp. He climbed from the 5-6 turn at the start of August into the fourth round by the end of it ... and often sneaks into the third in sharper leagues.
I'm buying heavily into the hype on both rookies and would not be surprised to see both in fantasy RB1 territory by midseason. Hampton profiles as the lead back — and the far more explosive option — in Jim Harbaugh and Greg Roman's offense. That's fantasy gold regardless of draft capital, but the front office also spent the 22nd overall pick on this kid less than five months ago. He's going to eat.
As for Henderson, he was picked half a round after Hampton, but is even more dynamic and versatile. His only roadblocks to stardom are the "healthy" Rhamondre Stevenson and the trustworthiness of the Patriots offense. The drumbeat out of New England suggests Henderson is already surpassing the veteran back as the team's RB1, and I expect the offense to improve with returning OC Josh McDaniels, Year 2 Drake Maye, a quietly healthy Stefon Diggs and Henderson himself leading the charge. And if either of these running backs starts the season slow — not uncommon for rookies — be ready to send out trade offers. They're going to hit big sooner rather than later.
4. Emeka Egbuka & Matthew Golden, Buccaneers & Packers, WRs
While they're not going quite as early as Hampton and Henderson, rookie wideouts Emeka Egbuka and Matthew Golden have seen similar hype over the last month. Both have risen quickly on their own depth charts amid strong showings and injuries around them. When the Buccaneers drafted Egbuka 19th overall, it looked like he might start his career buried behind Mike Evans, Chris Godwin and late-2024 breakout Jalen McMillan. But with Godwin likely to miss a month or more battling to return from multiple ankle surgeries, and McMillan out for the foreseeable future with a preseason neck injury, things have changed. Egbuka will now be starting alongside Mike Evans — who's 32 years old and might have lost a step or two last season — and could start the year well ahead of the WR3 price tag he reached in ADP. Over in Green Bay, Golden has essentially become the de facto No. 1 for Jordan Love with Jayden Reed, Romeo Doubs, Dontayvion Wicks and Christian Watson all dealing with injuries over the past month. The Packers drafted Golden in the first round to eventually fill this role, but the speed and security with which he's stepped into it has been impressive.
"Buying into" the hype for this receiver duo takes a little less than it does for Hampton and Henderson — the RBs went 4-5 rounds earlier in drafts. And their upside as overall fantasy players is likely more capped — both Egbuka and Golden could feasibly be high-end WR2s, but are unlikely to crack WR1 territory. Still, even after the rising multiple rounds through the summer, they ended up in low-WR3 to high-WR4 range. Between the draft capital, evident talent and open opportunity in promising offenses, that's hype worth buying into. While they won't crack every starting lineup to open the season, expect to see both in FLEX spots as early as Week 2.
3. Tyler Warren, Colts, TE
Warren cracked the final list of biggest ADP risers in our weekly column after rising 2-3 rounds in August. And it's not hard to see why. As a prospect, Warren combined Rob Gronkowski size and athleticism with Brock Bowers' production, and it landed him at the 14th overall draft pick to Indianapolis. Then Warren's biggest roadblock to an early breakout was removed when the Colts named Daniel Jones the starter over Anthony Richardson Sr. While Jones is no Tom Brady or Patrick Mahomes, he completes 15% more of his passes than Richardson and has a better chance of supporting a fantasy-relevant tight end.
Still, while Jones is better than Richardson, that's not a particularly high bar and doesn't guarantee success for his pass-catchers. Evan Engram was Jones' tight end for three seasons in New York and was rarely startable over that stretch — he caught just five touchdowns in 30 games under the former Giants QB. Warren will also be competing with Michael Pittman Jr. and Josh Downs for targets in a low-pass-volume Shane Steichen offense. While the young tight end has plenty of "top-12" green flags, projecting him for anything close to the production of recent rookie stars Sam LaPorta and Brock Bowers would be a stretch. He should land somewhere around Engram, Tucker Kraft and David Njoku near the TE1 fringe — rankings that have him in the top six or seven have gone too far.
2. Braelon Allen & Tank Bigsby, Jets & Jaguars, RBs
In a list consisting mostly of rookies, Braelon Allen and Tank Bigsby's hype comes from a different angle. Both are young backs who initially seemed "stuck" behind more notable starters — Breece Hall and Travis Etienne Jr., respectively. But over the past month, both have made significant noise as the potential leaders of more balanced committees. And both are excellent analogs for players from their new coaches' recent pasts. Allen is a 6-foot-1, 235-pound terror who draws occasional comparisons to Derrick Henry and has been tagged as the "David Montgomery" of head coach Aaron Glenn and OC Tanner Engstrand's new "Sonic and Knuckles" duo in New York. And Bigsby is a fitting replacement for Bucky Irving in Liam Coen's new home — Jacksonville — as the hard-to-tackle hammer alongside Etienne's receiving focus.
The question is: Without an injury to the "incumbent," can either of these young RBs carve out a significant enough role to matter for fantasy? And the answer is yes. Both are (arguably) the superior pure runners in their backfields, and both Hall and Etienne might be better suited for pass-heavy snap shares and fewer between-the-tackles carries. Allen and Bigsby's rise in prominence have contributed to trade rumors around both of their counterparts, and while they may not materialize early in the season (or ever), they may be indicative of shifts in the depth chart. RBBC (running back by committee) is the way of the modern NFL, and is extremely hard to avoid outside the first couple rounds. Where Allen and Bigsby ended up going — in the eighth or ninth — is a fine spot to find future fantasy starters in these "foggy" committees. Both could be contributors as early as Week 1 — and if the usage scales tip far enough from the start, could be strong RB2s all season long.
1. Jacory Croskey-Merritt & Austin Ekeler, Commanders, RBs
Without a doubt the biggest hype train of the 2025 summer belongs to Jacory "Bill" Croskey-Merritt, the Commanders' seventh-round pick and running back of the future ... if you buy into the hype. There was excited talk about JCM's ascent even before Washington traded Brian Robinson Jr., but as soon as they shipped B-Rob off to the Bay, all (hype) hell broke loose. From his low point in the 200s (by ADP) all the way into the eighth or ninth round, Croskey-Merritt saw the most meteoric rise of the offseason and is widely being touted as one of the hottest "sleeper" picks in fantasy — if such a thing even exists anymore.
However, as I said in the Risers piece on Croskey-Merritt, I'm far less convinced. Remember, JCM was picked in the last round of the draft back in April. In the last 25 years, just one running back picked in the last round managed to crest 100 fantasy points as a rookie: Isiah Pacheco hit 128.5 to finish as the RB33 in 2022. The next best? Peyton Hillis for the Broncos in 2008, with just 95.2 fantasy points on the season. Historically speaking, it's really, really ... really unlikely that Croskey-Merritt becomes a regular fantasy starter. You know what's less unlikely? That a 30-year-old back who finished top two at the position in both 2021 and 2022, lost 2023 to injury, and then was quietly efficient and effective as a backup in 2024, might take the reigns in this Commanders backfield and be the actual sleeper for 2025. I'm talking, of course, about Austin Ekeler, who's also garnered some hype — though far less than Bill — after the Robinson trade. Out of 50 RBs with 100+ touches last year, Ekeler's 1.02 fantasy points per touch was third-most, behind only Jahmyr Gibbs and James Cook — ahead of Derrick Henry and Saquon Barkley (among many others). Ekeler went a round later than JCM in ADP, but I would have taken him at least a round earlier (and did a couple times). It's not impossible Croskey-Merritt breaks all the rules of historical data, but I'm hitching my cart to the far quieter, but far more reliable Ekeler hype horse heading into the year.
Source: "AOL Sports"
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