We have devoted a decent number of words recently to players who improved their fantasy football stock in the closing weeks of the regular season and during the playoffs, while ignoring the fact that, actually, not everyone in the league can be trending up simultaneously.
For every player who gets a boost in the ranks, others must slide.
Today’s mission is to identify a few brand-name fantasy stars likely to fall into very different ADP ranges in 2025. In certain cases, these price cuts are entirely reasonable. But other players — like this first gentleman — don’t really deserve any sort of rankings relocation, although it’s coming nonetheless …
CeeDee Lamb, WR, Dallas Cowboys
Lamb just delivered his third consecutive 100-catch season, finishing with 1,194 receiving yards and six touchdowns despite spending much of his year dealing with the combined effects of injury, and Cooper Rush. He missed the final two weeks of the season yet still finished as the overall WR9.
If early mocks and ranks can be trusted (obviously they cannot, but let’s pretend), Lamb isn’t guaranteed first-round draft status this year, despite his heroic performance in 2024 under dreadful circumstances. Let’s just recall that he’ll have Dak Prescott back at the controls of a very Lamb-focused offense, with kinda/sorta stability in the coaching staff. He’s done nothing to deserve removal from the position’s top tier.
Tyreek Hill, WR, Miami Dolphins
OK, Hill actually has done a few things to warrant removal from the first (and possibly second) tier at receiver. He seemed pretty disgusted with Miami’s season generally and his usage specifically, which of course is understandable. After leading the NFL in receiving yardage in 2023, he finished with 840 fewer yards this past year while playing in one additional game. Not great.
It didn’t help that Tua Tagovailoa missed six weeks and Hill himself was playing through a wrist injury all season, so let’s not assume he’s cooked. But he’s also entering his age-31 season and is quite clearly no longer the centerpiece of his team’s offense. Hill isn’t really in the first-round conversation any longer, and he’s no lock to be selected in the second, either.
Christian McCaffrey, RB, San Francisco 49ers
CMC is coming off an all-time disaster season in fantasy, which of course could have been mitigated by a little honesty from his head coach. Alas. We will certainly not be able to trust any optimistic offseason reporting related to his lower extremities. Assume he is a little bit broken until you actually see him active on the field.
We should note, however, that if McCaffrey does manage to participate fully in a normal offseason program, then his name can’t be excluded from the RB1 conversation. He’s finished as a top-three fantasy back in four different seasons, including two as the overall top scorer at the position.
Still, if we were drafting a 2025 fantasy roster right now, today (which would be a terrible idea), CMC wouldn’t deserve serious consideration inside the first eight picks.
Breece Hall, RB, New York Jets
The argument for Hall as a top-of-draft option last year rested on three essential points:
New York’s offense was going to be massively improved;
Hall himself was going to be even better and more efficient, another year removed from ACL surgery;
He was going to be the unchallenged full-workload featured back for the Jets.
Unfortunately, none of those things were entirely accurate. Hall wasn’t quite as effective on a per-touch basis, he caught fewer passes, didn’t force as many missed tackles and he gained fewer yards after contact. Also, rookies Braelon Allen and Isaiah Davis were just good enough to emerge as nuisances.
The Jets are headed into a difficult and uncertain offseason, so last summer’s good vibes are a distant memory. Hall might settle into the third round in terms of ADP, a neighborhood in which the available receivers are likely to be more appealing than the running backs.
Patrick Mahomes and Travis Kelce, QB and TE, Kansas City Chiefs
Two of the all-time greats at their respective positions are now headed into their fifth Super Bowl appearance as teammates. Mahomes has twice finished as the overall QB1 and Kelce has absolutely ruled the tight end position over the past decade, ranking among the top three in every season from 2016 to 2023.
Despite their individual histories and outrageous team success, neither player was a difference-maker in fantasy in 2024. Kansas City has been a relentless and well-balanced team that manages to do exactly whatever is necessary to win games, without piling on. Mahomes is among the best and most inventive quarterbacks in the game’s history, but he’s coming off a regular season in which he averaged a career-low 245.5 yards per game and 6.8 per attempt.
Kelce produced another elite reception total this past year (97), but he converted all those catches into just 823 yards and three scores. Also, he turns 36 in October and he runs like a dad stumbling through a bouncy castle.
We simply can’t draft either of these legends inside the first five rounds in 2025, except in scoring formats that favor their positions. Not that either of them cares about such things, because they clearly have greater goals immediately ahead.
