2025 Fantasy Football Fades & 6 Situations To Avoid | Just The Tips

Welcome to the fantasy footballers, just the tips. I'm your host today, Mike Wright. You're preparing for your upcoming drafts, mocking your brains out, hoping you can find an edge that no one else in your league could possibly consider. Fantasy football is a game of probabilities and perhaps the best way to approach this silly game is to get control of the things that we have to get right. It really is a bit of an oxymoron considering so much of the game is chaotic and out of control. From play calling to playing time, there are so many things that are out of our grasp. Well, this week's Just the Tips is about helping you learn how to identify situations to avoid and who to fade at certain draft costs. What type of statistics are proven year over year? What players, teams, and situations should we be fading in 2025? Let's get into it. First, we got to describe what we mean by a fade or a bust. In the ultimate draft kit, we have a section of bust picks every year.

that are arguably the hardest to collectively agree upon. These are real NFL athletes with incredible skills and virtually superhuman abilities. Getting all the way to the NFL in of itself means these players are certainly not busts in the grand scheme of things, but for fantasy football, we are highlighting players who potentially could not pay off in 2025. These guys are not guaranteed to fail. but they have some things working against them and represent a high-risk situation for fantasy managers. Things might look beautiful on the outside, but beware. Historically speaking, a bust has often referred to a high draft pick, trade lance, that failed to meet expectations. In fantasy, we are not always necessarily fading players, but fading draft costs. This game is a market and every player can be rosterable at the right price. For example,

We're all willing to pay a first round price for Jamar Chase because he's consistently been worth it and we all ascribe to him this value. However, players like C.J. Stroud, who was one of our busts last year, vaulted into the fifth round territory because many assumed he would level up in his sophomore year. What Stroud had to do at that draft cost is what made him a bust. This is an important concept to drive home. Instead of focusing first on player takes, consider what that player has to do at that draft cost to pay off. Listen, none of us are taking a quarterback in the first round of our fantasy drafts anymore, no matter who the name is, because over time, we as a fantasy community realized the opportunity cost was way too high, and the alternatives in our drafts were better. We focused this study on a couple of key historical areas and simply ask the question,

Are there players in 2025 who fit this criteria? Well, here are six situations to avoid in 2025. First, obvious touchdown regression candidates. Regression is a term that's thrown around a ton in fantasy. Keep in mind the difference between causation and correlation. It is certainly not guaranteed that a player who overachieves in 2024 will underachieve in 2025 or vice versa. The historical rates at which players regress negatively and positively and long-term trends are loud enough that it will be foolish to put our heads in the sand and ignore it. We're trying to highlight situations where the cost of paying for last year's touchdowns is baked into this year's draft cost, making it a potential fade. Quarterback Baker Mayfield.

As a sixth, seventh round pick, he isn't exactly free like he was in 2024. His efficiency was off the charts last year, and in fact, his eight finishes inside the top five at the position were the most among all quarterbacks thanks to his outlier season. Prior to last year, Mayfield never had a touchdown rate higher than 5.6%. And last year, his rate was all the way up at 7.2%. Running back James Cook. If you had Jimmy Cook on your squad last year, you were riding high with all those touchdowns, despite playing fewer snaps and accumulating fewer yards with fewer opportunities in 2024 than he did in 2003. He finished with a ridiculous 16 rushing scores. He scored on 7.7% of his rush attempts a year ago, a mark that it's simply impossible to replicate with 43% of his fantasy production coming from touchdowns. Wide receiver Terry McLaurin.

We finally got that incredible season for Fantasy from Scary Terry after waiting forever for him to get a real quarterback. McLaurin is one of just 10 wide receivers since 2000 with 13 or more touchdown receptions on fewer than 125 targets. Those wide receivers dropped five or more touchdowns on average the following year. We still think he could post low-end wide receiver 2 numbers for fantasy, but as a fourth round pick, he's still someone you might want to avoid. Tight-end Mark Andrews, his 11 receiving touchdowns that was tied with Mike Evans for the fourth most in all of football last year. Yet, he had fewer targets than Chigakonquo. Every tight end who caught double-digit touchdowns with fewer than 900 receiving yards, they dropped in the touchdown department by a rate of at least three touchdowns. On average, that rate was more like six.

So if Andrews continues to seed playing time to his teammate likely and his volume remains low, we can expect his touchdown numbers to come crashing back to Earth. Next up, avoid inefficient veteran running backs who are being drafted based on last year's production. While last year's fantasy points can be quite predictive, they are not the only factor for the running back position. If there's a year-over-year decline in yards per carry or they were living off of touchdowns, we need to raise some red flags. Joe Mixon's recent injury happenings have us even more spooked, but there were already tons of red flags this off season. I high delighted at them on the main show. Yes, he started out the gate hot last year, but from week 12 on, he was not even a running back three for fantasy squads. Among 46 qualifying running backs with 100 or more carries, he was...

39th and percent of carries stuffed at the line and 38th in forced missed tackle rate. You might want to cross him off the board. David Montgomery might feel dependable, but as the running back 20, off the board, it feels pretty expensive. Over the last two years in Detroit, 37% of his fantasy points have come from touchdowns. Anything over 35% for a running back is signal for regression. He's lived off of touchdowns and consider... That on 185 carries last year, his longest run was just 21 yards. Over the last five years, the only running backs to have 185 or more carries in a season and not have a longer run, 29-year-old Cream Hunt, 20 yards, and 37-year-old Frank Gore, 17 yards. While Monty has been dependable in years past, he feels a bit more fragile in 2025 with the new OC and the changes at the offensive line. Staying with the running back position.

Running backs on teams with low projected Vegas win totals usually do not hit. There are obvious exceptions to the rule. I mean, we all remember the undrafted free agent James Robinson who came out of nowhere, but over the last 10 years, the data doesn't lie. Teams that finished bottom five in running back fantasy points had an average Vegas projected win total of just seven and a half wins. Those teams averaged seven total running back touchdowns as a team. It's just a bad bet to make. In 2025, both New York teams are sitting at five and a half wins per Vegas and both look like backfields. You might want to fade in your drafts. Breece Hall's past catching work is arguably the only thing keeping him afloat as the Jets could be one of the most anemic red zone offenses in the league. Over the last two season, the Jets have ranked dead last in total rushing plays inside the 10-yard line. Breece's third round price tag remains dangerous.

Tyrone Tracy Jr. He might be locked in as the running back one for the Giants, but this is a situation that we may not want to chase in the seventh round. The Giants have the hardest strength of schedule in the league and they're favored just once all year long. Even with Cam Scadaboo's recent injuries, we expect this to eventually morph into a gross timeshare. The next situation to fade, old wide receivers changing teams. Looking back at the last decade, we have only... two top 24 fantasy season from wide receivers changing teams in age 31 or older seasons. Yet, there are a few veteran wide receivers who still carry name and can be tempting to click that button during your draft. Cooper Cup. The decline across the board is painful to watch as he has dropped in routes, snaps, receiving yards, and yards after catch east of the last three years since that magical 2021 campaign.

The variables are starting to stack up on a new team in his age 32 season with a new quarterback and a new offensive system. Don't chase the fantasy points he scored four years ago. Devante Adams. Okay, the Rams believe in Devante. They gave him the contract that says he still has it. When have the Rams ever gotten that wrong, right? Alan Robinson. Jokes aside, the cost is what makes Adams a risky pick in the third round. He never, he has never been the wide receiver two on an offense. Matthew Stafford's health is truly a wildcard. Adams can be a fine wide receiver too for your squad, but he might be drafted near his ceiling. If you want to swing away with a different wide receiver in the fourth round, we get it knowing the risk. Avoid the injury dip. Jason has brought this up multiple times in the past, but everyone thinks they're getting a sneaky discount on injured players. ADP bakes this type of risk in for us.

We tend to view injured players at the beginning of the year in a vacuum when we put them aside as guys who will definitely be great once they come back. We have an injury tracker in the Ultimate Draft kit. It is headlined by our injury analyst and licensed physical therapist Matthew Betts. He gives surgery and recovery timelines along with a wealth of historical data showing how slow players are to return and more importantly return to the fantasy performance we're used to. He found in a study of over 100 players over the last four years players that missed at least three weeks of extended practice time in training camp only 28% of them returned their ADP expectation in terms of points per game in other words 70 plus percent of the time these players were bad bets at their ADP and we would call that a fade here are a couple of injury discount situations we're just going to caution you about Chris Godwin

He suffered a fractured ankle with dislocation in week seven against the Ravens and underwent surgery in late October to stabilize that fracture and repair torn ligaments in his left ankle. Godwin required a second clean-out procedure on his ankle in late July, so his early season outlook is certainly up in the air despite being taken off the pup. As we've seen from other players who have recovered from this type of an injury, Tank Dell, Tony Pollard. It takes time to ramp up to pre-injury levels of play. The most recent news states he's expected to start practicing in week two, but that remains the best case scenario. His eighth or ninth round draft cost is not tempting, as it seems, with the emergence of rookie Emeka Ibuka. Brandon Ayuk. Ayuk was incredible a couple years ago, but after he held out all offseason waiting for a new contract, then he struggled at the start of the 2024 season in weeks one through seven prior to tearing his ACL.

IUC had just one week with eight or more fantasy points, and now he's recovering from a multi-ligament ACL plus meniscus surgery that could cause him to get off to a slow start in 2025. We expect IUC to eventually be healthy enough to produce late in the season, but he's a tough click in drafts, especially if your league doesn't have an IR spot. Historically speaking, players coming off of ACL injuries tend to be more productive in year two after the surgery. So... Let's look for Brandon Ayyuk to potentially bounce back in 2026. Najee Harris. Despite getting a solid free agent contract from the charged back in March, things have gone downhill ever since for the veteran running back. The team spent a day one pick on Omari and Hampton, who we are incredibly bullish on. Najee's unfortunate eye injury was shrouded in mystery and his return to the field has basically only included light jogging.

This isn't exactly the kind of news you want to hear for an inefficient running back, changing teams who has received zero time with the first team offense. Ignore the name and realize that spending a pick at his current ADP is truly a guessing game. He is basically off of our board until we see something pop up. No pun intended. Rookie quarterbacks generally cannot supply more than one pass catcher. Let me hit you with a few statistics to drive home this situation to avoid. We've brought this stat up before, but over the last 20 years, rookie quarterbacks have failed to sustain even one top 36 fantasy wide receiver, nearly 70% of the time. In the last 14 years, across 31 rookie quarterbacks, only 10 receivers eclipsed 1,000 total receiving yards on the season, 32%. The leading receiver for a rookie quarterback in that span averaged 71 receptions, 848 yards, and 4.7 touchdowns. It's a bad bet.

to expect a ceiling outcome with a rookie quarterback. While Calvin Ridley is being drafted appropriately, the likely outcome that their rookie wide receivers and Chigalconquo sputter and fantasy no man's land for much of the year. As exciting as Cameron Ward will be, I've lowered expectations for a team that is favored in just one game all year long. Who knows when Jackson Dart will get his first start? But if you're thinking about reaching in the bargain bin for the Giants wide receivers not name elite neighbors, might want to look elsewhere. Wondale Robinson put up one of the least valuable seasons of all time as the only wide receiver in NFL history to turn 90 or more receptions into fewer than 800 receiving yards. And he actually had 699. Darius Slayton and Jalen Hylett will be impossible to predict when they get a spike week. It's just an easy situation to avoid. Identifying potential fades is definitely not a straightforward process. We do not...

want to be the people who bring up one statistic or one tweet as a reason to put someone on our do not draft lists however when layering some of this data along with the metrics that matter at each position and draft cost we can have a more holistic approach to fantasy that does not rely on just one piece of information thanks for watching if you want to access all of the fantasy footballers draft information check out the ultimate draft kit let us help you dominate your draft see you next time