10 Fantasy Football Sleepers Experts Draft: Running Backs

When preparing for your fantasy football drafts, knowing which players to target and others to avoid is important. The amount of information available can be overwhelming, so a great way to condense the data and determine players to draft and others to leave for your leaguemates is to use our expert consensus fantasy football rankings compared to fantasy football average draft position (ADP). In this way, you can identify players the experts are willing to reach for at ADP and others they are not drafting until much later than average. Let’s dive into a few notable fantasy football sleepers below. And check out all of the fantasy football sleepers experts love in our consensus sleeper rankings.

Fantasy Football Sleepers Experts Draft: Running Backs

Here are fantasy football sleepers the experts love to target in drafts.

Who are Fantasy Football Sleepers?

Fantasy football sleepers are players who have a strong chance to exceed expectations and become surprise difference-makers for fantasy managers.

Fantasy Football Sleepers: Running Backs

Our RB sleepers are based on a poll of experts who selected their favorite RBs with high upside. Each RB has a consensus draft rank below #45.

Rank	Running Backs	Team	Bye	Num Experts	ECR	ADP
1	J.K. Dobbins	DEN	12	7	42	40
2	Bhayshul Tuten	JAC	8	7	45	46
3	Austin Ekeler	WAS	12	4	47	47
4	Jaydon Blue	DAL	10	7	53	44
5	Jaylen Wright	MIA	12	5	50	55
6	Isaac Guerendo	SF	14	5	48	45
7	Roschon Johnson	CHI	5	4	59	59
8	Jerome Ford	CLE	9	3	49	50
9	Tyler Allgeier	ATL	5	3	52	54
10	Nick Chubb	HOU	6	3	56	48

Bhayshul Tuten found a port in the NFL with the Jacksonville Jaguars. Liam Coen and company hope that Tuten can pull their offense up the scoring ranks in 2025. Ok, that’s enough tugboat references. Tuten will compete from the jump for touches with holdovers Travis Etienne and Tank Bigsby. Etienne looked like a shell of his former self last season, so Bigsby might be the most formidable adversary to a Tuten takeover. That doesn’t mean that Tuten and Bigsby couldn’t form a solid committee. Tuten has the juice to make the most of his touches. During his final collegiate season, he ranked tenth in yards after contact per attempt and breakaway percentage and eighth in elusive rating (per PFF). Tuten is an upside flier who could pay off handsomely in 2025, much like Bucky Irving did last year.
– Derek Brown

Austin Ekeler is being left for dead in early 2025 drafts, with an ADP in the low-end RB4/high-end RB5 range. But Ekeler was productive when healthy last year and is playing in an exciting, up-and-coming offense in Washington. Ekeler scored double-digit PPR points in 8-of-12 games last season and finished RB31 in fantasy points per game. When Brian Robinson Jr. missed a pair of midseason games with a hamstring injury, Ekeler had 134 yards from scrimmage and scored three touchdowns in those two contests. I’m not expecting a return to the high-end RB1 days for the 30-year-old Ekeler, but I think he’s a value in the later rounds.
– Pat Fitzmaurice

After tearing his Achilles in Week 1 of the 2023 season, J.K. Dobbins made a successful return in 2024, rolling up 905 rushing yards and nine touchdowns for the Chargers in 13 games. Dobbins now joins the Broncos, where he’ll be part of Sean Payton’s backfield. Payton likes to use multiple running backs, and no doubt rookie R.J. Harvey will be prominently involved. But Dobbins figures to have a role as well, and it’s possible he’ll be Payton’s preferred goal-line back.
– Pat Fitzmaurice