{"id":238086,"date":"2025-06-29T10:00:25","date_gmt":"2025-06-29T14:00:25","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/nfl\/?p=238086"},"modified":"2025-06-29T00:27:10","modified_gmt":"2025-06-29T04:27:10","slug":"christian-mccaffrey-fantasy-outlook","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/nfl\/2025\/06\/29\/christian-mccaffrey-fantasy-outlook\/","title":{"rendered":"Christian McCaffrey Fantasy Outlook"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>In late May, we wrote about Christian McCaffrey being a solid value at his then-second-round ADP. Today, we want to further preview his <a href=\"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/nfl\/category\/fantasy\/\" target=\"_blank\" target=\"_self\">fantasy outlook<\/a> and potential rise up draft boards as we get deeper into the fantasy season. McCaffrey is perhaps the ideal recency bias candidate that savvy players can take advantage of in 2025. Reports out of <a href=\"https:\/\/www.si.com\/nfl\/49ers\/news\/49ers-christian-mccaffrey-nfls-biggest-bounce-back-candidate\" target=\"_blank\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">49ers OTAs<\/a> indicate that he has no restrictions and has looked like himself.<\/p>\n<h2>Christian McCaffrey Fantasy Outlook<\/h2>\n<h3>2025 Fantasy Football Profile: Christian McCaffrey<\/h3>\n<h3>2024 In Review<\/h3>\n<p>Christian McCaffrey burned every fantasy manager that drafted him at the 1.1. I was included in that large group of fantasy managers. However, let us take the emotion out of it and dissect what we did see from last season, in the short time he was available for fantasy managers.<\/p>\n<p>In the three full games he played last season, the fantasy numbers were there for him. McCaffrey averaged just under\u00a0<a href=\"https:\/\/www.fantasypros.com\/2025\/05\/must-have-running-backs-to-draft-fantasy-football\/\" target=\"_blank\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">19<\/a>\u00a0touches, 93.7 total yards per game, and played at least 80% of the snaps. As we look further into the metrics, CMC produced a\u00a0<a href=\"https:\/\/www.fantasypros.com\/2025\/05\/must-have-running-backs-to-draft-fantasy-football\/\" target=\"_blank\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">22%<\/a>\u00a0missed tackle rate and 1.80 yards per route run. Those two data points were both top 10 among qualified running backs.<\/p>\n<figure id=\"attachment_238207\" aria-describedby=\"caption-attachment-238207\" style=\"width: 640px\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-large wp-image-238207\" src=\"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/nfl\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/5\/2025\/06\/USATSI_24729990_168400545_lowres-1024x712.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"640\" height=\"445\" srcset=\"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/nfl\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/5\/2025\/06\/USATSI_24729990_168400545_lowres-1024x712.jpg 1024w, https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/nfl\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/5\/2025\/06\/USATSI_24729990_168400545_lowres-300x208.jpg 300w, https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/nfl\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/5\/2025\/06\/USATSI_24729990_168400545_lowres-768x534.jpg 768w, https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/nfl\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/5\/2025\/06\/USATSI_24729990_168400545_lowres-1536x1067.jpg 1536w, https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/nfl\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/5\/2025\/06\/USATSI_24729990_168400545_lowres.jpg 1924w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 640px) 100vw, 640px\" \/><figcaption id=\"caption-attachment-238207\" class=\"wp-caption-text\">Nov 10, 2024; Tampa, Florida, USA; San Francisco 49ers running back Christian McCaffrey (23) runs with the ball against the Tampa Bay Buccaneers during the second half at Raymond James Stadium. Mandatory Credit: Kim Klement Neitzel-Imagn Images<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<h3>2025 Projection<\/h3>\n<p>Christian McCaffrey&#8217;s 2025 projections are the following:<\/p>\n<ul>\n<li>260 fantasy points<\/li>\n<li>206 rushing attempts<\/li>\n<li>976 yards and seven rushing touchdowns<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p>As we further project McCaffrey&#8217;s 2025 <a href=\"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/nfl\/2025\/06\/26\/patrick-mahomes-fantasy-outlook\/\" target=\"_blank\" target=\"_self\">fantasy outlook<\/a>, we have to also consider what his potential ceiling might be. In his last full season back in 2023, he produced 21 touchdowns, over 2,000 yards from scrimmage, and 24.5 fantasy points per game.<\/p>\n<p>Deebo Samuel is no longer with the 49ers; his absence helps McCaffrey in multiple ways. Samuel was often used on designated runs in goal-line situations, and McCaffrey would yield some scoring opportunities to him. Second, McCaffrey is already a lethal option in the passing game, and Samuel\u2019s absence could potentially increase his target share.<\/p>\n<p>Next projected San Francisco WR1 <a href=\"https:\/\/www.essentiallysports.com\/nfl-active-news-brandon-aiyuk-injury-doctor-confirms-return-timeline-as-kyle-shanahan-gets-worrying-eighteen-point-four-million-dollars-news\/\" target=\"_blank\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">Brandon Aiyuk<\/a> is coming off a torn ACL he suffered in week seven last season. That injury usually takes approximately 11 months for recovery, so it is possible the 49ers lean on healthy McCaffrey early on this upcoming season.<\/p>\n<h3>Christian McCaffrey Fantasy Football ADP<\/h3>\n<p>Christian McCaffrey currently ranks as the overall <a href=\"https:\/\/www.fantasypros.com\/nfl\/rankings\/best-ball-rb.php\" target=\"_blank\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">RB6<\/a> in the second running back tier. His best ball ADP now sits in the first round at <a href=\"https:\/\/www.fantasypros.com\/nfl\/adp\/best-ball-overall.php\" target=\"_blank\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">9.5<\/a>. As we stated in our McCaffrey article back in earlier this month:<\/p>\n<p>In a Drafters mini best ball championship draft, I was able to start my roster with Ashton Jeanty at pick 11 and McCaffrey at pick 14. It would be a shock if his price tag stayed once reports start trickling in from OTAs and then training camp. His current ADP sits at <a href=\"https:\/\/www.fantasypros.com\/nfl\/adp\/best-ball-overall.php\" target=\"_blank\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">12.5<\/a> and will gradually rise into the first round as the 2025 fantasy season heats up.<\/p>\n<p>The ADP rise has happened with the positive OTA reports. McCaffrey&#8217;s ADP has now risen into the first round, making him less of a value. All that being said, getting CMC in the latter half of the first round still works, but you must handcuff him with projected backup <a href=\"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/nfl\/2025\/06\/17\/invest-in-both-kaleb-johnson-and-jaylen-warren-in-best-ball-drafts\/\" target=\"_blank\" target=\"_self\">running back<\/a> Isaac Guerendo!<\/p>\n<p>Main Image: Tina MacIntyre-Yee\/Democrat and Chronicle \/ USA TODAY NETWORK via Imagn Images<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>In late May, we wrote about Christian McCaffrey being a solid value at his then-second-round ADP. Today, we want to further preview his fantasy outlook and potential rise up draft boards as we get deeper into the fantasy season. McCaffrey is perhaps the ideal recency bias candidate that savvy players can take advantage of in [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":5440,"featured_media":238206,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_lmt_disableupdate":"no","_lmt_disable":"","sfio_featured_image":false,"sfio_embed_code":"","_ef_editorial_meta_date_first-draft-date":"","_ef_editorial_meta_paragraph_assignment":"","_ef_editorial_meta_checkbox_needs-photo":"","_ef_editorial_meta_number_word-count":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[59,6431,31],"tags":[33430,6254,4793,7325],"class_list":["post-238086","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-fantasy","category-nfl-teams","category-49ers","tag-2025-fantasy-football","tag-brandon-aiyuk","tag-deebo-samuel","tag-san-francisco-49ers-news"],"modified_by":"Drew Crabtree","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/238086","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/5440"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=238086"}],"version-history":[{"count":11,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/238086\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":238208,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/238086\/revisions\/238208"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/238206"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=238086"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=238086"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=238086"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}