2025 Underdog Best Ball Fades at ADP

We are two weeks into Underdog’s Big Board contest for the 2025 NFL season, which includes undrafted rookies for the first time. After nearly 12 Big Boards, preferences on who to reach for and who to fade at ADP are becoming a little clearer for me. 

When the Big Board opened, I discussed rookie values in my first article of the best ball season. At the time, Travis Hunter, the Heisman-winning phenom, was a calculated dice roll for me at WR69. I liked it even more when he opened as WR73. That’s a WR7.

However, in the two weeks since this contest opened, Hunter’s ADP has skyrocketed to 119 (WR57!). I drafted Tre Harris, Ole Miss rookie wide receiver with red zone potential, four picks after Hunter in a Big Board contest Friday. The uncertainty of what position Hunter will play is too high to take him above a player like Xavier Legette (ADP 131, WR60). 

It got me thinking, though: what other players am I fading repeatedly at their ADP?

2025 Best Ball Fades

Isiah Pacheco, RB, Kansas City Chiefs

(ADP 86, RB27)

You don’t need me to tell you Isiah Pacheco didn’t resemble his usual high-knee, ground-pounding self after returning from injury last season. Last preseason, Pacheco was going as high as the early second round in August BBM drafts. Unfortunately, the second-year running back suffered a fibula fracture in Week 2 that held him out until Week 13 and stymied his efficiency when he did return for the remainder of the regular season and the playoffs. 

His best outing after his return was his first game back from against the Raiders, in which he compiled a modest seven rushes for 44 yards, one reception for five yards and no touchdowns. That was his best outing. 

From that game forward, he did not top 3.9 yards per carry in any of his remaining games and did not score a touchdown. From when he returned in Week 13 through the end of the Chiefs’ starters’ regular season in Week 16, Andy Reid gave Pacheco 43 carries that went for 157 rushing yards. Not great. Per FTN’s StatsHub, what’s worse is that of the 29 running backs who carried the ball at least 40 times during that span, he ranked 25th in EPA, 23rd in success rate and 23rd in yards after contact.  

Pacheco has shown the ability to recover in the past, as he reportedly played an entire season with a torn labrum in 2022 and bounced back from finger and shoulder injuries in 2023 to make a solid playoff run. Still, Kansas City will likely address running back with at least one draft pick this April, and in The Big Board, I want to take as many shots as I can at rookies and young players before free agency, the combine and the draft hit.

It’s an ugly area of ADP for running back (Tony Pollard, Aaron Jones Sr., Jaylen Warren), so I tend to opt to go wide receiver (Ricky Pearsall, Matthew Golden, Josh Downs) and select from the group of running backs in the following group (J.K. Dobbins, Rhamondre Stevenson, Zach Charbonnet) in the next round.

Brandon Aiyuk, WR, San Francisco 49ers

(ADP 73, WR40)

With last week’s news of the 49ers granting Deebo Samuel Sr.’s representatives the opportunity to seek a trade for the former All-Pro, San Francisco’s receiver room is potentially wide open for targets alongside George Kittle. The Niners still need a trade partner, but this can bode well for young pass catchers in the Bay Area. 

Brandon Aiyuk made headlines last offseason with a contract holdout that the 49ers ultimately acquiesced in the 11th hour, just days before the regular season began. The rust showed early in Aiyuk’s 2024 performance on the field before he tore his ACL and MCL in Week 7, placing him on IR for the remainder of the season. 

In Weeks 1-6 of the 2024 season, 28 pass catchers received at least 35 targets. Among those 28 qualified pass catchers, Aiyuk ranked 14th in adjusted catch rate, 13th in yards per route run and ninth in explosive catch rate. Those seem reasonable, right? Well, until you compare them to his 2023 season, where he led the league in explosive catch rate, averaged 3.2 yards per route run (third in the NFL), and secured a 96.2% adjusted catch rate (sixth in the NFL). In short, the part of his game needed to warrant his ADP weren’t there before the injury. 

For a player that’s always considered one of the best against man coverage, this is a brutal blow to his ability to get off the line versus press, to square-off the top of routes, and to explode after the catch. 

If we Samuel (ADP 71, WR37) gets traded, that leaves Jauan Jennings (ADP 76, WR41) and Ricky Pearsall (ADP 85, WR46) with similar ADPs. 

I prefer most players at this ADP to Aiyuk, but some names going at or around his ADP that I like as values are Tyrone Tracy Jr. (ADP 72, RB24), Luther Burden (ADP 73, WR39), Jalen McMillan (ADP 77, WR42), and all of his San Francisco teammates listed above.