Should You Draft Omarion Hampton or Chuba Hubbard in 2025?

Welcome to the third installment of Fantasy Faceoff.

In this weekly series, we look at two players at the same position with similar price tags per current Underdog ADP (until we get reliable redraft ADP later this summer). This exercise places these two players side-by-side while outlining the cases for and against each in order to determine which is the better fantasy draft pick in 2025.

Our subjects for this one are Los Angeles Chargers rookie Omarion Hampton (ADP RB14) and Carolina Panthers running back Chuba Hubbard (ADP RB18).

(All stats per FTN’s NFL StatsHub unless otherwise noted)

Omarion Hampton, RB, Los Angeles Chargers

The Case for Hampton

Calling back to my pre-draft analysis of Hampton, this is a stout athlete with a rare size/speed combo. I honestly didn’t see a considerable gap between him and Ashton Jeanty as prospects entering the league.

To be clear, that’s not me saying, “Oh, these guys are basically the same,” but it’s just more of a compliment to the profile and efforts of the former North Carolina bruiser.

He operated as a high-volume player in college, tallying back-to-back seasons with at least 1,500 rushing yards to end his career en route to being named to consecutive first-team All-American honors. Hampton also showcased a penchant for receiving work (67 receptions since 2023, per Sports Reference). We’re looking at a guy capable of being a three-down player in an NFL offense.

I went into some specifics about this in the first edition of this series when highlighting Jeanty, but to reiterate here, first-round running backs are historically good bets for fantasy. According to Stathead, all but one (Rashaad Penny) of the 13 running backs drafted in the first round of the NFL Draft over the past decade recorded at least 200 touches in their debut campaigns.

The workload will likely be there for Hampton at some point in 2025, and he’ll be in a good offense for rushing, as well. The Jim Harbaugh system is quite run-heavy. Unfortunately, nailing down team stats for the University of Michigan proved to be a bit difficult. Still, at least anecdotally speaking, college football fans know how much the Wolverines loved pounding the rock during Harbaugh’s tenure from 2015 to 2023.

This dimension of the offense carried over into the professional ranks as well, evidenced by the fact that the Chargers tied for the 10th-highest number of team rushing attempts (463) in the NFL last season. In totality, Hampton and Harbaugh are a match made in football heaven.

The Case Against Hampton

Hampton is an excellent player, although he doesn’t have outright control of the RB1 job from the jump. The Chargers have some competition for touches he’ll need to beat out.

A former first-round running back himself, Najee Harris inked a one-year deal with the Chargers this offseason. The team isn’t paying him a ton to be there (one-year, $5.25 million deal), but Harris is no slouch. He handled at least 300 touches annually across his four seasons on the Pittsburgh Steelers with no fewer than 1,000 rushing yards in each campaign.

It’s not entirely uncommon nor unprecedented for teams to keep their future workhorse back on ice to begin their career, either (think 2018 Nick Chubb with Carlos Hyde in tow). There’s a realistic chance that the breakout changing of the guard won’t immediately take place, so fantasy managers may need to wait for Hampton until the latter half of the year.

This also feels like a good time to point out that the Chargers’ run game wasn’t particularly efficient last year. That starts with an offensive line that ranked in the bottom-third of the league in both Adjusted Line Yards (4.13 – 23rd) and stuff rate (23% – 28th) in 2024. Not great to see!

Some of this lack of efficacy can certainly be attributed to shaky running back personnel. A backfield led by J.K. Dobbins wasn’t optimal, given his lengthy injury history, and both Gus Edwards and Kimani Vidal stunk in their own right last season. Still, those woes do not make a wholesale excuse.

The Chargers simply weren’t exceptional on the ground, finishing last year ranked 16th in EPA per rush attempt (-0.035) as a collective, and we can’t ignore that. Does replacing those backs with Harris and Hampton correct some of these issues? Possibly, but the line blocking in front of them must also take a step forward.

Chuba Hubbard, RB, Carolina Panthers

The Case for Hubbard

Hubbard may be one of the more underappreciated runners in the NFL today.

After spending the first two years of his career playing second (sometimes third) fiddle to Christian McCaffrey, the 2023 season saw the Canadian export breakout from Week 12 on. He tallied 494 rushing yards on 134 carries and finished as the RB20 in PPR points per game (14.4) in this seven-game window.

Hubbard followed up these efforts with a robust 2024 season campaign in which he had the ninth-highest success rate (44.4%) among all qualified running backs and a 0.047 EPA per rush attempt that stood seventh-best in that group. In terms of raw counting stats, the former fourth-round pick is one of only 16 running backs to amass 1,000 rushing yards last year (1,195 – eighth-best).

Looking through the fantasy lens, his 17.8 PPR points per game ranked ninth-best at the position ahead of some more prominent names like Breece Hall of the Jets (15.7) and Rams bell cow Kyren Williams (16.7).

The Panthers rewarded Hubbard for his performance, signing him to a four-year, $33.2 million contract extension in early November. This front office clearly believes in Hubbard after putting their literal money where their mouth is.

Also, as much as we can criticize the Panthers’ offense, particularly regarding their passing game, their offensive line was stellar at opening holes for Hubbard in 2024. As a unit, they ended the season ranking fourth best in the league in adjusted line yards (4.73).

This franchise has invested significant resources into its line in recent years, including massive free-agent dollars spent on guards Robert Hunt and Damien Lewis last offseason, and they deserve a lot of credit in this area.

The Case Against Hubbard

While Hubbard might be a strong runner, his lack of pass-catching is a significant hole in his game.

First, consider that Bryce Young registered the seventh-lowest checkdown rate (10.4%) among all qualified quarterbacks in 2024 — this offense isn’t really looking to throw to the running back to begin with. But even when they do, Hubbard doesn’t do much with his aerial touches.

We’re looking at a player who has averaged a mere 2.9 targets, 2.4 receptions and 11.9 receiving yards per game over the past two seasons combined. To be clear, there are no typos or math-related errors; Hubbard really is just that ineffective with his hands.

It’s not like he did much of that work at the college level either. Across three seasons at Oklahoma State from 2018 through 2020, Hubbard averaged just 17.7 receptions per year, per Sports Reference.

So, if we wanted, we could sit here and predict who will handle the pass-catching work (rookie Trevor Etienne? Rico Dowdle?) in Carolina. However, as established, the Panthers straight up do not throw the ball to that position often. It would be a wasted effort to parse through this aspect of the backfield.

Sometimes matters really are that simple. You’re not likely to get a ton of extra production from Hubbard in half- or full-PPR scoring formats, and his ceiling is somewhat limited as a result.

The Verdict: Omarion Hampton

Both of these players come with some concerns. It’s even possible one of them might not lead their backfield for the entire season. Even so, Hampton is the more well-rounded player of these two.

My colleague Jeremy Popielarz agrees with my assessment as well. In his official pre-draft profile of Hampton, Popielarz states that the rookie “is above average in the passing game,” citing his “soft hands” and range as notable traits.

That’s the key difference between the two players here, and given that plenty of leagues these days use some form of PPR scoring (half- or full-point), the edge has to go to the player who is likely to catch the ball more often.

No disrespect to Hubbard. I think he’s an excellent pick, but you’ve got to take the extra fantasy upside where you can get it.