NFL Week 1 RB Index: Predicting top 10 leading rushers for 2025 season

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Year 8 of the RB Index is upon us. Thanks to all of you who have stayed with us on the ride and, most importantly, agreed with all my takes and rankings.

So, now that we’re officially in Week 1, it’s time for me to make my predictions on which players will be among the league’s 10 leading rushers — just as I did at this point last year. Let’s jump in.

I absolutely must put Barkley at the top of this list after his 2,000-yard campaign in 2024. Everything clicked for him in his first year in Philly. He ran behind a dominant offensive line that routinely opened lanes at the line of scrimmage before he relied on his own talent to do the rest. According to Next Gen Stats, Barkley had 829 rush yards before contact in 2024, the most in a season since at least 2017, which also helped him record a league-leading 46 carries of 10-plus yards. For a hot August minute, the offensive line was a concern for Philadelphia, but Landon Dickerson‘s return to the lineup helps set Barkley and the rest of the Eagles offense up for success.

I don’t care that he’s 31 years old — no rushing list feels complete without King Henry. He has posted a top-10 finish in rushing yards in each of the last seven seasons, including a 2021 campaign in which he played just eight games. He has two rushing titles to his name (2019, 2020) and has finished second in rushing yards in each of the last three seasons. He returns to Baltimore for Year 10 to lead the NFL’s top rushing attack with no signs of slowing down. Even with the addition of DeAndre Hopkins to the pass game and the healthy return of backup RB Keaton Mitchell, Henry will undoubtedly get his opportunities in Todd Monken’s offense, especially late in games and late in the season. In his career as a starter, Henry averages 22.8 rush yards per game in the fourth quarter (most since 2000, min. 80 games) and 108.4 rush yards per game in December or later (also most since 2000, min. 25 games). There is no stopping this guy.

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