Fantasy Football Today: How to identify mid-round steals you need to draft to help you win your 2025 leagues
Over the last three years, these players have returned insane value on their draft price

The Fantasy Football season has arrived -- well not quite. We've arrived at OTAs, minicamps and then we break until the information season that is training camp. However, now is the time to get started on your preparation for your 2025 Fantasy Football drafts. The Fantasy Football Today team has kicked things into high gear with podcasts and live shows delivered to pinpoint the players you want to target in all different rounds of your draft -- and also those you want to avoid. On a recent episode of Fantasy Football Today, Adam Aizer was joined by Dave Richard and Jamey Eisenberg to break down their favorite mid-round draft picks who will ultimately end up as steals -- and hopefully the difference makers in your Championship lineups.
Before we break down the players who Jamey, Dave, and Adam believe will help you win your leagues in the middle rounds of 2025 drafts, let's take a look back at who these players were for us in our last three Fantasy draft classes (2022-2024). Last draft season, the biggest draft steals in the middle rounds was a rookie. Several veterans joined him and they came at all three different positions. In the two seasons before that, some of the biggest mid-round steals came from the tight end position. One of those players was counted out entirely as a Fantasy bust for the 2022 season before it happened. The moral of the story? You can find a mid-round steal at any position.
For this exercise, we are following the criteria that a mid-round steal has to have an ADP on Fantasy Pros between 49-96 overall prior to the season.
Here were the biggest mid-round steals in each of the last three Fantasy Football seasons:
Best mid-round steals in 2024
*Also, in an effort to find a correlation between where the mid-round steal was drafted and if he was part of a productive NFL offense, Aizer has organized the following players by where they were drafted overall (EX: Malik Nabers #49) and where their team's offense finished overall in points per game (EX: Giants finished 31st in points per game so Nabers has "31st" alongside him).
- WR Malik Nabers (#49 … 31st)
- James Conner (56th … 13th)
- George Kittle (57th … 14th)
- Aaron Jones (59th … 9th)
- Joe Burrow (62nd … 8th)
- David Montgomery (62nd … 1st)
- Tee Higgins (62nd … 8th)
- Rashee Rice (68th … 12th)
- Terry McLaurin (72nd … 5th)
- Chris Godwin (76th … 4th)
Bottom line: Other than Malik Nabers (49th pick), the true standouts were on Top-14 offenses, and as we got later into the middle rounds they were all on Top 12 offenses or Top 8 offenses if you exclude Rashee Rice.
Best mid-round steals in 2023
- DJ Moore (51st … 17th)
- Alvin Kamara (62nd … 9th)
- James Conner (65th … 23rd)
- Rachaad White (66th … 20th)
- James Cook (71st … 6th)
- Brandon Aiyuk (72nd … 1st)
- Isiah Pacheco (73rd … 14th)
- Mike Evans (76th … 20th)
- Evan Engram (78th … 12th)
- Michael Pittman (82nd … 13th)
- David Njoku (86th … 10th)
- David Montgomery (86th … 5th)
- Dak Prescott (90th … 5th)
Bottom line: Here we have another fairly strong correlation between players breaking out as mid-round steals while also being part of a top-half NFL scoring offense, but there were some exceptions.
Best mid-round steals in 2022
- Josh Jacobs (49th … 12th)
- Breece Hall (7 games) (52nd … 28th)
- Jalen Hurts (55th … 2nd)
- Joe Burrow (60th … 6th)
- Chris Godwin (62nd … 24th)
- Amon-Ra St. Brown (64th … 5th)
- TJ Hockenson (66th … 5th)
- Amari Cooper (68th … 17th)
- Dallas Goedert (71st … 2nd)
- Damien Pierce (84th … 31st)
- Miles Sanders (85th … 2nd)
- Tony Pollard (86th … 4th)
- DeVonta Smith (90th … 2nd)
Bottom line: Once again we see a lot of good offenses here attached to these mid-round steals.
Who will break out from the mid-rounds in 2025?
With the knowledge of who broke out and why from the past three draft seasons, Jamey sees Browns wide receiver Jerry Jeudy as a potential mid-round steal in 2025.
"I'm operating under the assumption that Joe Flacco will be the starter. I'm taking Jeudy over someone like Chris Olave. If you look at how Jeudy finished so strong in 2024, the lack of passing options around Jeudy, and what Flacco still brings to the table, Jeudy has a chance to finish top-10 in targets at the wide receiver position in the entire NFL," Jamey said on Fantasy Football Today.
Jamey further went into detail about what Jeudy was able to accomplish in 2024, why we may be underrating his production, and the opportunities that are ahead for him vs. some of the receivers who are currently being drafted ahead of him.
Rookie running backs drafted in the middle rounds have often led to mid-round steals. FFt pinpointed a pair of rookie running backs in TreVeyon Henderson and Kaleb Johnson who could be those guys in 2025.
Dave "loves the talent" with Henderson but is concerned about the fit in Josh McDaniels' Patriots system given his history with running backs. Jamey views it in the opposite fashion. He referenced how McDaniels has maximized running backs in the passing game throughout his history calling plays and designing offenses. He also believes the lack of proven talent at receiver will lead to more opportunities for Henderson in the pass game.
For more mid-round steal predictions for 2025, you'll have to check out the full episode on Fantasy Football Today.