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Dynasty Winners & Losers of 2025 (Rookies)

January 5, 2026

Winners

Tyler Shough

A big winner is Tyler Shough. We all thought Jaxson Dart would get his immediate shot and Cam Ward was drafted high to be the guy in Tennessee. But I don’t know if anyone really knew what we’d see when Shough got his shot. Given that his main competition was Spencer Rattler, it was only a matter of time. He displayed excellent chemistry with his number one receiver in Chris Olave and coach that was viewed as the next big thing in Kellen Moore for quite some time. Shough posted an average of 19.2 points over the last 5 weeks (excluding week 18) with an arrow only pointing up. If the Saints can get him an extra weapon or two for 2026, New Orleans might be the next big challenger in the NFC South.

Kyle Monangai

We were able to see some phenomenal flashes from the 7th rounder out of Rutgers when Swift missed some time due to injury. His big game came against the Bengals with a 26 carry, 176 yard rushing effort and he continued to earn work once Swift returned. The one issue is that D’Andre Swift looked phenomenal himself and tied career highs in both yards and touchdowns while posting his post YPC since 2022. Ben Johnson had them both looking great. If he’s able to draw up a bit of a Lions backfield in Chicago, then have no worries. However, I sort of lean a little nervous of the situation. Given that you invested low draft capital here, I’d say you’d walk away happy with the outlook.

Harold Fannin

Fannin was a big time riser throughout the season and even came through with a touchdown during Championship week before exiting with an injury. He operated primarily as Cleveland’s TE1 even when Njoku was healthy. His overall numbers are good enough to finish the (fantasy) season as the TE5 in PPR leagues. There may be a shift in coaching this coming off season, but Fannin has no doubt locked himself in as a key contributor for the near future. A full offseason with presumed QB1 for the 2026 season should only help the budding star build on his fantastic rookie season.

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Losers

Tre Harris

The Chargers second round pick struggled to get much of anything going this season. It didn’t help that Quention Johnston took a massive step in the right direction in the early parts of the year. Couple that with Keenan Allen coming back to LA in August and the receiver room got crowded fast. He certainly had his moments, but as of week 17, he’s still short of 300 yards with just one touchdown on the year despite playing in early 50% of the snaps most weeks. All of this occurred with Ladd McConkey

Matthew Golden

I oddly feel even worse about Golden. Green Bay finally used a first round draft pick on a wide receiver for the first time in 23 years (Javon Walker, 2002) and it was definitely a bumpy ride. Golden isn’t going to reach the 525 yardage threshold either. While the Packers do have a lot of mouths to feed, you’d expect a player like Golden to come in and overtake Jayden Reed, Dontayvion Wicks, Romeo Doubs and maybe Christian Watson. Jordan Love also spread the ball to his tight ends room and did so quite a bit prior to the Tucker Kraft injury. All this to say, it was a very crowded offense. Golden has only played more than 50% snaps once since week 9 and just hasn’t been as reliable as you need him to be. He probably isn’t worth much in a trade and is definitely more of a hold at the moment.

Kaleb Johnson

How could he not be the biggest loser of the class? So many banked on Johnson being able to outwork Kenneth Gainwell and Jaylen Warren while claiming the RB1 role by mid season. Well, mid season came along and he was an “Out – Coach’s Decision” down the stretch. The memorable moment was a massive error early in the season on a return where he was unaware of a rule, costing his team a touchdown. His 28 attempts through 17 weeks of play were good enough for 69 yards and 2.5 YPC. He kind of screams Trey Sermon at this point, but that might even be insulting to what Sermon was able to accomplish. It’s so difficult to flop the way he did, but here we are. If you can sell or package him for an upgrade somehow, do it. There may still be a manager that attributes his struggles to a lack of playing time and has hope for him.

Keith, Author

Keith runs youth flag football leagues by day, and by night he hosts the podcast and writes articles with the confidence of a man who’s been rushing quarterbacks since dial-up. A longtime flag football DE and lifelong Falcons fan, he’s no stranger to heartbreak and enjoys watching the bears get slaughtered each week. Equal parts coach, critic, and chaos, Keith calls it like he sees it… even if it hurts.