RJ Harvey 2025 Season in Review

RJ Harvey finished his rookie year as the number 20 running back in total PPR scoring and the number 24 running back in PPR per game. Useful but uneven — 17 games of work on a 14-and-3 team that won the AFC West as the top seed, but he never locked down the lead-back role in Denver's committee. He split the backfield with J.K. Dobbins, and the split tells a story: Dobbins out-carried him 153 to 146 and nearly outgained him by a full yard a pop. Harvey's value lived in two places — the end zone, where he scored 12 total touchdowns rushing and receiving, and the passing game out of the backfield. The yards-per-carry profile is what kept him from climbing higher.

Now let's dig into the numbers. Harvey logged 146 carries for 540 yards — 3.7 a carry, well below Denver's team mark of 4.4 and miles behind Dobbins at 5.1. Under the hood it gets worse: his rushing yards over expected came in at minus 90.8, or minus 0.64 a carry, ranking 47th among qualified backs. Dobbins on the same offense? Plus 1.1 a carry, fourth in the league. This wasn't a blocking problem — it was a Harvey problem. He made his money in the passing game and at the goal line: 47 catches on 58 targets for 356 yards, five receiving touchdowns, plus seven rushing scores. The weekly profile is pure boom-or-bust — Harvey cleared 18 PPR points six different times, but finished under 8 in seven games, including four under 5. The 12.2 per-game average is a mirage. You got a 20-burger or a dud, with almost no middle ground.

The play that captures the season came Week 8 against the Cowboys. First drive, second-and-10 from the Dallas 40, Denver down 3-nothing — Harvey took a handoff left end and went 40 yards untouched. That single snap added nearly four expected points and represented the ceiling outcome that kept fantasy managers chasing him all year: when Harvey hit a crease, he was gone. Trouble is, the floor games kept showing up just as often, and on a per-carry basis the rookie got muffed by the expected-yardage models more than almost any back in football.