- D.J. Giddens could earn immediate playing time: Giddens was a fifth-round pick by the Indianapolis Colts, where the third-down running back battle is wide open.
- Giddens could be a fantasy starter in his rookie year: Jonathan Taylor has dealt with multiple injuries over the last two seasons, and he hasn’t been as effective of a runner compared to his peak. This could lead to games where Giddens is the lead runner.
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Estimated Reading Time: 5 minutes
PFF’s Fantasy Football Player Profile series delivers the most in-depth fantasy football analysis available for the 2025 season.
Using PFF’s exclusive data, we evaluate player performance, competition for touches and how teammates and coaching staffs will impact each player's fantasy football outlook.
Last updated: 7:15 a.m. Tuesday, May 6
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Player performance
Giddens started his college career in 2022 as the backup to Deuce Vaughn at Kansas State. While Vaughn was the clear feature back, Giddens graded slightly better. After Vaughn’s departure to the Dallas Cowboys, Giddens served as the feature back in 2023 and 2024.
Giddens was a strong runner throughout his three years at Kansas State. He was always strong at breaking 10-plus-yard runs but could break some runs even further in 2024, leading to better cumulative stats while at the same volume. On the downside, he was a little less consistent on a per-play basis, which hurt his EPA and PFF rushing grade. He was one of the few running backs in the draft class who was more experienced on gap runs than zone runs.
Giddens was given plenty of opportunities in the passing game, leading to a fine receiving yards per game total, but wasn’t the most effective on a per-play basis. In his final season, he dropped five passes compared to 21 receptions and fumbled twice, which tanked his receiving grade in both 2024 and during his time at college. However, our draft guide notes he “shows decent potential as a receiver.”
At 6 feet and 214 pounds, he is one of the bigger running backs of the 2025 draft class. He ranked in the 83rd percentile or better in hand size, 40-yard dash time, 10-yard split, vertical jump and broad jump.
Projected role
Giddens joins an Indianapolis Colts team where Jonathan Taylor has been the clear lead running back for five years. Trey Sermon was the primary backup last season but didn’t re-sign with the team, while Tyler Goodson was the secondary backup. The team added Khalil Herbert in free agency and drafted Giddens.
Taylor played 80% of the Colts' offensive snaps in games where he was active, a career-high. Giddens' quickest path to playing time would likely be on third downs, where the role appears wide open. Every running back on the roster is better on early downs than third downs, but Giddens' yards per route run in college were relatively strong.
Giddens’ most direct path to fantasy value is if he can win Taylor's primary backup job. Over the last two seasons, Taylor has had three injuries, which have cost him three or four games each. While Sermon and Goodson typically split time when that happens, there is a chance Giddens can play well enough to be the primary running back if Taylor is out. He would need to beat out Herbert, who played well earlier in his career but failed to make a significant contribution with the Chicago Bears or Cincinnati Bengals last season.
There is also a chance that Giddens can simply take some playing time away from a healthy Taylor, who was at his best in 2021, leading the league in rushing attempts, yards and touchdowns while posting a 90.0 rushing grade. His grades have been declining ever since. He was receiving a positive run grade on over half of his runs in 2021, but that rate has dropped each season since then. He received a positive grade on 38.4% of his runs last season, which ranked 40th out of 47 running backs with at least 100 carries. Taylor had the fifth-most rushing attempts last season, so his cumulative numbers were still substantial, and he made some long runs, but part of his success was the offensive line, and he wasn’t as consistent from one run to the next as he was in past years.
There is a chance injuries have taken their toll on Taylor, but he can rebound next season. However, there is also a chance he’s never the same back he was a few years ago, in which case the door is open for Giddens to simply out-play him.
Impact of teammates
This year will be Shane Steichen’s third as head coach with Indianapolis. He’s typically called more runs the typical coach, but he doesn’t call too many throws to running backs. This means that even if Giddens wins the third-down job, he won’t get many touches. The Colts have tended to call more gap runs than zone runs, which makes Giddens a good fit in the offense.
If he can earn playing time on rushing downs, he will get significant help from the offensive line. Bernhard Raimann and Quenton Nelson have been the left side of the Colts' offensive line for the past three years, and both had their best seasons during that stretch, finishing with run block grades in the 80.0s. Right tackle Braden Smith has earned an 86.0-plus run-blocking grade in three of the last six seasons. The Colts went through several players at center, right guard and tackle when players were injured last year. Both Tanor Bortolini and Matt Goncalves played well for mid-round rookies in their limited starts. If the two young players can take another step forward, the Colts could have one of the best lines in the NFL.
Bottom line
Given Jonathan Taylor’s injury history, Giddens is a fine late-round dart throw, but he will need to at least beat out Khalil Herbert for the backup job to have any fantasy value this season.
Footnotes
- Statistics in tables and charts were chosen based on their ability to predict future fantasy performance on a per-game or per-opportunity basis or to describe the player relative to others at the same position.
- “Opportunities” are defined as passing dropbacks, rushing attempts and routes run as a receiver.
- Numbers are provided either by season or based on the past three years. For rookies, only college statistics are included. For non-rookies, only NFL statistics are considered, regardless of whether they played in college within the previous three years.
- As college competition is easier than NFL competition, most rookies are likely to see a decline from their historical numbers.
- Only FBS data is considered for college players and comparisons.
- Kneel-downs are removed from rushing data to provide cleaner quarterback rushing rate statistics.
- The table colors in this article range from blue (indicating good/high) to red (indicating bad/low).
- All percentiles and color codings compare the given player to others with a high sample of opportunities. Generally, the cutoff is one-third of the possible opportunities in the sample. If a player does not meet the threshold, they are still included in the comparison, though their results may appear better or worse than expected due to the smaller, less predictive sample size.
- Information on utilization classifications and their importance can be found here for running backs, wide receivers and tight ends.
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