- Derrick Henry is great, but not as a receiver: In his entire career, Henry has totaled only 189 regular-season receptions.
- Kenneth Walker III‘s passing role may augment: Walker could see more targets than usual given Andy Reid's scheme.
- Josh Jacobs hasn't been a focal point of the Packers‘ pass game: Jacobs has traditionally operated as more of a dump-off option.
Christian McCaffrey’s receiving work alone in 2025 contributed 236.4 standard PPR points. It would have been enough to be the RB14 on its own. Meanwhile, McCaffrey may be slowing down as a runner, as evidenced by his 66.3 PFF rushing grade — dead last among backs with at least 175 rushes — as well as his lowest yards per carry — 3.8 — since his rookie season.
It’s all to say that in fantasy football, getting a running back with genuine receiving chops can be the difference between a league-winner and just a solid, low-end back that will never crack the top five at their position.
Which backs have limited receiving work capping their ceiling, no matter how great their rushing output is? Let’s dive in.
Derrick Henry, Baltimore Ravens
Fun fact: Henry has never finished as the overall RB1 in fantasy football. His closest in PPR formats was the RB3 overall in 2020.
Henry is a force of nature as a running back, but across his stellar 10-year career, he has just 189 regular-season catches and five touchdowns. He is very much this generation’s Adrian Peterson, who himself finished with 305 catches and six touchdowns across a 15-year Hall of Fame career.
Though a small sample size at 19 targets in 2025, Henry’s 59.1 PFF receiving grade was the fifth-highest of his career. Below that, he has logged four separate sub-50.0 receiving grades.
Even at his advancing age, Henry is a bonafide RB1. But his lack of receiving work has shown to consistently cap him as a top-five-to-10 running back instead of *the* RB1, even when he has been seen as the best real-life running back for large chunks of his career.
Kenneth Walker III, Kansas City Chiefs
Walker’s signing with the Chiefs may see his target volume rise considerably from the 34 he received in 2025, tied for the second-lowest of his young career so far. But Walker’s 52-target 2024 season — a campaign that was limited to 11 games due to injury — is his outlier so far, which explains why he has been a consistent medium-to-low-end RB2 in fantasy football.
It isn’t that Walker can’t catch. He has just six drops in his career. Although his 66.8 PFF receiving grade was a step down from a career-high 72.9 mark in 2024, it shows Walker can be a factor in the pass game.
A move to a team coached by Andy Reid, who has never met a screen he didn’t want to add to his playbook, may symbolize the start of an uptick in receiving work for Walker — especially as the Chiefs’ receiver room itself is still a work-in-progress. If Walker can top 50 catches, and add to his two career receiving touchdowns in a meaningful way, he could find himself in fringe RB1 territory.
Josh Jacobs, Green Bay Packers
In 2024, Jacobs finished as the RB6 overall. Of the five backs above him, only Henry and Saquon Barkley had fewer than Jacobs’ 36 catches — but Barkley had a 2,000-yard rushing season, and Henry concluded just 79 yards off that magical mark as well.
Jacobs has never been a true threat in the passing game, as evidenced by the fact it took him until 2024 to log his first ever receiving touchdown. Yet his elite 90.0 PFF receiving grade in last year’s regular season shows he is a steady outlet when Jordan Love needs him.
However, Jacobs’ -0.8-yard average depth of target — and the fact just 11 targets and 86 yards came on designed screens — indicates he is very much the dump-off option when everything else breaks down, as opposed to a genuine part of the passing game.
Jacobs is still a good, grinding back. Of his 929 yards in 2025, 717 of them came after contact, as the Packers’ 60.1 PFF run-blocking grade ranked 20th in the NFL. Yet Green Bay owned an 82.3 PFF running grade, largely carried by Jacobs.
There is a chance Jacobs is more involved in the Green Bay pass game with Romeo Doubs and Dontayvion Wicks — who combined for 127 regular-season targets in 2025 — both leaving in the offseason. But for Jacobs to crack the top five at his position for just the second time in his career (he had an RB3 finish in 2022, fittingly his best pass catch season as a pro), Jacobs will need to put together a more complete season as a receiver.
© 2026 PFF - all rights reserved.