Fantasy football preseason hype can be a wicked seductress. Try as you might, it’s really hard to remain impervious to the hyperbolic player reports that relentlessly wash over you like a storm event off the North Shore of Hawaii. Going into every summer, I tell myself to ignore the noise and remain steadfast to logical, rational thinking. But try as I might, I have to admit I’ve been infected with TreVeyon Henderson mania.

Henderson may be the king of 2025 preseason puffery. He’s been steamed up to the mid-30s in late-August fantasy drafts thanks to some scintillating demonstrations of his talent during preseason games and the accompanying adulation of the fantasy community about said performances. In Michael Salfino’s recent article on the biggest preseason ADP risers, he had this to say about Henderson:

“They’re already working on his bust for Canton after his kickoff return TD in the preseason. I’m shocked the new price is only 38.6 (overall), frankly. People are drafting Henderson in the second round. I don’t get the hype, though I’m always trying to fade hype… Can Henderson be a bell cow? It never worked out for him health-wise at Ohio State on Saturdays, and now it will happen on Sundays in the NFL? We need to tamp down this fire.”

Honestly, I’ve shared Salfino’s sentiment for most of the summer. But, the more and more I’ve contemplated Henderson, passing his latest ADP through the logic lens, I’ve actually become more of a buyer than a seller.

Salfino’s big question, and mine, is “Does Henderson have to be a bell cow to deliver a commensurate ROI at his current positional price (RB15)?”

With elite breakaway ability and a top-tier passing game resume (both as a receiver and pass protector), Henderson gets a lot of comps to Jahmyr Gibbs, who wasn’t a bell cow when he finished RB9 in PPR scoring his rookie season with Detroit — backfield partner David Montgomery averaged 16.8 touches per game to Gibbs’ 15.6. It’s true that the Lions had a better offensive infrastructure to work with than we expect Henderson will have. But can we expect Henderson to get a similar level of touches to that of Gibbs’ rookie season? And, if he does, what does a reasonable line of production for Henderson look like?

To answer the touches question, let’s first start with our own Jake Ciely’s expectations. He has Henderson down for 181 rushes and 51 receptions. Interesting, because Gibbs’ inaugural season resulted in 182 carries and 52 catches. I see you, Jake! Alright, what about ESPN’s Mike Clay? Even more bullish at 225 carries and 43 catches (267 touches). Pro Football Focus (PFF)? On the light side, at 164 carries and 35 receptions (199 touches). Alright, how about one more — Yahoo? 199 carries and 40 receptions (239 touches).

OK, three of those four projections have Henderson checking in under 240 touches. So, with something less than 240 touches, what’s it going to take for Henderson to deliver a top 15 RB campaign? Looking at FFToday’s PPR scoring for the past 24 seasons dating back to 2001, the RB15 has scored 213.8 PPR points on average. Last season was an abnormally high 245.6  points (Chuba Hubbard), the second-highest RB15 finish of this span — 256.1 (Duce Staley in 2002) was the RB15 high-water mark. The lowest RB15 total since 2001 was in 2015 (188.1, DeMarco Murray). In fact, that was a drought period for RB15 production, with 2014-2017 delivering a RB15 average of 194.4 PPR points. The past five seasons, the average RB15 finish is 217.4, which aligns pretty closely with the entire 24-year mark of 213.8 despite the 2024 spike year. So, 213.8 is a good target number for Henderson. If he produced that return, he’d at least be close to justifying his ranking.

So, let’s look for rookie running backs who have touched the ball 239 times or less in the past 24 years and who also scored 213.8 fantasy points. It happened eight times in that span — an average of once every three seasons. But seven of those eight running backs have accomplished this feat in the past 12 seasons, a rate of once every 1.7 seasons. Let’s take a look at our poster RBs for Henderson to emulate:

As you can see, there’s a few ways to skin this RB15 cat, but the average numbers for the backs who managed this level of production on the requisite limited workload roughly look like this: 210 touches, 772.5 rush yards, 54.5 receptions, 494 receiving yards, 10 TDs.

If I’m looking for the running back who gives me the most hope for Henderson’s prospects in this mix, it’s Giovani Bernard. Here’s some similarities between the two running backs:

• Bernard was the 37th pick in 2013 NFL Draft; Henderson was the 38th pick in 2024 NFL Draft
• Bernard was listed at 5-foot-9, 205 pounds; Henderson is listed at 5-foot-10, 202 pounds
• Both were lauded for pass protection and receiving skills coming out of college
• Bernard handled the short side of the ball-calling platoon as a rookie, ceding 220 carries and 7 rushing TDs to (former Patriot!) BenJarvis Green-Ellis, who finished as the RB40 —right about where Rhamondre Stevenson sits in current ADP.

Bernard was RB13 despite just 170 carries and fewer than double-digit TDs (8). He was powered by his receiving-game work, as his 32.1 receiving yards per game ranked third among this crew. If Henderson is going to finish shy of 200 carries, he’s gonna likely need north of 50 catches to have a chance at returning his draft value. After all, you can’t expect him to thread the needle like David Johnson did, finishing RB8 as a rookie despite a mere 161 touches.

So about that receptions upside. Henderson’s landing spot has to be considered idyllic in terms of his passing game ceiling. In 18 seasons calling shots for an NFL offense, be it as head coach or offensive coordinator, Josh McDaniels’ leading receiver at the running back position has averaged right at 50 receptions. And when he was able to find an RB especially adept in the passing game, he utilized him to the hilt. If you haven’t guessed, I’m talking about fantasy legend James White, who had a four-year run with McDaniels from 2016-2019 in which he averaged 68.8 receptions and had a RB7 finish in 2018 with just 181 touches (87 catches) and a RB19 finish in 2019 on just 139 touches (72 catches).

So the path to RB15 seems attainable for Henderson given his profile and likely role for the Patriots. Of course, like any running back in fantasy football, the best ability is availability. Of the eight running backs listed in the chart above, they all played at least 15 games, and you might be pointing back to the top of this article to where Salfino cast aspersions at Henderson’s durability — “It never worked out for him health-wise at Ohio State on Saturdays…” But I look at his four-year Buckeyes career, and I see eight missed games — three as a junior for a rib injury sustained from what he called  a “cheap shot” by a Notre Dame player and five as a sophomore for a broken foot. In total, he played 47 of a possible 55 games (85%), and averaged 14.2 touches in those contests.

Let’s say he plays 15 games (88%) in the coming season and averages 14 touches. Call it 10 carries and, with the lack of receiving talent in New England, let’s say four catches per game, which nets out to 150 carries and 60 catches. If he averages 4.5 yards per carry and 8.0 yards per catch, that’s 675 rushing yards and 480 receiving yards. For reference, in 2024, there were 17 RBs who averaged 8+ yards per catch (min. 30 catches), 19 RBs who averaged 4.5 yards per carry (min. 100 rushes), and six RBs who accomplished both (including last year’s rookie Bucky Irving). So these are reasonable benchmarks for Henderson to attain. And let’s set his TD total at a modest 7. In PPR, that nets out to 217.5 points — that’s 0.1 better than the RB15 average over the past five seasons. In 15 of the past 24 seasons, that would have returned at least RB15 value.

And that, my friends, is what I consider to be a logical, back-of-the-napkin explanation for how TreVeyon Henderson delivers on his fantasy football hype in 2025. He’s my RB15, and in my three upcoming 12-team drafts between now and the season’s kickoff game, I will readily accept him if available anywhere in Round 4.

(Photo of TreVeyon Henderson: Brad Rempel-Imagn Images)