The top twenty. From here every name is a genuine star, and the gaps between them are measured in fractions. Numbers 20 to 11, as the offGrid writers saw the 2025 season.
20. George Pickens – WR, Dallas Cowboys
(AVP: 15.1)
The move from Pittsburgh to Dallas was supposed to be a gamble on temperament. Instead, it produced the best football of his career.
Freed as the perfect complement to CeeDee Lamb, Pickens went for well over 1,400 yards and earned second-team All-Pro honours, his contested-catch brilliance finally paired with the volume to match. Dallas now faces the pleasant problem of paying two elite receivers; Pickens earned every dollar of the conversation.
19. Trey McBride – TE, Arizona Cardinals
(AVP: 14.8)
In a golden era for the position, McBride has quietly become one of its very best.
He is Kyler Murray’s most reliable target by a distance, a sure-handed, yards-after-catch machine who functions as a de facto number one receiver out in the desert. The blocking is coming along; the receiving has already arrived, in full.
18. Danielle Hunter – EDGE, Houston Texans
(AVP: 14.0)
Deep into a long career, Hunter is still producing sacks at a rate that shames men a decade younger.
Alongside Will Anderson Jr., he gives Houston one of the most fearsome edge duos in football, and his consistency, year after year, has become almost boringly reliable. The burst that defined his prime has simply refused to fade.
17. Penei Sewell – OT, Detroit Lions
(AVP: 13.4)
The best right tackle in football, and it is not an especially close race.
Sewell moves like a skill player and finishes like a wrecking ball, and Detroit’s dominant rushing attack begins with the doors he opens on the right edge. In pass protection he is nearly airtight; in the run game he is a highlight waiting to happen.
16. Bijan Robinson – RB, Atlanta Falcons
(AVP: 12.5)
Everything the hype promised, and then a little more. Robinson is now, unarguably, one of the best backs in the league.
He is a three-down force, dangerous as a runner and as a receiver, and Atlanta’s offence lives and dies by how often it remembers to feed him. Balance, vision, hands; there is no part of the position he does not do well.
15. Jonathan Taylor – RB, Indianapolis Colts
(AVP: 12.1)
When the Colts commit to running Jonathan Taylor, the Colts are hard to beat. In 2025 they remembered that for long, punishing stretches.
Taylor was among the league’s most productive backs, a downhill runner with breakaway gears who carried Indianapolis’s offence whenever the passing game wobbled. Give him a lead and a fourth quarter and few players in football are more miserable to try and stop.
14. Christian Gonzalez – CB, New England Patriots
(AVP: 11.6)
The best young cornerback in football, and a cornerstone of the Patriots side that stunned everyone by reaching the Super Bowl.
Gonzalez has the length, speed and ball skills to travel with anyone, and New England’s remarkable, road-warrior run to Super Bowl LX was built on a defence he headlined. He shuts down half the field and lets the rest of Mike Vrabel’s plan do its work.
13. Devon Witherspoon – CB, Seattle Seahawks
(AVP: 11.2)
The heartbeat of the league’s best defence, and now a champion for it.
Witherspoon plays with a ferocity that sets Seattle’s tone, blitzing off the slot, erasing receivers and hitting like a safety, and the Seahawks’ march to a title ran straight through the standard he set. On a unit full of talent, he is the one who makes it mean something, and is very deserving of a new contract.
12. Jahmyr Gibbs – RB, Detroit Lions
(AVP: 10.9)
Lightning in a Lions uniform. Gibbs might be the single most explosive player in the entire league.
He can take any touch the distance, and Detroit’s offence weaponises him as a runner and a receiver in ways that break defensive assignments before the snap. The frightening part is that he shares a backfield; imagine the numbers if he did not.
11. Patrick Surtain II – CB, Denver Broncos
(AVP: 10.1)
The 2024 Defensive Player of the Year did nothing in 2025 to suggest the honour was a one-off.
Surtain is a true shutdown corner, the sort quarterbacks strike off their reads entirely, and Denver’s excellent defence is built on the freedom that gives everyone else. He makes elite receivers disappear for three hours at a time; there is no higher praise at the position.