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PFF: 49ers RB Christian McCaffrey is NFL's 7th-Best Running Back

This year, lots of analysts project Christian McCaffrey to have a major bounce-back season.
Grant Cohn|
Dec 1, 2024; Orchard Park, New York, USA; San Francisco 49ers running back Christian McCaffrey (23) warms up prior to the game against the Buffalo Bills at Highmark Stadium. Mandatory Credit: Gregory Fisher-Imagn Images
Dec 1, 2024; Orchard Park, New York, USA; San Francisco 49ers running back Christian McCaffrey (23) warms up prior to the game against the Buffalo Bills at Highmark Stadium. Mandatory Credit: Gregory Fisher-Imagn Images | Gregory Fisher-Imagn Images

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It's hard to know where to rank Christian McCaffrey among NFL running backs in 2025.

In 2022 and 2023, he was arguably the best running back in the league. But he'll be 29 in June and he's coming off a season in which he played just four games. And when he played, he wasn't good. He looked like a different player.

This year, lots of analysts project Christian McCaffrey to have a major bounce-back season. That's why Pro Football Focus ranks him seventh among NFL running backs.

"We don’t need to tell you how good McCaffrey is when healthy," writes PFF's Trevor Sikkema. "He owns a 91.0 cumulative PFF rushing grade over the past three years and led all running backs in PFF WAR in 2023. All of his fully healthy seasons have yielded incredibly high volume and efficiency numbers.

"But 2024 was once again a season riddled with injuries. McCaffrey played in just four games due to calf, Achilles and knee ailments, and he will be 29 years old this year."

Here's what's so troubling about McCaffrey's performance last year: He was healthy when he was on the field. He did not rush back from bilateral Achilles tendonitis. He waited until it had gone away completely.

And when McCaffrey returned, he averaged just 4.0 yards per carry, forced just five missed tackles in four games and never topped 17 miles per hour. In 2023, he routinely hit 19 and 20 miles an hour when running. That's why PFF gave McCaffrey a lower rushing grade than Jordan Mason and Patrick Taylor Jr. last season.

So even if McCaffrey stays healthy this year, which is no guarantee -- he might not ever be the player he was before 2024.

Running backs age quickly.

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Grant Cohn
GRANT COHN

Grant Cohn has covered the San Francisco 49ers daily since 2011. He spent the first nine years of his career with the Santa Rosa Press Democrat where he wrote the Inside the 49ers blog and covered famous coaches and athletes such as Jim Harbaugh, Colin Kaepernick and Patrick Willis. In 2012, Inside the 49ers won Sports Blog of the Year from the Peninsula Press Club. In 2020, Cohn joined FanNation and began writing All49ers. In addition, he created a YouTube channel which has become the go-to place on YouTube to consume 49ers content. Cohn's channel typically generates roughly 3.5 million viewers per month, while the 49ers' official YouTube channel generates roughly 1.5 million viewers per month. Cohn live streams almost every day and posts videos hourly during the football season. Cohn is committed to asking the questions that 49ers fans want answered, and providing the most honest and interactive coverage in the country. His loyalty is to the reader and the viewer, not the team or any player or coach. Cohn is a new-age multimedia journalist with an old-school mentality, because his father is Lowell Cohn, the legendary sports columnist for the San Francisco Chronicle from 1979 to 1993. The two have a live podcast every Tuesday. Grant Cohn grew up in Oakland and studied English Literature at UCLA from 2006 to 2010. He currently lives in Oakland with his wife.

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