Bear Digest

Chicago Bears RB D'Andre Swift dubbed overvalued fantasy football pick in 2025

The Chicago Bears' questions at running back have led to their current RB1 being dubbed an overvalued fantasy asset in 2025.

Bryan Perez

Jeff Hanisch-Imagn Images
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No Chicago Bears player has dealt with more criticism since the end of the 2024 season than running back D'Andre Swift. After signing a sizable three-year, $24 million contract in free agency last offseason, Swift was expected to bring juice and field-flipping ability to the Bears' offense. Instead, he finished his first year in Chicago with a career-worst 3.8 yards per carry.

The analytics support the Swift criticism, too. He earned a 61.3 grade from Pro Football Focus last season, the second-lowest of his career. His 65.7 rushing grade also ranked second-worst out of his five years in the league.

The biggest knock on Swift was his inability to gain the tough yards. And, again, the criticism is fair. He averaged just 2.46 yards after contact, which ranked 44th in the league for players with a minimum of 100 rushing attempts.

Chicago Bears running back D'Andre Swift (4) runs the ball against the Minnesota Vikings
Jeffrey Becker-Imagn Images

As a result, Bears fans were hoping for an upgrade at running back in the early rounds of the 2025 NFL Draft. And while that didn't happen, Chicago did select former Rutgers star Kyle Monangai in the seventh round; he'll factor into the rotation this summer and could be a surprise contributor on offense this year.

Still, the path for Swift to retain the Bears' clear RB1 workload is there, which usually translates to interest from fantasy football managers. But Swift's tarnished reputation is impacting him in fantasy football circles, too.

He was recently dubbed one of five overvalued players as 2025 fantasy football draft season approaches.

"Swift finished his initial Bears season as the RB19 and struggled down the stretch," Bleacher Report's Alex Kay wrote. "While he opened the 2024 campaign with four top-12 finishes across the first seven games, he was never higher than RB13 after Week 8 and had five finishes of RB28 or worse during that stretch.

"While Swift is not being extremely overvalued, his current ADP of 69 (RB24) is a tad too optimistic. He may be worth nabbing in the sixth-round range later in the offseason if the Bears don't end up adding a quality veteran, but managers will want to monitor the situation in the Windy City closely."

It's hard to call a player overvalued when they're being drafted as the RB24, which, in a 12-team league is a fringe-starter. In fact, it feels like that's a perfectly fair ranking for Swift.

For the Bears, rolling the dice on Swift to be a productive starter in Ben Johnson's offense isn't the riskiest proposition. At worst, he'll be fine. And any shortcomings in his game can be supplemented by Monangai and Roschon Johnson. At best, he'll thrive behind Chicago's revamped offensive line and innovative playcalling.

Fantasy football managers could do a lot worse than rostering Swift as their RB2.

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Bryan Perez
BRYAN PEREZ

Bryan Perez founded and operated Bears Talk, a Chicago sports blog. Prior to that, he covered the Bears for USA Today’s Bears Wire and NBC Sports Chicago. In addition to his Chicago Bears coverage, Perez is a respected member of NFL Draft media and was a past winner of The Huddle's Mock Draft competition. Bryan's past life includes time as a Northeast scout for the CFL's Ottawa Redblacks.

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