Who Should I Start? Chuba Hubbard or Jaylen Warren

Thursday, January 8, 1:08 PM

Carolina Panthers running back Chuba Hubbard opened the 2025 season with double-digit carries in his first six games. Since then, he's seen double-digit carries just once in nine games as Rico Dowdle has pretty much taken over as Carolina's lead back. The 26-year-old has 134 carries for 511 yards (3.8 yards per carry) and only one touchdown, adding 30 receptions for 223 yards and three receiving touchdowns on 39 targets. Fantasy managers probably won't have much confidence in Hubbard as an RB2 going into the Wild-Card playoff matchup on Saturday against the Los Angeles Rams. In the last four games, Hubbard has just 23 carries for 78 yards (3.4 yards per tote) and seven catches for 29 yards. He'll be stuck in a timeshare with Dowdle again this weekend against a Rams defense that allowed just six rushing TDs to RBs during the regular season, the third-fewest in the NFL.

Friday, January 9, 5:09 PM

Pittsburgh Steelers running back Jaylen Warren (illness) returned to a full practice on Friday, according to Brooke Pryor of ESPN. Warren was under the weather and did not practice on Thursday. Now that he's back, he should be ready to rock by Monday night when the Steelers take on the Houston Texans in a Wild-Card playoff matchup. The 27-year-old back finished as the RB17 in half-PPR scoring during the regular season with 958 rushing yards and six touchdowns on 211 carries. He added 40 receptions on 45 targets for 333 receiving yards and two more TDs. Warren will be splitting the backfield workload with Kenneth Gainwell, who has become a bigger part of the offense in the second half of the season. Warren should be considered a low-end RB1 during Wild-Card weekend while going up against a Texans defense that allowed the fourth-fewest rushing yards to RBs this year.