2025 Baltimore Ravens Fantasy Preview: Is Zay Flowers a breakout candidate?

NBC Sports

18-06-2025

John Harbaugh's 17th year on the job was the first time the Ravens led the league in offensive yardage. They did so their way, melting every efficiency metric while leading in rushing and clocking a distant 30th in dropbacks.
2024 Stats (rank)
Points per game: 30.5 (3rd)
Total yards per game: 424.9 (1st)
Plays per game: 62.1 (16th)
Dropbacks per game: 34.1 (30th)
Dropback EPA per play: 0.33 (1st)
Rush attempts per game: 32.6 (2nd)
Rush EPA per play: 0.05 (2nd)
How do you top Lamar Jackson's MVP-caliber year and Derrick Henry rushing for the 11th most yards in NFL history?
That's a rhetorical question, of course. There's nowhere to go but down after your offense averaged the second most yards per play in NFL history after the 2000 Greatest Show on Turf Rams. But if you are going to fall, it might as well be from those stratospheric heights. Narrow though this offense is for fantasy purposes, it could boast the No. 1 overall quarterback, the No. 1 overall running back, a top 24 receiver in Zay Flowers, and potentially a pair of top 15 tight ends in Mark Andrews and Isaiah Likely. Harbaugh has said he wants Likely to have an All-Pro type season. That's not a statement a coach with Harbaugh's experience makes lightly.
Passing Game
QB: Lamar Jackson, Cooper Rush
WR: Zay Flowers, Tez Walker
WR: Rashod Bateman, Tylan Wallace
WR: DeAndre Hopkins, LaJohntay Wester
TE: Mark Andrews, Isaiah Likely
Lamar Jackson's latest MVP-caliber campaign (second to Josh Allen) was just as profitable in fantasy football as real life. L-Jax finished as the QB1 both from an overall and points per game perspective. His 28.7 PPG were the most since Allen's 29.5 in 2022, and fourth most since 2020. With Henry's rushing threat terrifying opposing defenses, Jackson's 8.8 yards per attempt were a new career high by a whopping 0.8 yards.
Somewhat surprisingly, Jackson's rushing efficiency remained largely unchanged, while Henry's goal-line dominance left L-Jax with only four rushing scores. His 915 yards on the ground were nevertheless his most since 2020. In terms of pure explosiveness, Jackson was the league's top dual-threat.
That's despite a receiver corps that has improved but still leaves something to be desired. Zay Flowers' 1,000-yard campaign last season was just the second by a Ravens wide receiver since 2016. It is worth noting Flowers might not have gotten there without the benefit of the 17th game, as he averaged 'just' 62.3 yards per contest. Of course, Flowers actually cleared the mark in Week 16, achieving the accomplishment before injury slowed him the final two games of the year. Already battling a shoulder issue, Flowers suffered a Week 18 knee ailment that ended up sidelining him for the Ravens' postseason run.
Although not a target dominator before going down, Flowers was a solid 21st in target share (26 percent). He was 16th in yards per route run at 2.25, a strong half-yard improvement from his rookie mark of 1.72. If it seemed like he too often disappeared — Flowers drew five or fewer looks in 12-of-17 appearances — the Ravens' coaching staff believed it was as much their fault as his. OC Todd Monken has said he wants to get Flowers more involved for 2025. In the right place at the right time in a concentrated offense, Flowers could tack on 15-20 more looks and produce as a more reliable WR2 this season after last year's WR32 finish by average PPR points.
If Flowers' 2024 step forward was to be expected, Rashod Bateman's was more surprising. The oft-injured 2021 first-rounder finally appeared in all 17 games and more than doubled his previous career high for yardage with 756. Flukily, nine of Bateman's 45 grabs ended up in the end zone, helping him to a WR4 finish in PPR leagues despite his paltry receptions total. Understandably, summer best ball drafters aren't betting on a repeat, treating Bateman as a low-end WR5. I would like to argue that is too sharp of a fade for the WR2 in an elite offense, but we all know Bateman's touchdown luck will regress, while he is unlikely to level up as a compiler. For re-draft purposes, consider Bateman a volatile WR4/5 with matchup-flipping upside but all too prevalent 0.0 downside.
Bateman is the WR2, but the No. 2 overall weapon is probably more likely to come from the tight end group. That's where Mark Andrews and Isaiah Likely will battle for looks. After a frigid start to 2024, Andrews ended up finishing as the TE7 by average PPR points, though fantasy managers will probably only remember the beginning and the end. The latter was a pair of season-altering drops in the Ravens' Divisional Round loss. Although Andrews' overall production has remained remarkably steady, his yards per route run efficiency has quietly declined three straight years. For tight end purposes, it did remain a strong 1.88 last year. Going on 30, Andrews has a lengthening injury history while Likely continues to improve, but as long as he stays on the field, it's difficult to believe he will finish outside the top 10 at tight end.
A 2022 fourth-rounder who has gotten a little better with each passing season, Likely has been the challenger to Andrews' champion for some time now. Right behind Andrews in yards per route run at 1.71, which was good for seventh overall amongst seam stretchers, Likely surprisingly trailed Andrews on a per-catch basis. Andrews averaged a robust 12.2 yards per grab to Likely's 11.4. Both are great numbers for a tight end, but it belies Likely's reputation as a better down-field threat. Likely did lap Andrews from an average yards after the catch perspective, with his 6.1 tying for sixth amongst tight ends. Andrews' 3.7 was tied for 41st.
Harbaugh clearly loved what he saw, and must have come away even more intrigued from offseason practices, but it is still difficult to regard Likely as a true TE1 as long as Andrews is standing in his way. Andrews could begin to fade in earnest as Likely continues to ascend, but his summer best ball ADP of TE16 seems fair. Just know that, even in an unusually crowded tight end group, Likely offers legitimate TE1 upside. He will be a matchup-based streamer from the jump, warranting an end-of-bench spot in 12-team re-draft leagues.
Beyond here lies … not a lot. DeAndre Hopkins is a fantasy name brand whose efficiency and raw production completely cratered last season. His 1.61 yards per route run were his worst since 2016, and good for 54th amongst wideouts. Jackson makes everyone more efficient, but Hopkins is at best the fourth or fifth passing-game weapon in an offense low on aerial volume. He is not worth a late-round flier.
Running Game
RB: Derrick Henry, Justice Hill, Keaton Mitchell, Rasheen Ali
OL (L-R): Ronnie Stanley, Andrew Vorhees, Tyler Linderbaum, Daniel Faalele, Roger Rosengarten
The NFL's pre-eminent unstoppable force for nine years now, Derrick Henry has yet to meet an immovable object. His age-30 campaign in Baltimore resulted in the aforementioned 11th most yards rushing in league history, while his average rush yards over expected of 1.77 actually exceeded Saquon Barkley's mark. Henry, of course, led the league in that advanced metric. Henry is another year older with hands as stony as ever, but even were he to take a major efficiency hit, his raw volume keeps him safely locked into the top five at running back even in PPR formats.
Behind Henry is holdover third-down back Justice Hill and change-of-pace option Keaton Mitchell. Hill's 42 2024 receptions quietly ranked 14th amongst running backs, but he had the benefit of Mitchell barely playing after returning from his 2023 knee injury. For his part, Mitchell now insists he feels better and faster than ever. Although Hill and Mitchell profile as a potentially dynamic change-of-pace/third-down duo for Baltimore, they are all but assured of cannibalizing each other's production in fantasy, rendering them tough sells as 'insurance' picks behind Henry. Were the unthinkable to occur and the Big Dog to go down with injury, an unpredictable committee would develop, with second-year fifth-rounder Rasheen Ali also in the mix.
Baltimore Ravens 2025 Win Total
Unsurprisingly, the Ravens boast one of 2025's highest team totals, with the over/under generally coming in at 11.5. That's a steep number for even the league's best teams to summit, but one Harbaugh's Ravens have cleared 3-of-4 times when Jackson has made at least 15 starts. The lone exception was an 11-5 2020 where they went 11-4 in Jackson's outings. Loaded on both sides of the ball and checking in with merely the league's 21st toughest schedule according to Warren Sharp, the over, as usual, feels like the stronger possibility in Baltimore.
Kyle Dvorchak acknowledges that Rashod Bateman's extension is a "vote of confidence" by the Ravens, but he's pumping the brakes on Bateman in fantasy, skeptical he'll be more than just a big-play specialist this year.