Aaron Jones Sr. has cleared 1,100 scrimmage yards in each of his past five healthy seasons (minimum 12 games played), but he’s now on the wrong side of 30 years old and experiencing an offense that is naturally going to look different with Sam Darnold taking his talents to Seattle.
Is the fantasy football floor high enough to justify penciling Jones into your weekly lineup, or is he a player to cross off of your cheat sheets this summer?
Should You Draft Aaron Jones in Fantasy?
Jones is an interesting option. His advanced resume doesn’t look great, but he’s stayed on the field for a full season in two of the past three years (one such season prior in his career) and continues to be labeled as a bellcow.
- Aaron Jones
- Christian McCaffrey
That’s your entire list of players with at least 1,000 rushing yards and 50 catches in two of the past three seasons. That’s not too shabby, and we saw some ceiling in this profile as a featured part of this Kevin O’Connell system — Jones was a top-16 RB in three of four weeks to open 2024 and finished the campaign with five RB1 finishes.
The story has been great, but we as 2025 managers aren’t interested in the “story”. “Stories” take place in the past, and we are in the business of forecasting the future. From Weeks 8-13 last season, we saw Jones fade a bit (average weekly finish: RB24), and that’s about what I’m expecting this season, understanding that the peak of his powers is more likely to come in September than December.
Fueling that belief is the early (Week 6) bye — is this the type of player you want to be betting on while playing for a 10th consecutive week?
#Vikings HC Kevin O’Connell on his backfield:
“Aaron Jones is at his best when we can keep him fresh, we can keep him truly as that 1a, because we’ve got the 1b with him, and that was Jordan Mason.” pic.twitter.com/5nGWoeX3vb
— The Coachspeak Index (@CoachspeakIndex) April 1, 2025
It’s not for me. Our internal Elusive Rating has Jones trending in the wrong direction for consecutive seasons (9.8% of his carries gained 10+ yards a season ago, down from his 12% career number), and there simply isn’t much upside to chase.
He ripped off a 34-yard gain against the Lions in Week 7, and that was fun, but he had just one game with a 20+ yard run after that point, with some real duds sprinkled in there (Week 11 at Tennessee: 15 carries with his longest carry going for 15 feet).
His role in the passing game stabilized his fantasy value a season ago, but color me pessimistic about a repeat performance in 2025. Not only is there a quarterback change that this offense has to navigate, but there’s natural regression to pencil in. In 2024, Jones caught 82.3% of his targets (51-of-62).
Still, considering that he caught 73.3% of his looks in 2019-20 with Aaron Rodgers playing at an elite level, we have to draw back some, if not a lot, of efficiency as a pass catcher in addition to his declining abilities on the ground.
He could, of course, save you with a spike touchdown season. This offense projects as a top-10 unit, and Jones does have a 19-touchdown season on his resume, but that was a long time ago (2019). Half of his career rushing scores came in those mentioned above 2019-20 stretch (50% of rushing TDs in 26.3% of his career games).
Remove that peak, and he’s averaging a mere 5.1 scores on the ground per 17 games, a rate that doesn’t have the potential to save you from an otherwise inefficient campaign.
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Jordan Mason was brought in this offseason, and I consider him a threat to subtract from his bottom line more than just a backup in case of an emergency. The incoming rookie running crop of running backs is strong, and I’d prefer almost any of them with a reasonable shot at playing time over Jones this year.
Jones, for me, is a volume/floor play only this season — picking him makes some sense if you are swallowing some risk with your first two running backs.
Outside of that, I’m more tempted by RBs who could improve as the regular season wears on than one who I believe will see his production fade as the days go by.
Dan Fornek’s Aaron Jones Fantasy Projection
We finally got an opportunity to see what Aaron Jones Sr. could do without a timeshare in 2024. Jones played in all 17 games, racking up 255 carries for 1,138 yards and five rushing touchdowns while adding 62 targets, 51 receptions, 408 receiving yards, and two touchdowns. It was the first time in his career that the veteran running back had more than 300 touches with only a minor dip in his efficiency (5.1 yards per touch compared to 5.4 for his career).
The result was a solid RB20 finish in fantasy (14.2 points per game). Jones has now had at least 14.0 fantasy points per game in six of his last seven seasons. Minnesota was impressed enough with him that they signed him to a two-year, $20 million contract to return to the team.
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There are a lot of positives for Jones as a fantasy asset heading into 2025. Minnesota spent heavily in free agency and the draft to bolster its offensive line, signing center Ryan Kelly and right guard Will Fries and drafting Ohio State guard Donovan Jackson in the first round of the 2025 NFL Draft. The offense could also be more dynamic with 2024 first-round quarterback J.J. McCarthy set to take over the offense. However, not everything is positive for Jones in fantasy.
Minnesota also traded for Jordan Mason to be their primary backup running back. Mason is coming off a successful stint as the 49ers starter when Christian McCaffrey missed games to start the season. But Mason missed time (and lost the job) due to several minor injuries.
The Vikings are shaping up to be a timeshare backfield in 2025, which makes it hard to trust Jones, given the lesser volume.
However, we have also seen Jones thrive throughout his career in a timeshare environment. It could be hard to trust Jones as a top-12 running back in 2025, but he should be a rock-solid RB2 with big upside if Mason continues to struggle with staying on the field.
