Welcome back to the 2025 Dynasty Rookie Rankings Battle. While last week we looked at some workhorses out of the Big 12, this week we’re comparing some change-of-pace backs with game-breaking ability. Georgia’s Trevor Etienne, Tennessee’s Dylan Sampson, and UCF’s RJ Harvey are all lightning in a bottle, but how do they profile to full-time NFL roles?
The sections of this article will follow the categories laid out in the final part of the Get Better at Dynasty Series, copied here for your convenience. Recall that the highlighting in the template reflects the relative importance of each trait, whereas the actual prospect report represents how strong they are in that skill.
Fantasy-Relevant Traits
Goal Line
Dylan Sampson was actually extremely effective and relied upon in this area despite measuring in at only 200 lbs. Although he’s more known for being a speed back, he is really willing to put his head down and drive forward for tough yardage, and Tennessee ended up relying on his goal-line ability to the tune of 22 rushing touchdowns.
He has great grit and leg drive, as well as the ability to pivot around shots delivered by linebackers in order to back into the endzone. However, considering his smaller stature, there is a major concern he’ll share the backfield with a more traditional goal-line back in the NFL.
RJ Harvey actually profiles very similarly in this area. My big gripe with him on early downs was that he wasn’t willing enough to get north/south, but to his credit, he has a switch that he flips in goal line and short-yardage situations where he is willing to get his hands dirty.
Listed at 5’8” 207, he’s pretty dense but can get swallowed up by penetrating defenders. Like Sampson, he was the main scoring outlet on his college team but might get subbed off in the NFL.
Trevor Etienne, on the other hand, was not as productive in this area. He was part of a rotation at Georgia, and it was not uncommon for him to get subbed off in these situations or to be deployed solely as a decoy. He was not Georgia’s first choice to finish drives, unlike Sampson and Harvey.
However, I actually did think he was decent in this area when called upon. Etienne makes second and third efforts, churning his legs and twisting his body around to will his way into the endzone. At 205 lbs, he is missing a pure strength component, but he could get goal-line work if things break the right way.
Pass Catching
Trevor Etienne managed to put up decent reception totals despite missing some games due to injury and being subbed off frequently in obvious passing situations. We’ll get to the latter point later on in this article, but as far as when he is on the field, he’s very capable out there.
He’s a hands catcher, which is somewhat rare at the RB position, and he put up some nice receiving games (6 for 35 and 6 for 36 in back-to-back weeks at one point), considering he didn’t really play third downs. He wasn’t asked to run downfield much, but with his explosive play ability, it would behoove his NFL team to involve him in screens and run-after-catch concepts.
RJ Harvey also brings a lot to the table in this area. He was actually used downfield on occasion, catching some wheel routes for huge gains. He even caught the ball in contested situations and plucked it away from his frame when the throw wasn’t between the numbers.
I do think he can justifiably have a sizable pass-catching role in the NFL. His track record of winning on high-value routes down the field sets him apart from Etienne.
On the other hand, Dylan Sampson struggled in this area. He has a naturally small catch radius, and I thought his hands were below average. He was not asked to run routes downfield, and I think he underwhelmed in run-after-catch situations because although he’s fast, he’s a very linear athlete, whereas fluidity and elusiveness become very important in the screen game since the runway is rarely perfect.
Elusiveness
With these backs, I found it very important to draw a distinction between elusiveness and explosiveness. Because these athletes are known as electric backs with home run ability, it’s natural to conflate that explosiveness with elusiveness. However, both Dylan Sampson and RJ Harvey have a sort of athleticism that lends itself significantly more to explosiveness than elusiveness, and I don’t want to count it twice.
For example, RJ Harvey has lateral agility in the sense that he can bounce a run with an explosive lateral move and gain the corner, but he doesn’t have the rapid footwork or sidestepping in a phone booth that Devin Neal and DJ Giddens have. So, I want to give Harvey high scores in the explosiveness section, but I want to keep it on the lower side in the elusiveness section.
Dylan Sampson, meanwhile, is an extremely linear athlete. I frequently saw him lose his balance or even slip when he tried to sidestep tackles, and he sometimes leaves big plays on the field because he can’t make lateral progress at top speed, which means he misses opportunities to force defenders into bad tackling angles.
To the extent both of these players have contact balance, it shows up in the second level, where they’re trying to turn a four-yard gain into an eight-yard gain. Both Sampson and Harvey are really gritty in this area and look downright tenacious, trying to drag a defender across the line to gain.
However, they lack contact balance *before* the second level, where their smaller stature really shows up when failing to shed arm tackles from bigger defenders or when they need to get through a narrow crease in the trenches without falling down, something Kaleb Johnson excels at.
In general, neither player excels at making the first man miss in tight spaces like I would have hoped since this skill often comes down to balance and footwork. They need room to get around a defender rather than slipping through a congested space. They can do it at a fine level but don’t excel at it like I thought Devin Neal or even Omarion Hampton did.
Trevor Etienne is better than Harvey and Sampson in terms of pure elusiveness in tight spaces. His best move is a dead leg that he consistently used to make the first man miss cleanly. And because he takes shorter strides, he can make more rapid adjustments around the line of scrimmage, much like Quinshon Judkins does.
His lateral agility is fine, but he does slow down in and out of cuts, so his tackle evasion won’t lead to explosive plays quite as reliably as it might for backs with better balance. There was a lack of a strength component to his tackle-breaking, but he was able to flip the switch and fall forward in short-yardage situations.
Explosive Play Ability
All three of these backs shine in this area, and the key will be figuring out who will get on the field enough for their workload to turn into explosive playmaking and sustain a dynasty asset.
Of these three backs, RJ Harvey is by far the best at pressing the line of scrimmage and then using a jump cut to bounce a run and win the corner. Defenses have to focus intensely on setting the edge against him because he is always probing and looking to see if he can bounce a run (sometimes even to a fault).
Once he does, his explosiveness is great, and he gets to top speed quickly once he has some runway. His long speed is a hair slower than Sampson’s, so he can sometimes get caught from behind, but he’ll still make his fair share of house calls.
I mentioned earlier that Dylan Sampson is a linear athlete. Well, he certainly is the fastest and most explosive of this bunch when he gets on a runway. Sampson has the type of speed that will lead to numerous house calls at the NFL level if the circumstances are right.
My one gripe with him is that his lateral agility in the second level is actually pretty bad, where I see him failing to erase angles not because he lacks speed but because he can’t move horizontally at high speed. This sometimes left huge plays on the field.
I think at the NFL level this often gets magnified, and it sometimes prevents college speedsters from breaking big plays at the NFL level. However, his explosiveness leaves very little margin for error for the defense, and it does not take much daylight for defenses to get left in the dust.
Trevor Etienne’s package of explosive traits is a tad less loud than Sampson’s and Harvey’s, but it’s more balanced and projects cleanly to the NFL level. He accelerates quickly, even with murkier runways than what Sampson requires, and he has plenty of long speed to break huge runs.
He’s fine at turning the corner, but he's just not quite as effective as Harvey. If he gets through the line of scrimmage, watch out because he can chew up yardage at the second level, and he actually makes lateral progress at a top speed much better than Sampson, so he can genuinely erase angles. His pure speed is slower than Sampson’s, though, which means he sometimes can get caught.
Traits That Matter For Earning a Role
Ball Security
Ball security was a little rough for this cohort. In his only full season as a workhorse, Dylan Sampson fumbled four times. RJ Harvey fumbled nine times in the last three years, and Etienne fumbled four times in three years despite always being in committees that limited his mileage. Sometimes, we see players come out of camp way down the depth chart, and we don’t know why, and often, the issue can be a failure to earn trust in practices.
Early Down Rushing
While I’ve been really positive on RJ Harvey so far, here he could really burn dynasty owners. While he is willing and able to get tough yards in obvious short-yardage situations, he is mentally not a between-the-tackles runner on early downs.
He is not a north/south runner; instead always looking to bounce it at all times. This leads to him dancing behind the line of scrimmage and eating negative plays. He wastes time that could have been spent exploding through a crease, instead scanning for his chance to bounce the run. NFL coaches will hate this trait, and if it’s not an easy fix in training camp, Harvey will open the season way down the depth chart.
He also steps gingerly through the gap when he does decide to run up the middle and gets swallowed up by defensive linemen who stack, shed, and get arms on him. To this point, Harvey’s traits have been lining up the best as an electric change of pace back with pass-catching ability. However, if this does not get coached out of him quickly, he will not have a big enough role to matter for fantasy.
On the other hand, I actually thought Trevor Etienne and Dylan Sampson were surprisingly good here. Georgia knew that Etienne was their best back, and they acted accordingly, giving him lots of opportunities on early downs.
While he lacks a physical component in between the tackles, which is a concern, he mentally is very willing to force his way through narrow creases, and he makes quick adjustments to slip his way through messy scrums. He hits the hole hard, and any time he steps through cleanly, look out. His tendency to slow down in and out of cuts limits his ability to bounce runs and change the complexion of a play, however.
Dylan Sampson is missing a certain amount of creation between the tackles, but he is very willing to fight for tough yards. When the situation calls for it, he is willing to run hard with a low pad level and fall forward, even at his size.
This reminds me of college De’Von Achane, who, despite being a home run hitter, did a lot of dirty work in between the tackles in college, and it served him well in terms of getting on the field in a wider variety of downs and distances.
Offensive coordinators limit your usage if your very presence on the field is a dead giveaway of what the next play is going to be. Being a home run hitter who is reliable enough at early down rushing gets you more chances to actually break a big play. Package players rarely become impactful fantasy assets.
Essentially, when considering how these three players profile to the NFL, I’m more confident that Sampson and Etienne will actually get enough of a sample size to make the big play ability count. Since they aren’t negative in early down rushing, they’ll get more chances to eventually break the big one, which won’t be lost on an offensive coordinator. If this habit of Harvey’s persists, we’ll only see him take the field as a gadgety player and in obvious passing situations.
Pass Blocking
RJ Harvey is the most accomplished pass blocker in this group, even if his strength limits him here. He is willing and able to meet blitzers in the gap, even stonewalling a couple on occasion. He does sometimes catch against bigger players, and it doesn’t go well, but in general, his willingness and technique are decent. It would behoove an NFL team to get him on the field in passing situations because he can pass block well enough and is a legitimate threat to catch passes down the field.
On the other hand, I did not like Sampson’s pass-blocking. He sits back and lets the rusher contact him, and at this size, it means he’s barely even an obstacle. I don’t love Sampson’s profile as an asset in the passing game, which is a pretty serious defect in a change of pace back.
Travis Etienne is likewise very tentative in pass protection. To me, it appears as though he’s looking to avoid contact unless absolutely necessary. He was also consistently subbed off in obvious pass situations. Like with Sampson, it’s tough to trust a change of pace back who might get subbed off in obvious pass situations and two-minute drills.
Short Yardage
All three of these backs are similar here in that they’re willing to run with low pad level and make second and third efforts in these situations, but their size will limit them at the NFL level. None of them went above and beyond with a surprising strength component, at least not until they had a head of steam at the second level. This is something Bucky Irving notably excelled at. Of the three, RJ Harvey was the most successful in terms of pure results, but all three of these backs might be used sparingly in these situations.
Overall
Dylan Sampson
Profile
Ideally, a diminutive lead back who is trusted to handle the bulk of his team’s rushing workload and stretches defenses with his pure explosiveness and speed. Even if he’s getting stopped more often than you’d like, a coach keeps using him because they know that, eventually, he’ll make a house call and pay them off.
More likely, however, a change of pace option who does not come onto the field in quite enough situations to be a major fantasy asset. Landing spot will dictate a lot here.
Best Case
His grit between the tackles is rewarded with a major rushing workload, and he doesn’t come off the field except in the most obvious pass situations. Between surprisingly good results at the goal line and the occasional huge run, he becomes a low-end RB1. His best case is a player who consolidates a major share of his team’s rushing.
Worst Case
He is used more as a role player, but one who isn’t trusted in obvious pass situations. The lack of lateral agility means he breaks fewer tackles and generates fewer explosive runs than we saw in college.
Trevor Etienne
Profile
Ideally, a starting back who earns touches in a variety of situations and whose backup is really only there to rest him or to eat obvious pass-blocking reps. Like before, the situation will dictate a lot because it will be very easy for a coach to rationalize outsourcing a major share of opportunities to a bigger back and not look back.
Best Case
The explosiveness and elusiveness really shine on a major share of early down rushing. He’s used as a receiving option even on standard dropbacks, giving him a high receiving floor. The time spent in deep rotations in college keeps him fresh for his NFL career, and he remains explosive into his second contract.
Worst Case
Like with Sampson, he cedes starter-level touches to a bigger back and is used exclusively as a change-of-pace option, relegating him to career handcuff status.
RJ Harvey
Profile
A highly utilized 1B in an efficient committee, partnered with a punishing early down runner. He could have a high floor for fantasy due to his pass-catching ability, coupled with a smattering of outside rushes against light boxes that occasionally result in spike weeks.
Best Case
He actually splits rushing work very evenly with his backfield partner and dominates passing game work, leading to a high-end RB2.
Worst Case
The lack of early down rushing work means he is a backup or pure change-of-pace option, not a 1B in his committee. The usage can’t sustain a fantasy asset. This scenario feels likely enough to explain how he ends up a tier below his two counterparts in my 2025 Dynasty Rookie Rankings.