Welcome to the countdown. Over the next five days, I’m dropping my top five Carolina Panthers for 2026 fantasy football, one name at a time. We start at the bottom of the list and work our way up to the guy you’ll actually reach for in the first handful of rounds. Kicking things off at number five is the biggest boom-or-bust swing on the whole roster: running back Jonathon Brooks.
If you drafted in dynasty leagues in 2024, you already know the name. If you’re a redraft-only manager, you might have forgotten he exists. That’s exactly the kind of gap that wins leagues, so let’s dig into why Brooks is worth a very late-round dart throw in PPR formats this season.
Rewind to college. Brooks spent three years at Texas behind Bijan Robinson, then finally took over as the lead back in 2023. All he did with the opportunity was rush for 1,139 yards on 187 carries. That’s a 6.1 yards-per-carry average with 10 rushing touchdowns, and he tacked on 25 catches for 286 yards and another score through the air. Those receiving numbers matter a lot for our purposes, because PPR value lives in the passing game, and Brooks showed he can be more than a between-the-tackles grinder.
Here’s the wild part. Brooks put up that 1,139-yard season, good for the 14th-most rushing yards in Texas program history, and he did it in only 10 games. He tore his ACL in early November and still finished as a second-team All-Big 12 selection. The production-per-game rate was elite, and it’s why he came off the board as the first running back taken in the 2024 NFL Draft when Carolina traded up to grab him at pick number 46.
The Panthers didn’t spend a second-round pick and move up the board for a committee body. They drafted a lead back. That vision hasn’t changed. It’s just been buried under two years of bad injury luck.
We have to be honest about the risk, because it’s the entire reason Brooks is available so cheaply. The knee that ended his college career in 2023 also delayed the start of his rookie NFL season. He didn’t get on the field until late in 2024, managed just nine carries for 22 yards across three games, and then tore the same right ACL again in Week 14. That second tear cost him all of 2025, which he spent on the PUP list.
So the résumé at the NFL level is essentially nine carries. That’s it. For a player heading into his age-22 season, he has almost no professional tape, and two surgeries on the same knee is a legitimate red flag you should factor into your draft-day math.
Now the good news, and there’s a real case here. Every report out of Carolina this offseason has been encouraging. Brooks has cleared to participate in the offseason program and says he feels close to 100 percent for the first time since he entered the league. Head coach Dave Canales keeps praising him in the run game and, bigger for fantasy, in the passing game. Canales has pointed to Brooks’s ability to catch, track, and transition once the ball is in his hands, and he mentioned building packages to get him involved.
That’s the phrase PPR managers want to hear. A coach talking about designed touches and passing-down work is describing a specific fantasy role, not a vague “we like the kid” quote.
The opportunity is real, too. Rico Dowdle walked into free agency and took roughly 275 touches with him. Chuba Hubbard, whom I’ll cover higher up this list, is the clear early-down lead, but 275 vacated touches do not all funnel to one back. Brooks is the most talented option to soak up the leftovers, and if his knee holds, this becomes a committee at worst. At best, a healthy Brooks flashes enough to wrestle real volume away from Hubbard as the season goes on.
Picture the path to a fantasy spike. Brooks carves out the passing-down role Canales keeps hinting at, giving him a safe weekly floor of four to six receptions in PPR. Then Hubbard misses time, or simply cedes ground, and Brooks steps into a three-down workload for a stretch. That’s the profile of a player who sits on your bench in September and becomes a flex-worthy or even RB2 fill-in by midseason. In a low-scoring Carolina offense projected to take a step back, standalone value is capped, but pass-game backs age well in PPR even on bad teams.
The bottom line for your draft
The market has started to notice. Brooks entered the offseason as roughly the RB36 in ADP and keeps climbing, to the point where in some high-stakes and best-ball formats his price has crept up toward Hubbard’s. You should be able to land him around Round 10 in a standard 10 to 12 team PPR league, and that’s a price worth paying for a former second-round back with a defined role and league-winning upside if the knee cooperates.
Draft him as your last bench running back, not as someone you need to start Week 1. Stash him, watch the Hubbard workload, and be ready to pounce. That combination of cost, talent, and opportunity is exactly why Jonathon Brooks kicks off this countdown at number five.
Come back tomorrow for number four. The names only get better from here.
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