The NFL has seen an injection of exciting young talent over the last decade. As offenses spread out, the priority to acquire massive bodies who win with power has shifted towards quicker, shiftier playmakers who create big plays. The NFL is more efficient now and the scoring rate has taken off as teams realize throwing the ball and maximizing space is advantageous.
The shift in thinking and priorities has led to more opportunities for non-traditional talents. We’ve compiled a list of the top 25 players in the NFL under the age of 25 years old. These recent stars are the current and future faces of the new-era.
Few 2021 rookies have been included since they’ve yet to prove themselves. And we used 25 as the cut-off since anyone 25 or over has generally had a full rookie contract to develop. Opening this list to a bigger cast of players would essentially just be a ranking of the top players in the league since Patrick Mahomes and Josh Allen would be eligible.
Positional importance, career accolades, consistency, statistics, and the eye test all contributed to these rankings. It was difficult even paring this list down to 25. But these individuals have balled out to this point in their careers to justify high expectations for 2021 and beyond.
The stakes are obviously higher for quarterbacks than anyone else. But don’t let the five signal-callers in the top-25 overshadow the All-Pro-caliber players amongst the list. Producing at a high level at any position is impressive and exceedingly rare for anyone under the age of 25.