Cam Skattebo became a household name on New Year’s Day with his tour de force performance in Arizona State’s Peach Bowl matchup against Texas. The Sun Devils running back almost singlehandedly brought his team back from what looked like a blowout loss to a wildly entertaining overtime thriller.
Skattebo ran for 143 yards on 30 carries, scoring two touchdowns and a two-point conversion. He also threw a touchdown pass and caught eight passes for 99 yards in Arizona State’s loss.
The senior transfer from Sacramento State was electrifying. His power, his effort, his emotional style are all very appealing traits. He’s one of the most fun college football players of the year. But that doesn’t necessarily make Skattebo a coveted NFL draft prospect.
Entering the CFP, most projections had Skattebo as a Day 3 prospect, somewhere between 100 and 200 overall. That’s been going up from his preseason draft stock as a relative unknown, of course. After the amazing Peach Bowl–capping a very impressive season–there’s a lot of momentum wanting to push Skattebo into the conversation for the top running back in the 2025 NFL Draft class.
That’s writing checks that Skattebo’s 5-foot-11, 205-pound body isn’t ready to cash. Skattebo is a good prospect with excellent positional versatility. He’s the first running back to top 1,500 yards on the ground and 500 receiving yards in the same season since one Christian McCaffrey at Stanford back in 2016. He’s very close to the same size as McCaffrey too, though his agility and acceleration aren’t in the same class as the 49ers All-Pro.
The national showcase now has many NFL fans buzzing that Skattebo can be the next McCaffrey. As far as running style, Skattebo is more akin to Carolina’s Chuba Hubbard, relying on vision, zero wasted motion and excellent balance through contact than blazing speed, quick acceleration or brute power. But the Hubbard comparison isn’t great because Skattebo offers a lot more in the passing game, both as a receiver and a blocker–though the latter is inconsistent. That harkens more to Detroit’s Craig Reynolds, though Skattebo is more slippery and creative with the ball in his hands than Reynolds. I’ve seen comparisons to guys like Zach Charbonnet, Royce Freeman and D’Andre Swift (one that I don’t personally see).
And that’s part of what makes Skattebo a difficult evaluation, especially prior to athletic testing. He’s a unique player with a lot of different “reminds me of…” comparisons. His relative lack of speed and heavy workload (over 820 touches in college) lower his NFL ceiling, but his consistency of performance with his versatility is quite impressive.
As of today (January 2nd), I have Skattebo in the cluster of prospects between 100-125 overall. He’s currently RB5. That’s far from finalized, just as the NFL teams aren’t close to having a board done yet. Still, I don’t see any NFL team valuing Skattebo higher than the early third round based on his profile and the draft class as a whole.