Broncos general manager George Paton still calls RJ Harvey the “pet cat” of their running-back room. And it was obvious last week that while the team is hitting the pavement hard in its search for a running back — or perhaps running backs — any additions to the room will be made with Harvey’s progress in mind.
But for all the peaks and valleys of Harvey’s rookie season, he was the primary force behind the Broncos’ rookie class finishing above expected value for its picks, as calculated through Pro Football Reference’s Approximate Value metric.
Harvey finished with an AV of 6, which is significant because when going through the common-draft era, the expected rookie AV of the No. 60 pick Is 2.60 points.
In other words, Harvey’s AV came out to roughly that of an average No. 5 overall pick (5.99 points), with the scale going from 6.80 points for the No. 1 overall pick to 0.60 points for every choice from No. 240 onward.
As a collective, the Broncos’ seven choices would have been expected to produce 13.57 points of AV; with 17 points, they were at plus-3.43.
But that placed the Broncos only 16th in the NFL, thanks to a cluster of teams that finished well above value — led by the AFC champion New England Patriots, who likely wouldn’t have exploded out of nowhere without a draft class that had 38 points of approximate value — 17.13 points over what was expected from the Patriots’ 11 draft slots.
A year earlier, thanks in large part to Bo Nix and his outsized contribution, the Broncos were at plus-12.39.
BRONCOS 2025 ROOKIES IN AV
CB Jahdae Barron
No. 20 overall
Projected AV: 4.32
Actual AV: 3
Difference: Minus-1.32
RB RJ Harvey
No. 60 overall
Projected AV: 2.60
Actual AV: 6
Difference: Plus-3.40
WR Pat Bryant
No. 74 overall
Projected AV: 2.22
Actual AV: 3
Difference: Plus-0.78
DE Sai’vion Jones
No. 101 overall
Projected AV: 1.75
Actual AV: 1
Difference: Minus-0.75
Edge rusher Que Robinson
No. 134 overall
Projected AV: 1.30
Actual AV: 1
Difference: Minus-0.30
Punter Jeremy Crawshaw
No. 216 overall
Projected AV: 0.78
Actual AV: 3
Difference: Plus-2.22
Tight end Caleb Lohner
No. 241 overall
Projected AV: 0.60
Actual AV: 0
Difference: Minus-0.60
AV doesn’t provide a measurement of progress on the practice field, of course, and in the cases of Robinson and Jones, their production was hindered by the depth the Broncos had ahead of them. Robinson got on the field just six times in the regular season and once in the postseason because the Broncos had good health and strong performance from their edge-rushing quartet.
His sack in the AFC Championship Game gave the public a reminder of the promise he displayed in the preseason, but now it’s on the Broncos to find more snaps for him — even if they have to get creative in how they structure their game-day roster to do it, as second-team edges Jonah Elliss and Dondrea Tillman did nothing to justify losing snaps themselves. Their efficiency played a significant role in the Broncos’ defensive success, as they could keep Nik Bonitto and Jonathon Cooper fresh.
But a big test this year will be just how much more they can get from their 2025 rookie class. The Broncos saw their 2024 rookie class drop from 24 points of AV to 21, but they also traded Devaughn Vele and waived Audric Estimé, which canceled out the gain made by Troy Franklin, who improved from 2 to 6 AV.
IMMEDIATE IMPACTS FROM DRAFT CLASSES WEREN’T NECESSARY FOR SUCCESS
Consider this: The bottom five teams in terms of approximate value above expected value for their selections all made the postseason; the team that ranked third from the bottom, Seattle, won it all. Their draft picks had a collective AV of 16, 2.91 points below what the 1967-2025 sample size expected for their selections.
Nine teams finished in the negative, starting with the No. 23-ranked Las Vegas Raiders, at minus-0.57, getting 20 points of AV from 20.57 expected points of draft capital.
THE FULL ROOKIE-CLASS RANKINGS
1. New England: 38 points AV, 17.13 above expected value
2. Washington: 21 points AV, 11.89 above expected value
3. Cleveland: 30 points AV, 9.94 above expected value
4. Tampa Bay: 22 points, AV, 9.64 above expected value
5. Cincinnati: 22 points AV, 9.01 points above expected value
6. Miami: 23 points AV, 8.97 points above expected value
7. New Orleans: 26 points AV, 8.35 above expected value
8. N.Y. Giants: 25 points AV, 8.04 above expected value
9. Chicago: 24 points AV, 6.54 above expected value
10. Carolina: 23 points AV, 6.51 above expected value
11. Tennessee: 25 points AV, 6.06 above expected value
12. L.A. Chargers: 20 points AV, 5.42 above expected value
13. Houston: 20 points AV, 4.85 above expected value
14. Atlanta: 17 points AV, 4.60 above expected value
15. N.Y. Jets: 20 points AV, 4.01 above expected value
16. Denver: 17 points AV, 3.43 above expected value
17. Kansas City: 15 points AV, 1.27 above expected value
18. Indianapolis: 16 points AV, 1.24 above expected value
19. Detroit: 16 points AV, 1.18 above expected value
20. Buffalo: 16 points AV, 0.79 above expected value
21. Green Bay: 13 points AV, 0.30 above expected value
22. Baltimore: 16 points AV, 0.21 above expected value
23. Las Vegas: 20 points AV, 0.57 points below expected value
24. Pittsburgh: 10 points AV, 1.01 points below expected value
25. Minnesota: 7 points AV, 1.56 points below expected value
26. Arizona: 12 points AV, 1.75 points below expected value
27. Dallas: 13 points AV, 2.26 points below expected value
28. Philadelphia: 12 points AV, 2.57 points below expected value
29. Jacksonville: 14 points AV, 2.75 points below expected value
30. Seattle points: 16 points AV, 2.91 points below expected value
31. San Francisco: 16 points AV, 3.08 points below expected value
32. L.A. Rams: 6 points AV, 3.18 points below expected value