Training camp is in full swing around the NFL, with 32 of 32 teams beginning practices and preparations for the upcoming 2024 season. The story of the year is in the infant stages of being composed, so it’s the perfect time to look around the league to try and identify the next wave of breakout stars.
Here are the players we’ve found, one for each team, who we think are poised to make a major leap forward in 2024. Stats are compiled from Pro Football Reference and Pro Football Focus:
49ers
CB Isaac Yiadom
A former third-round pick of the Broncos back in 2018, Yiadom is on his sixth team and has been traded twice, making him uniquely well-traveled even among NFL journeymen. But the light seemed to finally click on for Yiadom with the Saints last year once he was pressed into the starting lineup due to injuries. Yiadom played all 17 games and started eight, finishing the year with 14 pass breakups and an interception. Pro Football Reference credited him with a completion percentage allowed of only 49 percent and Pro Football Focus graded him as the No. 10 cornerback out of 127 qualifying players.
That earned him a one-year, $3 million deal with the 49ers and a chance to start if he can hold off some younger players behind him. Another strong season for a Super Bowl-contending team like San Francisco could raise Yiadom’s profile, and his bank account, even further in 2025.
Bears
Brisker has been a Day 1 starter since being drafted by the Bears in the second round out of Penn State in 2022. He’s made his fair share of impact plays, topping 100 total tackles in his first two years and totaling five sacks, eight tackles for loss, three forced fumbles, two recoveries, two interceptions and 11 pass deflections in two years. Those are solid stats, but Brisker has room to elevate his game even more — coinciding with Chicago’s hopeful rise to contention with No. 1 overall QB Caleb Williams. Brisker hasn’t made a Pro Bowl yet but he could break new ground in 2024.
Bengals
TE Mike Gesicki
People have been wish-casting a play-making tight end for the Bengals and QB Joe Burrow for a few years now, but this might finally be the year. The offense is evolving with the departure of WR Tyler Boyd, who had been a mainstay as a slot receiver, and the looming departure of WR Tee Higgins after the season. There’s room for another weapon to step up, and the Bengals are a much better fit for Gesicki than the Patriots and Dolphins have been over the past two years. Gesicki has a unique skillset, more like a jumbo-sized slot receiver than a true tight end, and he has a chance to top his previous career highs of 780 yards and six receiving touchdowns, or at least come close.
Bills
Buffalo’s not short on breakout candidates entering a transitional season. Last year’s first-round TE Dalton Kincaid has a chance to become the top weapon on offense, while guys like DE Greg Rousseau and DT Ed Oliver have more room to grow despite solid to great starts to their career so far. But Brown is the one I have my eye on. The former third-round pick out of Northern Iowa has started 41 games in three years to open his career and has improved each season after a predictably rocky start. His true pass set efficiency made a major jump to over 95 percent in 2023, per PFF. Now he’s in a contract year and has a chance to really establish himself with a big year.
Broncos
OLB Baron Browning/Nik Bonitto
I’m cheating and doing an either/or both with the Broncos, as they have two young pass rushers who profile remarkably similar and are candidates to keep an eye on heading into a 2024 season where expectations around the Broncos are low. Browning started his career as an off-ball linebacker but was moved to edge rusher in 2022 and was surprisingly good. He was a popular breakout pick entering 2023 but an injury derailed things. He still finished with 4.5 sacks and two forced fumbles in a little over half a season of work. Bonitto was a third-round pick in 2021 who hit eight sacks as a rotational rusher in his second season.
Both players are undersized at 6-3 and 240 pounds, but have great speed, agility and quickness to bend the edge. PFF has a metric called pass rush productivity that measures how efficiently a player creates pressure with their opportunities. Both Browning and Bonitto scored high, with Browning ranking 27th out of 118 qualifying edge rushers and Bonitto coming in at No. 5. It’s still a challenge to maintain that kind of efficiency with a higher snap count but Browning and Bonitto remain two breakout players to monitor on a so-far unheralded Broncos defense.
Browns
DE Alex Wright
Cleveland took a big gamble on Wright as a third-round pick out of UAB in 2022, betting that they could mold him into a useful player. Wright had some physical tools at 6-5 and 270 pounds but needed a lot of work to tap into his physical gifts and learn some of the nuances of the position. Last year, the Browns started to reap some of the rewards. In a rotational role, Wright had five sacks and was just half a sack away from tying DE Za’Darius Smith for second on the team behind DE Myles Garrett. Smith will still start across from Garrett but Wright could continue to eat into his role.
Buccaneers
LB K.J. Britt
Britt doesn’t have gaudy stats to this point in his career and has played more snaps on special teams than defense in each of his first three years. But late last year, he started running ahead of former top LB Devin White on early downs and he enters his fourth year with hardly any competition for the starting job next to LB Lavonte David. Bucs HC Todd Bowles called Britt one of the “unquestioned” leaders of the defense and Tampa Bay seems to be treating him as a locked-in starter so far. He’s not the biggest or twitchiest, so it’ll be interesting to see if other teams try to attack him in coverage, but he’s a quality run defender and hits like a sledgehammer. There are a lot of parallels with Chargers LB Denzel Perryman who is going on his 10th year in the league.
Cardinals
Johnson had a solid season if you grade on a curve for being a rookie and switching to the right side after playing left tackle his final year at Ohio State. Pro Football Focus credited him with 42 total pressures allowed, including eight sacks. His pass block efficiency, both on all snaps and in true pass sets, was right around league average, which again is solid for a rookie. He also suited up for all 17 games. With that experience behind him and moving back to his natural side on the left, Johnson has the tools to take a big leap for a Cardinals team that needs building block pieces to count on.
Chargers
PFF can be subjective but in their estimation, Gilman already had a breakout season in 2023. He was the full-time starter for the first time in his career and responded with a career-high 86.1 grade — seventh among all safeties. Gilman picked off two passes, broke up 10 more, forced three fumbles and recovered two more. But there could be another leap forward coming in 2024 with new DC Jesse Minter, who is a branch off the Ravens defensive tree which seems to be the new in-vogue scheme in the NFL. The system does a great job of putting players in position to maximize their strengths while confusing offenses, and Minter is a former defensive back who could get even more out of Gilman than we’ve seen.
Chiefs
Williams is competing with CB Jaylen Watson and a couple of other players to fill the void left in the secondary by the departed L’Jarius Sneed. He split time with Watson last year and did well. In 310 coverage snaps, he was targeted only 29 times, per PFF, and allowed just 12 catches for 103 yards and a stellar 41.4 completion percentage. The Chiefs always seem to have defensive backs in the pipeline ready to step up and Williams seems like the next future starter.
Colts
We included Raimann in our recent 2024 NFLTR Top 100 Players, so there’s cleary a case he has already broken out. However, there’s another level Raimann can reach to become more consistent and become more of a household name at the position. Although he turns 27 in September, Raimann is still new in some ways to football after growing up in Austria and there’s a lot more room for development. That’s despite the already high bar he set as the ninth tackle in ESPN’s run block win rate leaderboard at 78 percent and a true pass set efficiency of 98.4 percent, 28th in PFF’s accounting. Raimann has the potential to be a top-10 tackle in football.
Commanders
A gunshot wound from an attempted carjacking made for a slow start to Robinson’s career and Washington’s general struggles the past couple of years have limited his opportunities. But new Commanders OC Kliff Kingsbury will likely lean much more on the ground game as he did with the Cardinals, and Robinson could put up similar numbers to Cardinals RB James Conner the past few years. Like Conner, Robinson is a bruising runner who is surprisingly adept in the receiving game, making him a complete player who can be relied on as the lead back. A season with 1,500 yards from scrimmage and double-digit touchdowns is not out of the question.
Cowboys
There are bigger stars in Dallas right now, but Odighizuwa has quietly become a force as an interior pass rusher. The sack totals don’t jump off the page. Odighizuwa had only three quarterback takedowns in 2023. But the underlying metrics show a much more disruptive player. Odighizuwa was fourth among all defensive tackles on ESPN’s pass rush win rate leaderboard at 18 percent. His 44 total pressures ranked 24th out of 129 players per PFF and his pass rush productivity score of 6.9 was 16th. He’s competent in run defense as well with 17 tackles for loss and 58 stops combined from 2022-2023. These numbers are all signs of a player who is due for a massive year with a lot of sacks, and the timing couldn’t be better since 2024 is the final year of Odighizuwa’s contract.
Dolphins
OL Isaiah Wynn
Signed as insurance for LT Terron Armstead last year, Wynn ended up winning the starting left guard job to start the season and was performing well until he got hurt yet again. PFF credited Wynn with just four allowed pressures and no sacks, though HC Mike McDaniel’s offense might be the most friendly to offensive linemen in the league. Miami brought Wynn back on another one-year deal and he should be the frontrunner to start again at left guard. Health is the major caveat, as Wynn has missed 48 of 98 possible games since being drafted in the first round by the Patriots in 2018.
Eagles
While the Eagles spent significant draft capital on first-round CB Quinyon Mitchell and second-round DB Cooper DeJean and brought back veteran Avonte Maddox to go along with holdovers like Darius Slay, James Bradberry and Kelee Ringo, the under-the-radar addition of Rodgers could actually pay the biggest dividends. Philadelphia signed Rodgers after he was cut by the Colts following his year-long suspension for violating the league’s gambling policy in 2023. It was a patience play for the Eagles who could be rewarded, as Rodgers was running with the starters during the spring and making plays. Outside of Slay, the Eagles cornerback room is wide open with major questions about every player. Before his suspension, Rodgers had already made his mark as a kickoff returner — something with extra relevance this year with the rule changes — and had been carving out a bigger role on defense. He’s my darkhorse pick to win the No. 2 corner job across from Slay.
Falcons
Dalman seized the starting job in 2022 when Matt Hennessy was injured and hasn’t looked back, starting 31 of 34 possible games since then. Hennessy was a solid player, too, but Dalman has just been better. PFF in particular has been high on him, grading Dalman as the No. 14 and No. 3 center in the past two years respectively, largely on the back of his run-blocking grades. This coming year is the final year of Dalman’s contract and his run blocking should be an equally good fit for new OC Zac Robinson just like the past few years under HC Arthur Smith. If he can improve his pass protection, Dalman could start to build name recognition beyond just PFF.
Giants
Schmitz took his lumps as a rookie, finishing as PFF’s worst-graded center despite being billed as a pro-ready prospect. It’s a good reminder that the rookie learning curve hits 99 percent of players. The Giants still have high hopes for Schmitz and the good news is the bar is set low for improvement. New York needs Schmitz to take a big step forward and not go the route of OT Evan Neal — another supposed pro-ready offensive lineman they drafted who struggled mightily as a rookie and didn’t take a step forward in year 2.
Jaguars
Cisco has built a reputation as a ball-hawk over the past two seasons with seven interception and 15 pass deflections, great numbers for a safety. He’s also got a great size/speed combination for a safety at 6-1 and 216 pounds and a 4.33-second 40-yard dash at his pro day back in 2021. New Jaguars DC Ryan Nielsen uses a lot of single-high safety looks and Cisco’s range makes him a great fit for that role. Entering a contract year, Cisco could put himself in line for a big reward if he can keep being the ball magnet he’s been the last two years.
Jets
After a quiet rookie year in a rotational role, Johnson nearly doubled his snaps in 2023 and became a full-time starter for all 17 games. He saw a resulting bump in his production, recording 11 tackles for loss, 7.5 sacks, one forced fumble, seven batted passes and a pick-six for good measure. Johnson notched 56 total pressures which was 27th among all edge rushers, per PFF, and had the sixth-best run stop win rate per ESPN. He made the leap into a solid NFL starter, but there’s room for him to ascend even further and stake a claim as a top-15 or better edge rusher.
Lions
OLB James Houston
Houston was unable to follow up an outstanding rookie season when he notched eight sacks in just 92 pass rushing snaps. He played in only two games due to injury in 2023. One of the things the Lions need to take the next step on defense and as a franchise is someone outside of DE Aidan Hutchinson to establish themselves as a legit pass-rushing threat. Back and healthy for 2024, Houston is a candidate to fill that need.
Packers
The Packers are loaded with potential breakout players thanks to the youth movement they embraced in 2023, which ended in a playoff run after some early-season growing pains. Guys like OT Zach Tom, WR Dontayvion Wicks and DT Karl Brooks received some consideration. But I settled on Van Ness as the pick. The 2023 first-rounder flashed as a rookie and had a great Week 1 with five total pressures against the Bears. He didn’t record more than two pressures in a game the rest of the season but the new defensive scheme under DC Jeff Hafley should be well-suited to maximize Van Ness’ athleticism as a pass rusher. After recording 22 total pressures and four sacks in his debut, Van Ness should be able to take a big step forward in 2024 even if he’s working in behind Rashan Gary and Preston Smith.
Panthers
CB Jayce Horn
The popular breakout pick for Carolina is QB Bryce Young, and the Panthers have a lot riding on the former No. 1 overall pick finding his NFL footing. But this is a team that just needs an influx of talent, period, on both sides of the ball, and Horn is someone the team has a lot riding on. Injuries have limited Horn to only 22 games in his first three seasons, but when he’s been on the field, Horn has been outstanding. His career completion percentage allowed is under 55 percent. He has the potential to not only be the Panthers’ best player but one of the best players in the NFL at his position.
Patriots
Gonzalez was making an early bid for defensive rookie of the year when his season was shuttered after just four games due to a shoulder injury. He had three pass deflections, an interception and a sack before going down, and was impressing the team with both sticky coverage and a mature approach to the game. Some rookies have a transition period, others are pros from Day 1, and it seems like Gonzalez was the latter. Patriots teammates say Gonzalez is ready to pick up where he left off in Year 2.
Raiders
Munford ended up starting 10 games for the Raiders last year between both left and right tackle due to injury, and he acquitted himself well for a former seventh-round pick. Las Vegas believes he’s ready to step into a starting role on the right side going into the 2024 season. While there were some rough moments in pass protection, Munford was excellent as a run blocker and that dovetails nicely with the identity the Raiders want to play with this season. He has the tools to improve in pass protection as well and take a step forward to reward Las Vegas’ confidence in him.
Rams
DT Kobie Turner
There was an undercurrent of support for Turner to win the 2023 Defensive Rookie of the Year award for his work on a young, spunky and usually overmatched Rams defense. Turner did his best Aaron Donald impersonation with nine sacks as an undersized rookie defensive tackle, and his underlying metrics were of good quality too. PFF tracked Turner with 50 total pressures, 15th best out of 129 defensive tackles. Development isn’t always linear but generally players see the most improvement from their first to their second season, which leaves the Rams in an exciting place with Turner.
Ravens
The former first-round pick has been a trendy breakout pick before but unfortunately a series of injuries and other unfortunate events over the last few years have bottled Bateman up. After popping off for 1,200 yards receiving his sophomore year of college, a gnarly case of COVID-19 held him back in 2020. His rookie season got off to a slow start due to a groin injury, then a foot injury shut him down after a fast start in 2022 and lingered into this past season. But now, everyone in Baltimore is singing the same tune about Bateman being healthy and ready to capitalize on his potential. Bateman has generally performed well when he’s been healthy, so perhaps now things are aligning for him to finally generate some momentum.
Saints
The Saints did a great job of keeping Shaheed under the radar to start his career as a former undrafted free agent out of Weber State before unleashing him halfway through his first year in 2022. His first two career touches were long touchdowns, including one rushing and one receiving. Shaheed continued his work as a big play threat last year, going over 700 yards receiving and five touchdowns. He’s also made waves as a return specialist, taking a punt back for a score and making the Pro Bowl as a returner in 2023. Shaheed has continued to expand his role on offense and enters the 2024 season as a projected starter next to WR Chris Olave. He’s poised for his best season yet.
Seahawks
LB Tyrel Dodson
Dodson has a unique arc compared to a lot of the players on this list. An undrafted free agent out of Texas A&M in 2019, Dodson didn’t play as a rookie in part to a six-game suspension for a domestic violence incident. He stuck around in Buffalo on the practice squad and eventually played his way onto the active roster, primarily as a special teams player. He had nearly 700 snaps on special teams compared to just 470 on defense. But due to injuries in 2023, Dodson was pressed into duty and surprisingly excelled. He had 74 total tackles, eight tackles for loss, 2.5 sacks, one forced fumble and two pass deflections. PFF actually graded him as their top linebacker, which might have been a fluke since his grade was nearly twice as good as any previous season. He has a chance with the Seahawks to prove it was a true breakout and cement himself as a starter — and he’s in a great position to do so. New Seahawks HC Mike Macdonald has a history of getting quality linebacker play.
Steelers
Freiermuth looked eminently competent as a rookie — which is hard to do since tight end has one of the steepest learning curves of any position. He had 60 catches for 497 yards and seven touchdowns in his first season. While he improved his receiving totals to 63 catches and 732 yards in Year 2, he only found the end zone twice due to systemic struggles surrounding OC Matt Canada. Year 3 was a big step back due to injury and continued issues on offense. But the great news for Freiermuth is new OC Arthur Smith has a love affair with the position, and Freiermuth is exactly the type of well-rounded player he loves to feature.
Texans
WR Tank Dell
Unfortunately for Dell and the Texans, a nasty ankle injury cut short what was looking like a brilliant rookie year. Houston took Dell in the third round due in part to a glowing recommendation from QB C.J. Stroud after working out with Dell during the pre-draft process. The two had an instant rapport and Dell was on his way to hitting 1,000 yards receiving as a rookie with 47 catches, 709 yards and seven touchdowns in 11 games. Despite being only 5-10 and 165 pounds, Dell is a terror as an outside receiver running routes. Houston has a crowded receiving corps in 2024, but Dell’s talent should still lead to a big season.
Titans
RB Tyjae Spears
Some rookies are so good they literally force the coaching staff to find ways to put them on the field. That’s what happened with Spears last year, as the third-rounder out of Tulane was on the field for the exact same number of snaps as workhorse starting RB Derrick Henry, even if the veteran doubled up the rookie in total touches. Spears was an all-around solid back as a rookie, taking 100 carries for 453 yards and two touchdowns with 52 catches, 385 yards and another score through the air. He was 12th in the NFL in yards after contact per attempt and was PFF’s third-best back in pass protection. Though the Titans brought in RB Tony Pollard to share the load, expect Spears to take a big step forward in his second season and become an even larger part of Tennessee’s offense.
Vikings
QB Sam Darnold
This is easily the breakout pick I’m least confident in. There are several years of data on who Darnold is as an NFL quarterback at this point in his career and he’s on his fourth team. But it seems like there’s been a trend over the past few years of a quarterback resurrecting his career from irrelevancy. If you had to pick a player to be this year’s Geno Smith or Baker Mayfield, Darnold seems like a decent bet. The Vikings seem determined to give him a long leash as the starter and not rush first-round QB J.J. McCarthy into action. This will be the best supporting cast Darnold has had in his career as a starter and HC Kevin O’Connell is the best play-caller (I’m excluding last year with the 49ers as Darnold only got mop-up duty and a Week 18 start when San Francisco was resting its starters). The talent is there from an arm talent and creativity standpoint, Darnold just has to avoid the brain-dead mistakes when pressured. If he can’t do it in Minnesota, that might be the final nail in the coffin.
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