2025 IDP Waiver Wire: Week 2
Who are the IDPs you should target on the waiver wire in your league?
What a great start to the 2025 NFL season! Now that Week 1 is over, we begin the mad scramble to grab players that will make our teams better. Because I know we all play in leagues of varying depth—with different IDPs on the waiver wire—I’m going to identify IDP waiver targets at each position for shallow, average, and deep leagues.
Defensive Line
Shallow: Alex Highsmith, Edge, Pittsburgh Steelers
As I write this, Highsmith is rostered in 54% of Sleeper IDP dynasty leagues. To quote Adam Marcum, “What are we doin’ here, folks?”
Highsmith isn’t just the beneficiary of playing across from T.J. Watt; he is also a very talented player himself. His PFF grades have been all greens and blues over the last two years, with his pass rush grade leading the way. It was 86.2 in 2023 and 89.4 during an injury-shortened season in 2024. Then you look at the production:
2022: 15 sacks and 5 QB hits on 55 pressures.
2023: 7 sacks and 12 QB hits on 69 pressures.
2024: 6 sacks and 9 QB hits on 48 pressures in just 11 games.
Those pressures and QB hits are going to turn into more sacks at some point, and that point might be the year. In Week 1 against the Jets, Highsmith had 8 pressures, 1 sack, and 1 QB hit. He added 7 tackles on top of that. I don’t expect 8 pressures every game (that would be absurd), but this is a great start for a great player.
Highsmith should be rostered in every type of IDP league.
Average: Haason Reddick, Edge, Tampa Bay Buccaneers
Reddick is the first of three Buccaneers on this list who are under-rostered. Now, I will admit to not being 100% sure that Reddick is back. It is just one week of production following a lost season that was filled with drama.
But for Tampa Bay, Reddick was as advertised in Week 1. He tallied 1 sack on 8 pressures and added a couple of tackles. When Reddick is locked in and deployed properly (which I expect with the Buccaneers), he can be an explosive player. Before all the extracurricular activities, he recorded 59 sacks from 2020 to 2023.
I don’t expect 15 sacks from Reddick, but it also wouldn’t surprise me. We’ve seen it before. He’s worth picking up and will be in consideration as your EDGE2.