2026 IDP Breakout Candidates: Linebackers
Identify the linebackers poised for a fantasy football breakout, with advanced IDP analysis and key metrics.
Each season, players take their games to new levels and significantly improve their fantasy football production along the way.
The linebacker position for IDP often relies on snaps, and that is going to be a key factor when looking at this year’s breakout candidates.
Notes:
A significant jump in overall fantasy finish or fantasy points per game is expected, not just an incremental improvement.
We’re looking for over 12.0 points per game in 2026.
No rookies.
Referenced Big-3 Scoring can be found here.
Jihaad Campbell, Philadelphia Eagles
Campbell was a highly touted prospect coming into his rookie season, earning first-round draft capital out of Alabama and scoring in the 95th percentile in my prospect model. There was one holdup when it came to his immediate IDP potential, which was that Nakobe Dean was likely going to return to the Eagles lineup at some point in 2025, which would have muddied Campbell’s playing time and IDP production. After starting the first seven weeks of the year, averaging 94% of the team’s defensive snaps, Dean did, in fact, return, which cut Campbell’s playing time down to 33% of snaps over his next seven games. Step 1 toward a breakout season for Campbell is Dean moving on from the team, leaving the runway clear for Campbell to once again assume a full-time role in Vic Fangio’s defense.
As mentioned at the top, high-end playing time is essential for linebackers to produce IDP-relevant numbers, and Campbell is clearly set for a much larger and more consistent role in Year 2. The next step for Campbell to elevate his game is to be more efficient with his opportunities than he was in 2025, as he managed just a 26th-percentile mark in Tackles versus Expected and didn’t deliver a single sack, despite solid pass-rush metrics and a high 13% blitz rate. That usage isn’t typically great for tackle efficiency, but Campbell should at least be able to make up for that deficiency with more luck in the sack column. Our IDP projections have Campbell close to three sacks on the year, on top of reasonable tackle production — good for LB24 with his new role this season.
Should Campbell improve even marginally as a tackler to go along with an every-down role and positive regression in the sack column, he should be no worse than an IDP LB2 this season. With great luck in the sack column and an above-average tackle rate, there’s significantly more upside to target for a sure-to-be breakout season.
Barrett Carter, Cincinnati Bengals
Carter spent just over a month of his rookie season playing the LB3 role in Cincinnati’s defense before the team decided to make a major change away from Logan Wilson, crowning Carter as the team’s lone every-down linebacker. While Carter’s level of play in Year 1 was suspect at best, ranking near the bottom-100 players at his position in all the key PFF grading categories, it says a lot that the team didn’t add to the position this offseason, leaving Carter primed to be the team’s green-dot linebacker once again in 2026.
Carter was not necessarily the most effective IDP in his full-time role, averaging just under 9.0 points per game once he took over as a full-time player. We’ll be betting on some progression as both an NFL starter and as an IDP for him to deliver a true breakout season here in Year 2, which will almost certainly bank on better play in run defense, where he finished just 12th percentile in Tackles versus Expected against the run, despite an elite 95th percentile mark in that regard on passing downs. Carter was picked on quite a bit by opposing NFL passing offenses, and that isn’t likely to change in 2026, which gives me hope that he’ll continue to get strong tackle opportunities in that regard. If he’s able to clean up the missed tackles and be in a better position on run downs, that will certainly help him deliver the higher tackle rates we’re looking for in our starting IDP linebackers.
Carter isn’t the sexiest IDP option, but given that the Bengals have no other options to play that every-down role, and the fact that he’s being drafted as LB45 right now, he becomes an easy choice to scoop up and bank on a breakout season.
Drake Thomas, Seattle Seahawks
Thomas emerged seemingly out of nowhere last season, after spending the first two years of his career as a special teamer and barely sniffing the field on defense. Thomas took over for an injured Tyrice Knight in Week 6 of last season, and with Knight continuously managing several injuries, Thomas took that job and never looked back. It wasn’t a full-time role for Thomas as the Seahawks’ LB2, but it was enough that he was able to show some promise as an IDP and create some hope, especially after earning a two-year contract extension with the team this offseason.
Thomas’ snap shares in his first year as a starter were up and down, and that carried over into the NFL Playoffs and the Super Bowl. There were several weeks in the middle of the year, including when Ernest Jones missed some time, where Thomas was playing a near-every-down role, and even if it’s not a 90-plus percent snap share in 2026, we’ll be looking for something resembling that of the second half of last regular season (77%). If Thomas can maintain that 80ish-percent snap share as his floor, he should find himself delivering more consistent tackle numbers.
Thomas’ tackle production is the reason he was only LB45 in points per game last season, despite recording three sacks and other big plays that would have pushed him higher up the standings. Thomas finished in just the 20th percentile in Tackles versus Expected last season, which will need to improve for a breakout year, especially if his big plays regress in any way. Considering the new contract and the need at LB2, Thomas should be in a good spot for a better and more consistent IDP season in 2026.
Payton Wilson, Pittsburgh Steelers
Okay, get ready, because it’s time to inhale a near-fatal amount of hopium one last time. It’s now been two years of Payton Wilson proving to be the better player and more effective IDP than his teammate and Steelers’ LB1 Patrick Queen, so eventually it’s going to lead to the Steelers coaching staff recognizing that they’re better off with Wilson playing more snaps, right? With an entirely new coaching staff coming in and no loyalty to either player, maybe this is the year that Wilson plays a full-time role (I warned you that there’d be hopium involved).
So let’s make the case for Wilson once again. Or more accurately, the case against Queen, who has continuously struggled as an NFL starter. Even though Wilson did not score as well on PFF grades as he did in his rookie season, he still outperformed Queen across the board. This was the case in 2024 as well. Queen finished with a bottom-five missed tackle rate (21.2%) and coverage grade (31.3) for the position in 2025, and after his first-round capital has bought him six years of leeway, at some point enough is going to be enough. Ideally, that starts with the Steelers giving Wilson more run as an every-down player, even if both he and Queen remain on the field at the same time, to better shore up the significant tackling issues at the second level of the defense.
If Patrick Graham and company are more willing to play Wilson at a higher rate, we should easily see him clear Queen as an IDP as well. Queen played 379 more defensive snaps than Wilson in 2025, and Wilson still outperformed him as an IDP, finishing as LB30 in Big-30 scoring compared to Queen’s LB32. Now picture the two with the same amount of snaps. Wilson has been an elite tackler at the position since entering the league, finishing in the 93rd percentile as a rookie and in the 97th percentile last year in Tackles versus Expected. There’s too much potential there for me to ignore, even if the Pittsburgh coaching staff has continued to do so. But one more time, let’s pray to the football gods for the sake of my own sanity that we get more Wilson and less Queen in 2026.
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Loved Carter last year as a waiver pick up and got him on almost every dynasty squad now. Traded for Payton Wilson in the off season also, in a rebuilder. Wilson, Burden, and a 2026 1st (1.16) that turned into Caleb Downs, for Drake London.