The full list of NFL player ratings for Madden NFL 26 is here, and that means it’s time to pore over player pages and see who was treated kindly and who got a raw deal. CeeDee Lamb is widely accepted as an elite wide receiver, but how does that translate into this year’s edition of Madden?
CeeDee Lamb’s Madden 26 Ratings Overview
EA considers Lamb to still be among the absolute elite at the wide receiver position with a 95 Rating that is fourth best in the game. His strength as a wide receiver comes from his complete lack of any weakness. His physical and mental tools are strong, with 90 Speed, 91 Acceleration, 94 Agility, 95 Awareness, and 96 Jumping. He can read the play and has the physical abilities to make the play once in position.
As a receiver, his 93 Catch In Traffic represents the lowest rating of his receiving attributes. 98 Spectacular Catch is a huge ability if you’re playing a quarterback whose accuracy is sub-optimal, while Short-to-Deep Route Running ratings of 94, 94, and 95 mean he can run any route, while his 98 Release prevents handsy defensive backs from forcing him off his lines.
How CeeDee Lamb Plays In Madden 26
Lamb is the prototypical do-everything receiver. A receiver like Lamb, who comes onto the field with no notable weaknesses, is an extremely valuable tool in your offense, particularly as a team-building tool. While anything shy of the most stacked MUT team possible will see Lamb as your primary receiving option, his versatility still makes it easier to fill out your receiving core, as you don’t have to worry that your #2 will just be a worse Lamb.
If you find a possession monster, then Lamb can handle being your deep threat, while a #2 who opens the top of a defense will create space in the short and intermediate passing game that Lamb can dominate with.
Is CeeDee Lamb’s Player Rating Fair Based On The 2024 NFL Season?
As the fourth-highest rated wide receiver in the game, Lamb currently slightly outranks his 2024 performance, but with a nuanced assessment, it shows that the confidence in Lamb is more than fair. Playing for a Cowboys offense that saw three men start for the Boys, and none of them looked particularly great while doing so, Lamb’s production represented another strong year.
Touchdowns are a volatile state for a wide receiver, and while Lamb’s dip to six was disheartening to fantasy owners, that he still posted top-ten numbers in yardage and receiving shows he’s still producing. Doing so in an offense where the next best mark barely touches half of his output just highlights how good Lamb still is.
CeeDee Lamb Vs. Other Top WRs In Madden 26
Lamb is still one of the best receivers in the NFL, and his in-game ratings show that. When compared with other receivers in the top ten, Lamb offers a level of elite balance that can only be matched by 99 Club members Jamar Chase and Justin Jefferson. While he may not be able to equal a player like Tyreek Hill for raw physical skills, nobody can match Hill on a pure speed basis.
Overall, they share a 95 rating, just below Amon-Ra St. Brown, though even there, your comparative value will vary by your team composition, as Lamb is certainly talented enough to be a bigger asset than all but the top two in the right situation. St. Brown gets the edge in hands, but Lamb has a higher floor on his Route Running attributes, and any coach will happily include either in their gameday roster.
Franchise Mode Impact: Development, Contracts & Long-Term Value
When looking for players to build around, you can do a lot worse than Lamb. The receiver successfully leveraged his way to a new contract last season, which made him the third highest paid player at the position, and now sees him secured through the first three seasons of Madden 26. Although his $34 million Average Per Year may seem like a big cap hit, wide receiver is a crucial position, and Lamb is a 26-year-old who is just entering his physical prime and already a star performer.
As a 95 OVR player already, there is not a massive amount of space for Lamb to grow into, but his age profile means he’s likely not yet playing at his best. This means that by taking over the Cowboys, drafting him in a fantasy draft, or trading for him in season one, you lock down a player whose floor is top-five receiver and whose ceiling is becoming the best in the league if you can get him to out-develop his fellow young peers at the top of the positional rankings.
Tips For Using CeeDee Lamb In Madden 26
The good news about having CeeDee Lamb on the field for you in Madden 26 is that there is no bad way to use him other than not doing so. A no-weakness receiving threat like him is always dangerous to the opponent, no matter what he is doing on a given play. To get the most out of Lamb, however, keep these tips in mind.
- Make your other receivers’ weaknesses your strength: Because Lamb does it all, that means he can do whatever your other receivers can’t. While it may be counterintuitive to use Lamb around your lesser players if you have less-versatile options but ones who still possess single-role skills that are strong, letting them work their best routes and letting Lamb excel at whatever you need creates multiple high-threat targets for an unstoppable passing attack.
- Make use of his diversity: Don’t think that means you have to restrict Lamb to just one type of route, either. He is great at everything, and that is his threat, so make use of it. Keeping his routes varied keeps your opponent guessing and makes efforts to scheme Lamb out of the game that much more challenging.
- Keep him fed: Ultimately, the modern NFL game is about getting the ball in the hands of playmakers, so make sure you run enough plays for Lamb. His specialty catching abilities mean windows that may not be open for other players remain viable for Lamb, and getting the ball headed his way means giving him another chance to do something spectacular to make a big play for your team out of nothing.
- Sweep the defense off their feet: Lamb wasn’t the most active wide receiver in the running game last year, but with about one carry per game, he wasn’t an afterthought either. With 76 Carrying and 86 Break Tackle, he has relatively strong ball-handling attributes for a receiver. His 97 Ball Carrier Vision means he can see opportunities even under CPU control, and 93 Change Of Direction lets him make the hard cuts required to take advantage of them, meaning Lamb coming around the end with the ball has the potential to become a home run play.
- Use the sidelines: Lamb carries both the Short Out Elite and Mid Out Elite traits as well as YAC ‘Em Up. This shows that he excels at running routes toward the sideline at both short and medium range and is a threat once the ball is in his hands to rack up post-catch yardage. Break the defense’s ankles with hard cuts to the sidelines, then turn upfield once he’s hauled it in to gash the defense for big plays.
Final Verdict: Overrated, Underrated, Or Just Right?
Assessing the launch day ratings for Lamb, it’s hard to argue that the folks at EA got a whole lot wrong. Just as his attributes imply, he is a player who sits noticeably a step behind Chase and Jefferson, but with nobody else showing a clear ability gap back to Lamb and a whole lot of players whose best days would fall short of Lamb’s worst. It remains to be seen whether that translates to another big year on the field or if his supporting cast will let him down, but in Madden, he looks set for another dominant edition.
What are your thoughts on CeeDee Lamb in Madden NFL 26? Do you agree that EA seems to have hit the nail on the head, or do you think they’ve missed the mark by over- or under-representing what he’s bringing to the table in 2025?
