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| Tuesday, June 18, 2024 |
| Hello, welcome to the new-look newsletter. If this is the first email you are reading addressed to you from Jacob Gibbs, that means we missed in connecting on my initial introduction. It should have hit your inbox on Monday. |
| As this email's title gave away, my name is Jacob Gibbs. You can follow me on Twitter if you want to get to know me better. My hope is that your email inbox will become your one-stop shop for my work. Another hope of mine is to figure out how to better title newsletter emails. We'll get there! We're just getting started, you're technically reading part two of my intro. |
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| In part one of my intro, I laid out my hopes and dreams for the newsletter. If that sounds a bit too sentimental for your taste, then stay right here. Let's talk ball, y'all! |
| Also already spoiled by the title, this email does in fact detail the players that I am not drafting in 2024. I hate the price points for these players. I hate the opportunity cost of selecting one of these players with such awesome options surrounding them on the draft board. I hate the fact that some of you already have made up your mind on these players and are going to select them no matter what you hear here today. To quote Kendrick Lamer, "I'm the biggest hater." You have to be to survive these Fantasy football streets! |
| The other email very much leaned into a "good luck, have fun!" attitude as I waxed poetic about how Fantasy football -- for me -- centers around joy and learning and all the warm and fuzzy aspects of the game. Let's be honest, though. This game is not for the faint-hearted! I don't know if Kendrick Lamar plays Fantasy football, but I bet he'd be pretty freaking nasty at it if he did. I know I'd be terrified to see that "KDot616" scooped my head to head contest on DraftKings. |
| In addressing Drake recently, Lamar also said (among other things), "I don't have a hatin' bone in my body," just a day after saying that he was the biggest hater, and that juxtaposition is precisely the correct tone to kick things off with here, I think. Some say that hate is the opposite of love. Elie Wiesel was a Holocaust survivor, human rights activist, author, and teacher. He said that "hate is not the opposite of love. Indifference is the opposite of love." I think that hate might be the most intense expression of love. I believe Lamar when he says that he's the biggest hater, and I believe him when he says he doesn't have a hating bone in his body. I wonder if all expression -- with indifference being a lack of expression -- is a form of love and if love might be all that we are. |
| Are you ready to talk about Fantasy football? |
| Andre 3000 once said, "There's a fine line between love and hate, and I'm on it." That's the line that we're going to straddle today. You might have some intense feelings about some of the players who I will mention. Maybe not quite Kendrick Lamar-level intensity, but then again, you are reading a Fantasy football newsletter in June. That's pretty intense commitment. |
| You probably have some intense feelings about these players. Is it love? Is it hate? Is either just a path to inevitable disappointment, regardless of which you choose or whether you believe that no separation exists between the two -- is indifference the only path to peace and contentment? |
| I don't have the answer to that question, I'm still out here hating. I will hate it if you draft the players that I am about to mention in 2024. You're gonna do it anyway, aren't you? Hater. I put so much time into this! Don't you dare draft these players, or I just might write intros that get even longer and longer as we get into the heat of the summer just to spite you haters. I'm serious, I have no shortage of philosophical quotes from rappers. Do not test me. I better see the average draft positions (ADP) falling on all of these guys as we get closer to August. Do not draft these players! |
| Justin Jefferson and Jordan Addison |
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| The Minnesota Vikings were one of nine teams to produce over 3,000 route running opportunities in 2023. Only the Los Angeles Chargers (614) and Jacksonville Jaguars (607) produced more total targets than Minnesota (606). The Vikings also scored a league-high 77% of total touchdowns via passing scores. The league average rate was 58%. |
| Even if the QB position looked the exact same in 2024, this team would be subject to regression in the receiving touchdown department. It is very rare for a team to post a league-high type of outlier in a metric in back-to-back seasons, especially with a metric that fluctuates as often year-over-year as touchdowns tend to. For reference, 10 of 12 teams to post a rate above 70% over the past five seasons (Minnesota's rate was 77% in 2023) finished with fewer passing scores the following year. That group's total dropped by 8.7 passing TDs, on average. |
| Regression is coming for this offense's receiving stats. As a rookie, Jordan Addison became one of 15 receivers to post a double-digit touchdown total at 23 or younger since 2000. Among that group, Addison's production outside of the touchdown department clearly sticks out. Only Chase Claypool and Tyreek Hill (as a part-time RB-WR hybrid player) finished with fewer receiving yards. He's the primary regression candidate here. I'm worried a bit about Justin Jefferson's counting numbers too, though. |
| Over the past five seasons, NFL offenses have produced 37.9 dropbacks and 31.9 targets on average in games with a rookie starter at QB. Minnesota's offense has produced 42.3 dropbacks and 36.7 targets per game over the past two seasons. Jefferson has averaged 41.2 routes per healthy game (at least a 50% snap rate) during that time, no other NFL player has averaged more than 40. From an opportunity standpoint, Minnesota's offense has been the premier wide receiver Fantasy point print shop. |
| You might be surprised by where we find Jefferson's name among the league leaders at WR when measuring on a per-route basis rather than raw receiving volume. |
Targets per route run leaders
(2022-23) |
34.1% -- Tyreek Hill
29.7% -- Davante Adams
29.3% -- Amon-Ra St. Brown
28.2% -- CeeDee Lamb
27.3% -- Keenan Allen
27.0% -- Stefon Diggs
26.9% -- DeAndre Hopkins
26.8% -- Justin Jefferson |
| When it comes to turning those targets into production, Jefferson has of course been elite. He ranks third in first downs per route and second in yards per route over the past two seasons. Here's an amazing stat -- Jefferson's yard-per-route run rate was actually higher (2.94 on 171 routes) without Kirk Cousins on the field than it is (2.63) with him on the field in 2023! |
| On average, wide receiver yard per route run production drops by nine percent when playing with a rookie QB. We may see Jefferson produce less efficiently with some combination of J.J. McCarthy and Sam Darnold delivering him the ball. I wouldn't bet against his efficiency though. |
| His volume is what I'm worried about. Jefferson's target-per-route run rate isn't quite at the same level as other elite wide receivers. It's always been that way -- Jefferson didn't draw targets at a high rate in college, and his highest single-season TPRR rate as a pro is 27.1%. He runs a very downfield-oriented route tree, which puts an artificial ceiling on his target numbers. Previously, Minnesota's offensive environment has lifted that ceiling and allowed Jefferson to still rank first in the NFL with 11 targets per healthy game. My projections have that number coming down significantly in 2024. |
| Jefferson comes in at 11th overall in my half-PPR rankings. I would draft Puka Nacua and Garrett Wilson ahead of him. Don't you hate it?! |
| I get it if you can't help but push the button on Jefferson if he "falls" to you. He's not a bad pick, we know that he's a stud. The "floor" to his range of outcomes is very high. His median projection is still very high. I do not see a path to the same type of upside as the other players drafted in Round 1, though. |
| Addison's ranking will probably be easier for you to get behind. I have 45 receivers ranked ahead of him. Addison is, in my opinion, a bad pick for Fantasy in 2024. |
| Addison was really underwhelming on a per-route basis. He's a good real-life player. I was all in on him for Fantasy leading up to his rookie season. I do not feel the same enthusiasm without Kirk Cousins at QB. |
| Saquon Barkley and Jonathan Taylor |
| CBS average draft position has both of these players going off of the board at the back end of Round 1 in 12-team drafts. That is absolutely bananas, in my opinion. |
| Assuming health, Anthony Richardson and Jalen Hurts project to be the two most active rushing quarterbacks when in scoring distance. Both of these backs will contend with competition for goalline touches in a way that they never have before. |
| Either is capable of creating touchdowns from outside of the red zone, and both offenses project to score a lot of points, so a high touchdown total is still in play -- especially in Barkley's case. Vegas look-ahead lines imply the 11th-highest point total for the Eagles and the 17th-highest for the Colts. Those ranks provide solid, if unspectacular, baselines for building each team's offensive projection. Even within that, I don't see how we can get behind investing Round 1 draft equity into either player. |
| Touchdown upside isn't my only concern with these two. Both players offer limited receiving upside. Taylor's highest single-season reception total is 51. Barkley's highest total since his 121-target rookie season is 76. Among 82 qualified running backs, Taylor ranks 61st over the past three seasons in target per route run rate while Barkley is 26th. Both backs rank outside of the top 50 in yards per route during that time. You might think of Barkley as a dual-threat back because of his rookie season, but he hasn't been a productive receiving back in a long time. Jerome Ford drew more targets and produced more with his receiving opportunities than Barkley did in 2023. |
| Over the past five seasons, the league average target per route run rate at the RB position is 18.9%. The average for running backs playing in offenses with Kellen Moore (new Eagles offensive coordinator) at OC was 17.5%. The average for running backs with Jalen Hurts at QB was 15.9%. The average for Eagles running backs not named Kenneth Gainwell was 14.5%. |
| Targets and touchdowns are where Fantasy running back upside comes from. With concerns over both, Taylor and Barkley are two players who I never land in drafts. I would so much rather select the wide receivers available in that range from a straight-up projection comparison standpoint. We don't even need to get into the anti-fragility discussion when it comes to these two. |
| Kyren Williams |
| An anti-fragility discussion is necessary, though, as I'm about to hate on every running back pick in the first three rounds. |
| Selecting running backs in the early rounds of Fantasy drafts is a fragile way to construct a roster because of the inherent injury risk. I can't stomach the idea of investing an early pick into these backs when we have so many incredible wide receiver options available to us as well as a plethora of high-upside late-round running back targets. |
| Kyren Williams leaves the board as the 27th player on average in Underdog Fantasy drafts, which I believe contain the "sharpest" drafters. CBSSports ADP has Williams off the board at PICK 12! Williams ahead of Puka Nacua? |
| I actually do prefer Williams to Barkley and Taylor, an opinion that strays pretty far from consensus. All three of Jamey Eisenberg, Dave Richard, and Heath Cummings rank Taylor ahead of Williams, while Cummings is the only CBS ranker who joins me in rankings Williams over Barkley. You can find their rankings on CBS and can expect an email in your inbox with my rankings and analysis comparing discrepancies between mine and the FFT crew before the end of the month of June. |
| If healthy, Williams will likely do something pretty similar to what we saw in 2023. The Rams instituted a league-high "duo" rushing attack in 2023 and bulked up the interior offensive line even more this offseason. Williams is built for this bully-ball interior running system, and the Rams leaned heavily on him when in scoring distance. In games that Williams suited up, he accounted for 63% of the offensive touches from inside the 10-yard line. Only Joe Mixon and Barkley had rates above 60% throughout the full season. If not healthy, even if only for a game or two, Williams runs the risk of losing work to rookie Blake Corum. Like Williams, Corum's skill set is well suited to the duo-heavy approach in Los Angeles. I don't expect the rookie to demand work from Williams right away, but it's absolutely possible that he'll play his way into a role at some point. |
| The top to Williams' range of outcomes is higher than that wide receivers who are drafted around him, but the difference is not large enough for me to consider drafting him in that range given the difference in their respective bottom to those ranges. |
| Travis Etienne |
| The Jaguars come in sandwiched between the Colts (412 points) and Eagles (433.5 points) with a Vegas lookahead implied season-long point total of 417.5. Travis Etienne's inside the 10 touch rate was 35% in 2023, so he doesn't even sniff the Williams range, but his rate may not look that much different than Barkley's in 2024. D'Andre Swift's rate was 37% in Philly, for reference. |
| Etienne's receiving projection looks way better than Barkley or Taylor's, if comparing the three. Rachaad White, Bijan Robinson, and Christian McCaffrey were the only running backs who ran more routes than Etienne in 2023. |
| My projections don't see a whole lot of separation between Etienne, Barkley, and Taylor, yet he's drafted a full round behind them in most places. And I'm still not in, even at that price. Etienne is drafted ahead of Nico Collins and Drake London on CBS. He doesn't come close to those two in my rankings. I'd happily take Jaylen Waddle and Brandon Aiyuk over him as well. |
| From a role perspective, it can't get much better than what Etienne experienced in 2023 and we may even see his workload scaled back. There are still paths to an awesome Fantasy season; Jacksonville's offense could be better, for example. Rookie WR Brian Thomas Jr. could add an element to this offense that wasn't there. The offensive line play couldn't be much worse. Only the Chargers graded out as a worse run blocking unit than the Jags according to PFF. I don't feel particularly confident that things are going to improve for this offense, at least not enough to warrant taking the plunge on Etienne over the wide receivers available in his ADP range. |
| Isiah Pacheco |
| CBS Sports ADP |
17 overall -- Etienne
21 overall -- Isiah Pacheco |
| Underdog Fantasy ADP |
41 overall -- Etienne
47 overall -- Pacheco |
| Anytime there's a gap this wide between Underdog ADP data and the site that you draft on, it's worth taking note of. Underdog's ADP is derived from Best Ball drafts, so they are drafting for a slightly different game. But the ADP difference isn't so pronounced for every single running back. CMC is still the 1.01. Breece Hall and Bijan Robinson still are top-seven picks on average. Jahmyr Gibbs is the 12th player off the board on average, and Barkley and Taylor usually come close behind him. |
| Pacheco is a Round 2 pick on CBS but often falls to Round 5 on Underdog. |
| From a projections standpoint, Pacheco doesn't look like a bad pick. That's because projections don't assume injuries. With a 15.5-game projection, Pacheco is set to put up some really strong production. I worry about health, though. Pacheco runs like an absolute maniac. He invites contact. DraftSharks.com has an injury predictor tool that lists Pacheco as one of the highest-risk running backs. |
| At the Round 4-5 turn, I'm actually fine grabbing Pacheco if you need RB and don't feel great about any other options. He improved across the board in Year 2. Most notably, he was far more involved as a receiver. Pacheco was targeted on only 9.5% of his routes as a rookie, one of the lowest rates among qualified backs. In 2023, that rate was all the way up to a healthy 18.4%. His route participation rate (the percentage of total team dropbacks he ran a route on) nearly doubled too. Pacheco's efficiency as a rusher was noticeably improved as well, even though Kansas City's run game as a whole was much worse in 2023. After hitting the 20-touch threshold in just one game as a rookie, Pacheco reached that mark six times in 2023. Everything seems to be pointing up, and Pacheco appears poised to keep going for as long as he can. I sure hope he stays healthy, his running style is wildly entertaining. I have not ended up landing him in a single draft this summer, though. |
| Sam LaPorta |
| Trey McBride, Travis Kelce, and Mark Andrews all carry a higher expected median point total than Sam LaPorta in my projections, and I believe that both Kyle Pitts and Dalton Kincaid offer a higher ceiling. I feel more confident in LaPorta's role than Kincaid, and I feel absolutely no confidence in what to expect from Atlanta's offense, so for the purpose of keeping this conversation focused on LaPorta, let's table a conversation on those two for a later day. I am actively ranking McBride, Kelce, and Andrews ahead of LaPorta, though, which we definitely need to talk about since he is the consensus TE1. |
| According to Vegas lookahead lines, the Detroit Lions are who we can expect to be the second-highest scoring team in 2024 behind only the San Francisco 49ers. Detroit's implied point total is 465 points, compared to 456 for Kansas City and 441 for Baltimore. Arizona's implied total is 395 (21st), so from this perspective, McBride clearly stands out relative to the rest of this group. And especially when you consider that he only found the end zone three times in 2023, McBride's touchdown upside appears lower than the rest of this group. |
| I start the conversation with touchdowns because LaPorta overachieved in that department as a rookie. He found the end zone 10 times when most models based on usage (quantifying expectations based on where and when a player's opportunities on the field occur) implied a touchdown total of 6 or 7. Essentially, if we simulated last season 1,000 times, the number of times that LaPorta scored double-digit touchdowns would have been low. It was an unexpected outcome. LaPorta ranked 23rd in red zone targets and 32nd in end zone targets (among all players) but was one of just seven that found the end zone 10+ times as a receiver. |
| LaPorta ranked fifth at TE in expected Fantasy points per game according to the FantasyPoints Data Suite's model. He was sixth in yards per route run. Even in down years where injuries clearly impacted them both, Kelce and Andrews each remained more efficient with their routes than LaPorta. |
| You'll notice McBride's name above both Andrews and Kelce. In his first season as a starting NFL tight end, McBride finished first at his position in targets and first downs per route run. He became a full-time player in Week 8 and recorded a target share above 20% in every single game from that point on. LaPorta had a target share above 20% in just 6 of 17 games. Travis Kelce hit that mark in 10 of 15. McBride went 12 for 12. He finished as a top-12 Fantasy TE in 10 of 12 games during that stretch. |
| All evidence points towards McBride being unique in his ability to draw targets and convert them into yardage. At the collegiate level, McBride totaled 1,121 receiving yards in his final season. That ranks as the highest single-season total of any tight end prospect in TruMedia's database (dating back to 2017). On a per-route basis, McBride's 2021 was more productive than any collegiate season turned in by Andrews, Pitts, or Kincaid. The only tight end prospect who can rival his collegiate per-route data is Brock Bowers. |
| I expect McBride to remain a focal point of Arizona's offense while Marvin Harrison Jr.'s addition only helps raise the roof and create more space for him to operate in the short-to-intermediate area. In PPR formats, McBride was a cheat code in 2023. I don't expect that to change in Year 3. |
| McBride was better than LaPorta in college. He was targeted at a higher rate and more consistently than LaPorta in 2023 and was more efficient at converting his targets to yards. Touchdowns have been the only separator. Touchdowns are extremely important at the TE position, for sure, but touchdowns fluctuate rather wildly on a year-to-year basis. If you want the upside play, LaPorta makes more sense than McBride. His offense could lead the league in touchdowns, and his per-route rates could improve in a big way in his second season. |
| A similar type of improvement could be available to Andrews and Kelce with better health, though, and both face less target competition and have proven capable of existing as an offense's focal point. The run game is Detroit's offensive identity, and Amon-Ra St. Brown is the passing game's focal point. Even though Detroit is implied for slightly more points than Kansas City and Baltimore, I believe the top to ranges of outcomes for Kelce and Andrews is higher than LaPorta. If every one of those players is healthy and playing the peak versions of their possible roles within these offenses, I'd expect Andrews and Kelce to outscore LaPorta more often than not. |
| McBride has the best median projection of any tight end, in my projections, at least. LaPorta is more of a bet on upside play who also feels relatively unlikely to fail in a big way. And that's not a bad profile if you're able to select him in Round 4. I want no part of that profile in Round 2. |
| I am not out on Sam LaPorta. He's a stud, that much is clear watching him. His offense is awesome. He'll probably be a great Fantasy contributor once again in 2024. There's no way I can take him at his cost when I feel just as confident in the tight ends who come off the board after him. |
| Davante Adams |
| We're about to hit on several aging receivers, and before we do I want to point you to two resources. The first is this awesome article analyzing positional age curves written by Ryan Heath during the 2023 offseason. The second is this threat that I created on X: |
| I have no idea what type of production to expect from Davante Adams as he enters Year 10. His offense projects to be one of the lowest-output passing units in the NFL, and Adams has been on a steady decline that has accelerated over the past two seasons. |
| Year-over-year yard per route run rate for Davante Adams: |
2020 -- 2.96
2021 -- 2.82
2022 -- 2.46
2023 -- 1.98 |
| As detailed in the thread, Adams has seen a decline in his efficiency vs. man coverage. We'll cover coverage type data in more detail in future newsletter posts -- it's not a good sign when aging receivers decline in this metric. |
| Entering his age-32 season, Adams will face more target competition than he has since the 2010s. Jakobi Meyers has drawn targets at the 24th-highest per-route rate among 73 qualified receivers over the past three seasons. He has a higher target-per-route run rate during that time than Christian Kirk, DeVonta Smith, and Mike Evans. Meyers is a quality player, Adams saw his target per route run rate spike to 37% with Meyers off the field (compared to 29% with him on) in their first season together. Add Brock Bowers to the equation, and this is suddenly a well-rounded receiving group. Adams benefited from the highest first-read target rate in the NFL, per the FantasyPoints Data Suite, and Bowers is absolutely the type of weapon that is likely to soak up designed looks. If Adams loses any amount of the "lay-up" easy-button looks that he hogged in this offense last year, it will be felt in his Fantasy production. |
| Adams took a major step backward in his efficiency on downfield targets in 2023. Among 57 players who were targeted 15+ yards from the line of scrimmage at least 75 times, Adams ranked 50th in yards per target. This was heavily influenced by poor QB play, for sure. His off-target rate on deep targets was 21% over the three seasons prior to 2023 and then skyrocketed to 44% in 2023. His QB play is likely going to be poor again. Gardner Minshew wasn't quite as inaccurate as Aidan O'Connell, but his off-target rate on deep passes ranked 26th among 31 qualifiers. |
| I have a brutal projection for Adams and the Raiders pass game as a whole. He's the WR21 in my 2024 rankings, and his CBS ADP is 26th overall. So yeah, it appears as if I will have no Adams on my rosters this year. |
| Stefon Diggs |
| Diggs joined Adams in suffering a precipitous drop-off in efficiency on downfield targets, but unlike Adams, he had no poor QB play to point fingers at. His off-target rate on deep targets was actually lower (22.7%) in 2023 than it was across the 2020-22 seasons (23.4%). |
| Houston's offense might be so good that Diggs can still produce for Fantasy, but all signs point towards 2023 being the start of a real decline. With two awesome wide receivers who have already-existing chemistry with C.J. Stroud to compete for targets with, Diggs is not even a little bit interesting to me at his price. We don't even know what his role will be, there's a real possibility that he's not on the field in two-receiver sets and Houston only used three-receiver sets 62% of the time (22nd) in 2023. There are many paths to a disappointing season for Diggs. |
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| Cooper Kupp |
| I watched every target of Cooper Kupp's from 2023, and he did not look like the same player. Kupp has always been more effective at beating zone coverage than man, but he looked hopeless against man/press coverage. That's backed up by pretty horrendous data from within those specific coverage-type splits. |
| Kupp has not been healthy, and it's possible that he was simply battling through injuries for essentially the entirety of the 2023 season. If we assume good health in 2024, maybe a bounce back is possible. I loved what Sean McVay did with pre-snap motion to boost both his run and pass game, and Kupp was a primary beneficiary of designed looks that way. |
| My problem with Kupp is his price. He carries a CBS ADP of 36 overall, ahead of Michael Pittman, Jaylen Waddle, and Mark Andrews. That's nuts in my opinion, I can't get behind that or even close to it. I have Kupp ranked as the WR31 just ahead of Diggs and behind Zay Flowers, Keenan Allen (who, unlike Kupp, has shown no signs of slowing down), Christian Kirk, DeVonta Smith, and Amari Cooper. |
| Aaron Jones |
| In his age-29 season, Aaron Jones posted a career-worst explosive reception rate, finished with the fewest Fantasy points since his rookie campaign, and saw his avoided tackle rate drop from 25% in 2022 to 18%. Do you feel enthused about what might happen in his age-30 season? |
| I want to root for Jones, he's been one of the most dynamic and fun running backs in recent memory. If looking for optimism, Green Bay did run the offense through Jones down the stretch run in 2023, and with success. He topped 20 rush attempts in 4 of 5 games (including playoffs) to close out the season and turned in rushing yardage totals of 108 or higher in all five outings. We could see something similar from the Vikings if Kevin O'Connell chooses to ease J.J. McCarthy in. |
| All of the coach speak out of Minnesota this offseason has implied that Ty Chandler will remain an important part of Minnesota's backfield, though, and I'm just not feeling excited about investing in this offense as a whole. Even though I believe in O'Connell, it's tough to know what to do with an offense that has a Vegas lookahead line implied point total ranking just ahead (23rd) of the Steelers, Commanders, Saints, and Raiders. |
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| Jayden Reed |
| The great Denny Carter who has never been owned online found my Twitter account on the same day that I took over the newsletter, which I'm choosing to take as a fantastic omen. Unless you are someone who has been drafting a lot of Jayden Reed this summer, in which case you're probably feeling less fantastic. |
| Maybe you simply do not believe that Christian Watson is capable of playing a healthy season. If you do, then you are taking a huge leap of faith to invest in Reed at his draft price. We have no evidence that he will even be a full-time player if Watson is healthy. When Watson returned for Green Bay's playoff run, the only Packers WR that registered a route participation rate above 70% was Romeo Doubs. |
| I loved Reed as a prospect and believe in him as a player. I also believe that Watson is capable of being a playmaker in this offense. He pairs so well stylistically with Jordan Love. With Green Bay bringing in both Josh Jacobs and rookie RB Marshawn Lloyd, it's hard to project any dramatic increase in passing volume for this offense, which leaves it as a nearly impossible task to project Reed for the routes and targets needed to make him a viable pick anywhere before Rounds 8-9. You hate it, don't you? I'm taking Watson straight-up over Reed! Do you hate it?! I'm sorry, I just don't see how it makes any sense to draft him so high. From a range of outcomes standpoint, players like Watson, Xavier Worthy, Brian Thomas Jr., and Ladd McConkey feel like similar risk/reward bets and involve less opportunity cost at their respective price points. |
| Ladd McConkey |
| Speaking of McConkey, it feels like maybe we're a bit ahead of ourselves with some of the projections being thrown out for the rookie. |
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| McConkey's career-high single-game target total at Georgia was nine. He only topped six targets in 4 of 39 games. McConkey only drew a target on 24% of his routes during his Georgia career and his single-season high was just 26%. That's unusually low for an NFL prospect, even one playing in a competitive target space. |
| Yes, he competed with Bowers and other NFL prospects for targets in a run-first offense. We do have a decent sample size (140 routes) of McConkey without Brock Bowers on the field, his target per route run rate within that sample was just 24.7%. |
| All the film gurus and ballknowers tell me that McConkey is just that guy. Just watch him. Clearly, his routes are crisp. He's an awesome athlete. In theory, McConkey is a stud. In reality, he's an undersized receiver who posted horrible efficiency rates when pressed at the collegiate level and only topped 100 receiving yards in two career games. Now, as he enters a high-pressure situation in which his offense is severely lacking other weapons for defenses to key on, McConkey is going to be productive enough that I'll regret passing on him with a top-75 pick?! That's so high! We're drafting this profile ahead of so many proven players! |
| We haven't even discussed the elephant in the room. Jim Harbaugh is unlike anything we've seen at the NFL level recently. He only used three receiver sets 35% of the time, which ranked 68th of 69 Power 5 teams. During Harbaugh's tenure at Michigan, only 3 Power 5 teams scored a lower percentage of touchdowns via passing TDs. Harbaugh only passed the ball 30.1% of the time when in the red zone in 2023. |
| Some elements to Harbaugh's offense are exciting. He used pre-snap motion at the second-highest rate in the Power-5 last year, for example. I have no interest in critiquing Harbaugh. This is purely a discussion about his rookie receiver and how much we even expect him to play let alone draw targets in this offense. |
| Maybe McConkey will just be awesome and transcend all of this, but I'm not betting on it. I hate this pick. I find McConkey's ADP to be one of the most confusing in any position. |
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| Alright, that's it for now. I am only a mortal man, I can only do so much hating in one day. I might be back for more at the end of the summer with a new list to reflect updated ADP data. It'll probably depend on if we do indeed get a new Kendrick Lamar album to fuel me between now and the start of the season. |
| Before you leave, check this out! I created a new Beyond the Boxscore project that I am super excited about: |
| 'In The Lab,' a Fantasy Football Today Newsletter dynamic learning space for special people who like learning stuff |
| One Friday each month during the offseason and every Friday during the season, I'm going to explore topics decided upon by the FFT Newsletter audience. If you follow this link, you'll be able to fill out a quick Google Form and inform me of what you are curious about learning more about! July is right around the corner, and you know what comes after that. There's football in August. It's go time! Let's get in the lab! I am amped to learn more with you! |
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