Dynasty Watch: Second-Year WRs Pt. 3

This is the third post in a three-part series looking at the breakout potential for 20 receivers from the 2019 rookie class. A.J. Brown, DK Metcalf, and Terry McLaurin are excluded after already breaking out as rookies. 

Ostensibly ranked in descending dynasty value, the 20 receivers are named below. Click here to see the article 11-through-20, or click here to see 6-through-10. Otherwise, writeups for 1-through-5 are listed after the rankings.

1. Marquise Brown, BAL
2. Deebo Samuel, SF
3. Mecole Hardman, KC
4. Darius Slayton, NYG
5. Parris Campbell, IND
6. Preston Williams, MIA
7. Diontae Johnson, PIT
8. Andy Isabella, ARI
9. N'Keal Harry, NE
10. Hunter Renfrow, LV
11. Steven Sims, WAS
12. J.J. Arcega-Whiteside, PHI
13. Jalen Hurd, SF
14. Hakeem Butler, ARI
15. Kelvin Harmon, WAS
16. Miles Boykin, BAL
17. Scott Miller, TB
18. Bisi Johnson, MIN
19. Jakobi Meyers, NE
20. Riley Ridley, CHI

1. Marquise Brown, BAL

Brown (5-9, 170) doesn't have the frame to project as a traditional high-volume lead receiver in the NFL, but the Baltimore offense is far from traditional and Brown is poised to be a leading contributor within it. Despite a January 2019 surgery to repair a Lisfranc injury in his foot – one of the worst injuries for a football player at the moment – Brown made a standout rookie impact even at less than 100 percent and on limited reps both in terms of practice and in games.

Brown was hyper-productive at Oklahoma, outproducing the team's baseline with ease, and he did so before turning 22. Plus production with a positive age adjustment is a nice starting point for a prospect profile. There's additional luster to Brown's prospect profile thanks to his athleticism, though, which we have reason to believe contains a 40 time of 4.35 or better. Dede Westbrook was timed at a 4.39, and Baker Mayfield unequivocally called Brown the faster player. The film corroborates this. Even on a small frame, Brown is a menace before and after the catch and a danger to all levels of the field – he's just as lethal on underneath routes as ones downfield, and the defense has to take each possibility seriously on every play.

As long as that foot holds up – and the early indications are promising – then what we have here is simply one of the fastest, most skilled wide receiver prospects in the league playing on one of the highest-scoring offenses. Brown and Lamar Jackson will both go into this year at only 23 years old. If you can invest in a 23-year-old first-round receiver as fast and productive as Brown who's tied to a 23-year-old quarterback who just threw 36 touchdowns on 401 pass attempts then there's more reason for enthusiasm than caution. Brown should play closer to 55 snaps per game going forward after averaging 40.8 per game as a rookie, and the likely improvement in his foot should make him a more effective player yet than he was on the already-promising 2019 sample. Brown's rookie regular season is his past, but his future looks more like the playoff game against the Titans, when he caught seven of 11 targets for 126 yards.

Takeaway: Likely above average starter with star potential; mild volume but annually among league leaders in explosive plays

 
2. Deebo Samuel, SF

Samuel is a good player who I like at current cost in PPR redraft, but I think he's more maxed out than most suspect and I'm therefore a little lower on him in dynasty than his more vocal proponents might be. Still, Samuel was a good player in college and was convincing in his rookie season last year, earning 728 snaps in 15 games while drawing 81 targets and 14 carries, producing 57 receptions for 802 yards and three touchdowns through the air while stomping his way to another 159 yards and three touchdowns on the ground. That's a 71.3 percent catch rate at 9.9 yards per target – elite efficiency. We know Samuel is good, the question is what sort of growth we can realistically project.

Regardless of the specific way Samuel's story turns out in the NFL, it's safe to say in the meantime that he's a prototypical fit for Kyle Shanahan's offense, and as long as Shanahan is running the offense then Samuel is in his ideal playing situation. Shanahan uses motion and overall route designs to create short spaces underneath, where Samuel swoops in to take an easy grab into the open field, where his high-motor running and dense frame (5-11, 214) make for a painful tackling assignment for any defensive back. Even Samuel's catches, in other words, often resemble his carries – the distinction between the two in a spatial sense is pretty much just a rule technicality.

Samuel is an ideal fit for the San Francisco offense and possesses standout athleticism (4.48 40, 39-inch vertical), so I don't mean to question his upside in those senses. It's Samuel's skill set that I wonder about, and since I don't think Jimmy Garoppolo has room for growth I wonder if Samuel's 2019 season in some ways featured his best-case scenarios. More specifically, Samuel's 2019 production was dependent on low-ADOT, high-YAC production. His YAC average (8.5, 97th percentile) was significantly higher than his ADOT, in fact (7.5, 12th percentile), and that sort of tension between the two stats raises the specter of regression in Samuels' yardage output.

Samuel's low ADOT isn't explained entirely by circumstances, because Emmanuel Sanders's ADOT in San Franciso was 10.9. Samuel's ADOT may therefore have been informed by his skill set, which perhaps failed to translate when running as far downfield as Sanders. It may be for no reason other than variance, but I'm bothered how Samuels' pass-catching returns dwindled in the playoffs, as if defenses started keying on him and Samuel/Shanahan had no counter-move other than to give him more carries. Samuel drew 18 targets on 151 snaps in the playoffs, catching 10 for just 127 yards (55.5 percent catch rate, 7.1 YPT). Garoppolo wasn't exactly producing at a high level in this span, but he completed 63.8 percent of his passes at 7.4 YPA, meaning Samuel's peripherals were below baseline in the sample. Samuel will always be good carrying the football, but at 24 years old there might not be room to project much skill set growth for Samuel as a receiver to push back against the downward trend in his target returns.

If Samuel can't compete for targets at a higher ADOT, then his YPT average will almost certainly decline. D.J. Moore is one of the best YAC threats at wide receiver in the NFL, but his YAC average fell from 7.7 to 4.6 last year. Moore was a uniquely young prospect, however, so he had development time to project growth in other areas of his game. Moore's YAC average regressed, but he offset it by drawing a higher target rate at an ADOT 2.3 yards higher. I'm worried that Samuel – who's actually nearly a year older than Moore – will just have the decline in YAC without the growth in other areas. If we leave Samuel's per-snap, per-target numbers the same otherwise but project a YAC decline identical to the Moore example, then he's left with 668 yards instead of 802 (8.3 YPT).

Of course, the good news is that even if Samuel never improves, he's probably good enough as is. He'll always be a densely-built, explosive athlete who exploits YAC opportunities far above average. Even in the previously mentioned YAC regression scenario, Samuel would still project for 61 receptions for 715 yards and three touchdowns to go with 171 yards and three touchdowns on the ground in a 16-game sample. But even the best players face meaningless regression from time to time, and I think there's reason to believe that if/when that regression comes for Samuel he might not have the receiver traits to offset it. I'd say expect a high floor – WR2 utility in fantasy – but unless Samuel somehow benefits from improved quarterback play then last year's production might be close to his ceiling.

Takeaway: Likely above average starter; potentially limited skill set growth but current skill set has highly durable application already

 
3. Mecole Hardman, KC

Whereas Samuel is a high-floor asset with unclear growth potential, Hardman is a low-floor asset in the short term but with a strong assurance of uniquely high long-term yields. Last year was only Hardman's third playing wide receiver, and he only turned 22 in March. With 4.33 speed and an abundance of open-field running ability, Hardman projected as a high-upside prospect even before he was paired with Patrick Mahomes.

Hardman's rookie season was a ridiculous demonstration in explosiveness. He looked awkward at times and is clearly still developing as a receiver, yet he produced an outrageous 538 yards and six touchdowns on just 41 targets. That's without counting another 74-yard touchdown he had that was called back on an unrelated holding call, the inclusion of which would have raised Hardman from a 63.4 percent catch rate at 13.1 YPT to 64.3 percent catch rate at 14.6 YPT with seven touchdowns on 42 targets. 

Of course, Sammy Watkins is around for another year and he's a good veteran receiver, so Hardman is at a competitive disadvantage given his lower age and experience level. But Watkins will be a free agent at the season's conclusion, and Travis Kelce will turn 32 during the 2021 season. Hardman should enter his prime just as Watkins leaves and Kelce begins to decline, yet Mahomes will only be 26 at that point. Very few players at any position have as high and as reliable of an upside projection as Hardman does beginning in 2021. If you need upside more than short-term returns, I'd definitely prefer Hardman over Samuel.

Takeaway: Likely eventual above average starter with star potential; inexperienced at receiver and still developing physically

 
4. Darius Slayton, NYG

Draft capital is desirable in any dynasty prospect, but sometimes the NFL just makes a mistake and overlooks a perfectly good prospect. Slayton is probably one such case. Many will be tempted to fade him as a late fifth-round pick, assuming he lacks the pedigree to maintain the production he showed as a rookie. It's understandable, but I think they'd be wrong to do that. There is reason to believe Slayton is an NFL standout both in terms of skill and athleticism, and his competition for targets is either aging (Golden Tate) or injury prone (Sterling Shepard and Evan Engram).

Slayton is one of the most athletic receivers in the league. The NFL decided Slayton didn't show skill at Auburn – perhaps to rationalize their fond evaluation of Jarrett Stidham? – but Slayton made quick work of that criticism last year, playing 709 snaps in 14 games while catching 48 receptions for 740 yards and eight touchdowns on 84 targets. That's a 57.1 percent catch rate at 8.8 YPT in an offense that completed 61.9 percent of its targets at 6.7 YPA. Slayton's 2.1 YPT surplus overruled the 4.8-point catch percentage deficit, in my opinion, especially since he was playing at age 22.

What regression would Slayton's lack of pedigree imply, exactly? Normally pedigree functions as a heuristic for cumulative prospect capital regarding age, skill, and athleticism, but he checks all these boxes with strong grades. Slayton's rookie-year production implies a strong skill variable, none of it cheapened by the age adjustment, and his standout athleticism actually gives us reason to project skills growth. At 6-foot-1, 190 pounds, Slayton ran a 4.39-second 40 to go with a 40.5-inch vertical and 135-inch broad jump, and his stats with the Giants gives us strong reason to believe he knows how to harness that athleticism effectively.

Slayton's production was admittedly concerning at Auburn, because his catch rate was anemic in the final two years – 9.0 yards per target but on catch rate of just 43.8 percent. Particularly in light of Slayton's rookie season, though, I think it's obvious what went wrong at Auburn. Basically, Gus Malzahn utilized Slayton mostly as a decoy and downfield bomb target, and Stidham wasn't the type of quarterback to hit those throws. Auburn didn't use Slayton like the Giants did, though, so I don't see why his stats at Auburn are especially insightful by now. By the way, if any Stidham owners or Patriots fans want to feel bad, go watch Slayton's tape at Auburn.

Perhaps Slayton's numbers will fall off a bit as defenses focus on him more in 2020, but players as athletic and productive as Slayton at his age tend to show improvement with experience, affording him the chance to make counteradjustments as his exposure to defenses increases. Not only that, but there will be an enduring tension between the downfield threat posed by Slayton and the underneath attention demanded of targets like Saquon Barkley, Shepard, Tate, and Engram. Defenses might not have the luxury of paying as much attention to Slayton as they'd like to, in other words, and even if they do key on Slayton he might be good enough to withstand it anyway. The early complexion of Slayton's career looks a lot like that of Mike Wallace.

Takeaway: Likely above average starter with subtle star potential

 
5. Parris Campbell, IND

Campbell (6-0, 205) is perhaps one of the five most athletic players in the NFL. With a 4.31 40, 40-inch vertical, 135-inch broad jump, and 4.03-second 20-yard shuttle, Campbell is a truly memorable athlete, and despite an incomplete skill set at the moment, that sort of athleticism affords Campbell a lot of developmental upside.

That's particularly true given the evidence of skill he showed with his production at Ohio State. Although he didn't turn 22 until July, Campbell was outrageously productive in his final two seasons at Ohio State, where he caught 130 receptions for 1,647 yards and 15 touchdowns on 165 targets (78.8 percent catch rate, 10.0 YPT). Even in a very productive and crowded Ohio State offense, Campbell stood out both in terms of volume and efficiency. Of course, Campbell's skill set was not well-developed in a breadth sense. He was largely a one-trick pony, and the one trick worked to such shrieking success that he never really needed to learn a second one. That combined with his somewhat delayed breakout Ohio State should have told us to be patient with his NFL development. He has the tools to build his game, but he needed the time to work.

It's weird, then, to see how many abandoned all hope for Campbell in light of a rookie season where he was uniquely unfortunate, suffering a grisly broken hand injury in Week 5, and then a broken foot in Week 14. Campbell exceeded 30 snaps in four of his seven games, and he drew at least three targets in all of them. So despite his injuries he was actually earning regular, prominent usage, and he flashed ability despite the anemic state of the Jacoby Brissett passing game. Campbell's Week 9 effort at Pittsburgh was legitimately impressive, catching all five of his targets for 53 yards while taking three carries for 27 yards. If you want a tangible example of what to expect from Campbell, then focus on that game rather than the broader narrative around him. What we have here is basically a model for a younger, less dense but much more athletic version of what Deebo Samuel brings to the 49ers.

The broken foot is a fair ongoing concern, as is the health of the Indianapolis passing game with its current quarterback personnel, but the people who write off Campbell's talent aren't seeing clearly. He's dirt cheap right now and I'd try to buy him in any league where the current owner lost the faith.

Takeaway: Likely eventual above average starter with star potential if broken foot heals

6. Preston Williams, MIA
7. Diontae Johnson, PIT
8. Andy Isabella, ARI
9. N'Keal Harry, NE
10. Hunter Renfrow, LV
11. Steven Sims, WAS
12. J.J. Arcega-Whiteside, PHI
13. Jalen Hurd, SF
14. Hakeem Butler, ARI
15. Kelvin Harmon, WAS
16. Miles Boykin, BAL
17. Scott Miller, TB
18. Bisi Johnson, MIN
19. Jakobi Meyers, NE
20. Riley Ridley, CHI