Indianapolis’ rookie wideout Alec Pierce had an inauspicious start to the NFL season. He was concussed in his first-ever game after dropping a ball in the end zone. He missed Week 2 entirely. In Week 3, he finished second amongst Colts WR in targets despite playing less than 50 percent of the snaps.
So why are we stashing the third receiver on the Colts? Let’s start with the fact that the No. 2 target is Parris Campbell, a man who just can’t earn targets this year. Campbell has played 172 snaps this year and has a grand total of eight targets, one more than Pierce. When Campbell played in 2021, he had just one game with more than four targets all season. Mind you, he’s going through injury after injury over this time, and I don’t say this to act like he’s the worst receiver to ever suit up for an NFL game -- the NFL is a brutal business on young men’s bodies and some bodies can’t take the toll.
Pierce has draft capital on his side (he was the team’s second-round pick in this year’s draft) and the size to be a starting outside receiver. Ashton Dulin, the player who actually earned more targets than Campbell over the first three games, has roughly split slot and wide snaps per PFF’s charting. He’s got enough size to play outside in Indy’s two wide sets, but Pierce has more. This is big to me because the Colts are a 12-personnel team in their mind’s eye. Dulin’s 82 snaps in three games are well behind Kylen Granson‘s 108. The No. 2 receiver on this team figures to see way more of the field than the No. 3 receiver.
The empirical results on Pierce have been bad but are heavily influenced by that first game. He’s got a 43% catch rate -- real bad -- and a -11.8% DVOA which is roughly replacement level. If we look at last week’s game, though, Pierce was given the second-lowest amount of cushion per NFL Next Gen Stats of any qualifying receiver on the week at 2.8 but managed to lead the team in percentage of targeted air yards at 40.5%. Or, to put this in terms that don’t require statistics training to understand: Even though the Chiefs were able to play Pierce tight, the Colts still looked to feed him. That could partially be load reduction on Michael Pittman coming off his quad injury, but I think it’s also a promising sign that Pierce has the coaching staff’s trust.
I will be real with you and note that my viewing of Pierce’s Week 1 targets did not really suggest this. Both of Pierce’s red zone targets came with Matt Ryan leaving his first read and having to try to play hero ball.
Alec Pierce red zone targets Week 1 pic.twitter.com/RWfd2uzf5D
— rivers mccown (alt) (@mccownclips) September 26, 2022
On the first of these, Pierce is just running a simple seam route between two defenders and isn’t the first look for Ryan. Once Ryan readjusts off of it, Pierce does an excellent job street-balling past his defender (Derek Stingley Jr. is No. 24) to earn the target, he just can’t finish the play with a catch. On the second, Pierce runs a quick out that may have been completable, but Ryan is pushed off his landmark. Pierce again does a nice job of flashing open late in the play, but Stingley is able to break up the pass once it gets into Pierce’s body.
Pierce’s uncounted target in this game, one that was erased by a personal foul penalty, is a dig at about 12 yards of depth. There’s enough traffic in front of the dig for Ryan to not throw it immediately, so he steps up to buy some time and wings it. Pierce gets smashed by Jalen Pitre on what was already a tough contested catch.
The Colts have had a major problem this year with pressures and their offensive line. Even Jelani Woods’ two touchdowns were throws that Matt Ryan had to make under duress. This isn’t so much of a “Ryan is washed” or a “the line is bad” thing as it is a combination of the two things stepping up to bite Indianapolis at the worst times. Teams know they can get free runners up the middle by blitzing and that Ryan’s mobility is limited. The Colts even have problems throwing wide receiver screens without free runners disrupting it. I mention this because a lot of Pierce’s Week 3 targets were influenced by this pressure, including his biggest gain of the season, a 30-yarder outside.
Alec Pierce 30-Yd Catch Week 3 pic.twitter.com/xgcHYAio6x
— rivers mccown (alt) (@mccownclips) September 26, 2022
The Chiefs bring heat from Pierce’s side and he a) gets separation with a push -- maybe a little too close to OPI for comfort -- and b) is able to pluck the ball over his opponent. This is a level of physicality that the rest of Indianapolis’ non-Pittman receivers haven’t really demonstrated consistently. It’s something that Pierce has been hit-and-miss on too, but something that you can tell they clearly believe he can do by the targets he has created.
The most promising thing about this game to me is that the Colts a) had Pierce on the field with the game on the line and b) threw it to him with the game on the line when coverage dictated it.
Alec Pierce Wk3 Final Drive pic.twitter.com/zEPWgMQlDa
— rivers mccown (alt) (@mccownclips) September 26, 2022
Frank Reich spoke about Pierce after Sunday’s game and said “Big day for Alec, the go ball ... that’s what he’s here for, to make more of those.”
It’s interesting getting here early because I think there are a couple of different ways this can go and a lot of it depends on how the Colts are able to fold up their problems going forward. The Colts offense right now -- I know you don’t think about it this way -- but they’re currently dead last in DVOA. I don’t necessarily expect that to hold up. They just have too many talented players. But how it changes matters. The Colts are no strangers to slow starts. They were 25th in offensive DVOA after Week 3 in 2021.18th in 2020. But it’s also never been quite as bad as this before, and I must admit I am having a hard time figuring out how they play the game they want to play with this offensive line.
I don’t think Pierce is going to be someone you’re going to want to start every week in fantasy football this season. The combination of Ryan’s movement and this offensive line just isn’t going to lead to that level of commitment or numbers. But I do think he can blossom into a worthwhile WR3/FLEX play if the Colts continue to struggle to run the ball, and perhaps more than that if Pittman gets injured again. Looking back on why people took things slowly with him compared to some of this year’s other wideouts is instructive -- there was never an “if T.Y. Hilton returns...” issue hanging over George Pickens. Even with Curtis Samuel having run the best-case early scenarios off of Jahan Dotson‘s radar, Washington has enough other receiving talent to question his involvement without instant production.
But the way it’s run out for Pierce, the main competition he has to step into a bigger role is probably just the Colts playing so ground-and-pound that only Jonathan Taylor and Pittman are worth rostering. Except ... the Colts are 24th in rushing offense DVOA. Taylor has 125 yards in the last two games, and his only smash game of the season is against a team the Bears just ran for 280 yards on. The Chiefs aren’t traditionally a good run defense under Steve Spagnuolo. I don’t want to minimize Jelani Taylor’s chances of being a real piece, but tight ends are always fighting uphill in their rookie season.
So while nothing outside of the 30-yard catch grabbed me as a spectacular play, I do think Pierce is worth some bench stashes and speculation in mid-to-deep bench leagues if he’s been dropped or was ignored. There was already a lot of playing-time opportunity and the only reason he’s not already heavily on your radar is a rough Week 1.
