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It’s the coldest comfort to roster a receiver or tight end or running back who sees a glut of targets and fails to convert them into fantasy production.
Everything aligned for the player: He ran a bunch of pass routes, he saw a good number of looks from his quarterback -- maybe even a high-value target or two. It didn’t end with fantasy points on the scoreboard so it was, you believe, a failure.
“Process” can sound like the official excuse of the loser -- a word you blurt out when things go sideways. “The process was right,” the loser says, “and the results didn’t follow.” Whatever you think of a process for spotting worthy borderline fantasy options, it remains vitally important. Figuring out how to identify streaming plays or desperation options in fantasy football is the first step to benefiting from unforeseen production from said players.
In this space, we’ll examine the intriguing cross-section of defenses most vulnerable to certain positions and how pass catchers are being used in their respective offenses. Mostly we’ll focus on tight ends and running backs whose weekly prospects might look slightly less hideous with some much-needed context.
With every passing week, our understanding of defensive shortcomings and pass catchers’ roles will improve, and with that, players highlighted in this space will be more viable in 12 and 14-team fantasy leagues.
Reasons Not To Panic
Before we get into target decoding for borderline (or desperation) Week 14 fantasy options, let’s calm ourselves about slow starts for some of the offseason’s most highly touted pass catchers. In evaluating their opportunity, I looked at targets per route run, air yards share, and WOPR -- not the genocidal computer from the 1983 movie War Games, but a weighted average of a player’s target market share. WOPR is useful in determining who is earning targets and how valuable those targets can be.
Kyle Pitts (ATL)
Pitts, upon further review, is subject to the rookie struggles that have plagued every tight end in NFL history. It doesn’t mean Pitts won’t be a great -- generational, even -- but he’s clearly not beyond the rookie season blues that we (I) thought he would transcend. Nevertheless, we persist.
He’s fantasy’s ninth-highest scoring tight end through Week 13, about 5.4 PPR points per game behind Travis Kelce, the now-and-forever TE1. Pitts is about one point per game better than a handful of tight ends who weren’t drafted in 12-team leagues: Pat Freiermuth, Tyler Conklin, and their ilk. Burning a fifth- or six-round pick on Pitts was, in hindsight, a disastrous error.
Without Calvin Ridley, in an offense captained by the eminently washed Matt Ryan and coached by the irrepressibly uncreative Arthur Smith, Pitts is hardly in position to thrive. Atlanta opponents are doing everything they can to take him out of the Falcons’ passing game, leaving Ryan to check down to his crop of no-name pass catchers. Probably you know this if you’ve started Pitts through gritted teeth every week in 2021.
Here’s the thing: Pitts’ Week 14 matchup is quietly good. Some might call it great. In any case, Pitts -- going against the Panthers -- should remain in 12-team league lineups this week. Hear me out.
Tight ends are seeing a 25.4 percent target share against the Carolina defense; only the Colts and Ravens allow a larger slice of targets to tight ends. They give up the eighth-most raw tight end targets per game. The Panthers are, in short, a good tight end matchup who haven’t faced many dominant tight ends. In Week 8, they limited Pitts to two grabs for 13 yards on six targets. Fellow Atlanta TE Hayden Hurst -- who is highly questionable this week after being designated for return from IR -- caught two of his three targets against the Panthers in Week 8.
You’re sick of hearing it, I know, but Pitts’ peripherals numbers are outstanding. He’s run a pass route on nearly 84 percent of the Falcons’ drop backs this season (five tight ends have run more routes on the year) and he lines up out wide more than any other tight end (33 percent). Eight out of every ten Pitts pass routes come from the slot or from out wide. His seven targets of more than 20 yards downfield is fourth among tight ends. He is, in short, a wide receiver.
Pitts’ WOPR is higher than all but the game’s most dominant tight ends: George Kittle, Travis Kelce, Mark Andrews, and Darren Waller. His 30 percent air yards share is the highest among all tight ends. If genius head coach Arthur Smith ever decides to use Pitts as the team’s primary red-zone weapon, the rookie could go off. He has a mere five targets inside the 10-yard line all season -- fewer than guys like Cameron Brate, Gerald Everett, and Tyler Conklin. It’s enough to make a Pitts drafter forsake modernity and live forevermore in the woods.
You’re not going to find a waiver wire tight end who should supplant Pitts in your Week 14 lineup. I’m once again asking you to trust the process.
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Week 14 Targets: Decoded
Jared Cook (LAC) vs. NYG
My frazzled galaxy brain desperately wanted to feature Donald Parham in this week’s column. He is, after all, an athletic freak and a dominant red-zone threat who would have a starting gig in a just universe. Alas, there is no justice. So we turn our attention to Cook.
While Cook is increasingly spitting targets with Parham -- last week Parham out-targeted Cook four to three -- Parham isn’t running enough routes to be anything but a last-ditch fantasy option. He ran a mere eight routes last week against the Bengals. He’s run more than a dozen routes just once over his past six games. I can’t make much of that.
Cook is ninth in tight end pass routes this season, running a route on 65.7 percent of Justin Herbert’s drop backs (Parham’s route rate stands at 27.2 percent). It’s not stellar but it’ll do in a plus matchup. Tight ends have commanded a 22.6 percent target share against the Giants this season, a top-10 rate. That works out to 8.4 targets per game. Only four defenses have allowed more raw targets to tight ends this season than Big Blue.
The Giants allowing the seventh most tight end receptions this year isn’t entirely shocking when you consider how shoddy their linebackers have been in pass coverage. Giants LB Tae Crowder is graded as Pro Football Focus’ third-worst coverage linebacker -- giving up 48 catches on 64 targets -- while LB Reggie Ragland has earned a middling PFF coverage grade. New York safety Logan Ryan, meanwhile, is PFF’s 11th worst coverage safety this season.
It’s little wonder New York opponents have continually peppered tight ends with targets. Last week, Miami tight ends, led by Mike Gesicki, caught eight of 13 targets against the Giants. Two weeks prior, Bucs tight ends turned 15 combined targets into nine receptions for 98 yards.
The potential loss of Keenan Allen and Mike Williams -- both of whom landed on the COVID-19 list -- is an outsized factor in Cook’s (and Parham’s) touchdown potential against the G-people. Williams leads the Chargers with nine targets inside the 10 yards line; Allen is a close second with eight looks inside the ten. Allen, Herbert’s go-to guy near the paint, has the league’s fourth-most receptions in the red zone through Week 13.
Maybe the absence of Williams and Allen leads to more two tight end sets for the Bolts. So far, the Chargers have deployed two tight end looks on 27 percent of their snaps, the NFL’s seventh-highest rate. Cook and Parham are in an objectively good spot in Week 14.
Ricky Seals-Jones (WFT) vs. DAL
We’re back to asking Ricky not to lose those numbers. Stop calling me a boomer. I’m not a boomer.
Seals-Jones is in line to start for Washington this week against the Cowboys after Logan Thomas’ potentially season-ending knee injury. There’s unending uncertainty in fantasy football but one thing we can bank on: Washington’s starting tight end running all the routes and seeing all the targets. RSJ enjoyed such a role from Week 5-10 when he saw a 16 percent target share in the Football Team offense and averaged nine PPR points per game. Nine PPR points? In this economy? Yes.
Before his Week 10 outing against Tampa was cut short by a hip injury, Seals-Jones trailed only Travis Kelce in tight end pass routes from Week 5-8. RSJ ran a route on a dazzling 91.6 percent of Washington’s drop backs over that stretch. Like I said, all the routes. Seals-Jones has, quite stunningly, dominated red-zone targets in Washington’s offense this year. His 11 looks inside the 20-yard line lead the team by a good margin and his four targets inside the ten-yard line are tied for the team lead with Terry McLaurin. Seals-Jones has what the zoomers call “touchdown equity” any time Logan Thomas is out.
Dallas isn’t anyone’s idea of a great tight end matchup. Tight ends have seen 21 percent of the targets against the Cowboys through Week 13; Dallas is 15th in tight end receptions (61) allowed. Seals-Jones is a usage-based option rather than a pure matchup play. Probably that’s preferable for fantasy managers still streaming the tight end position in the middle of December. With the hope that Washington’s offense won’t be able to maintain its conservative approach against the potent Dallas offense, RSJ could be in for a target-rich day.
