Is there anything more frustrating than rolling out your wide receivers week after week, watching your opponent’s receivers pull in 3-4 TDs combined, and it seeming like your guys can never find the endzone? Every year, there are college fantasy managers who suffer through this. You feel like you’re doing everything right. You got high targets, guys, you have high-scoring offenses, and yet you can’t find that sweet, sweet score.
If there’s one thing worse than dealing with WRs in fantasy who fall into this category, it’s giving up on them and then watching them explode the moment they leave either your starting lineup, or worse, your roster, or even worse, someone else’s roster.
Today, we’re going to take a look at five wide receivers who have been frustrating to start the year. Their prospects for the second half of the season are looking good and should balance out their slow start. Many of them are players you likely drafted decently high in your leagues, and you’re struggling with whether to hold onto them. They may even be guys floating around on your waiver wire because of a previous manager’s frustration. If your league trades often, you could certainly call these guys redraft trade targets.
When identifying these targets, the key thing we’re looking for is guys whose team adjusted target share far outweighs their team receiving touchdown shares. The theory is that a guy who is seeing 25% of his team’s passing targets should roughly see about 25% of his team’s receiving touchdowns in the long run. Obviously, there are going to be variations, as there are every year. Different offenses also tend to target different positions in the red zone compared to between the 20s. These are all valid points, and one could theoretically take this a step further by including redzone data (which I do not have ready access to). However, the simple idea that target share and touchdown share balance out over time can lead us to clear candidates, especially when the difference between the two is as significant as it is with the players we’ll discuss today.
There are a few more constraints I placed to filter out some guys who might not be as relevant to this conversation. Firstly, all receivers we are discussing today are seeing at least 20% adjusted target share (adjusted target share meaning players with less than 5% raw target share are removed and target share is recalculated, this is to filter out noise caused by backups playing during blowouts and to give a better idea of what a team will do in more neutral matchups), which makes sure that the player is involved every week in their offense.
Secondly, their squad must pass at least 30 pass attempts per game. This ensures there is enough passing volume for these players to carve out a solid slice of production each week, filtering out guys like Jordan Brown of Nevada and Aaron Turner of Rice. The last filter is that we’re looking for offenses that ideally score at least two passing TDs a week. If they can’t hit that mark, then we want to make sure the offense is scoring three total TDs a week. This is obviously important because we want to ensure that the guys struggling to find the endzone have those opportunities. This filtered out some big names like Jacquon Gibson of UMass and CJ Williams of Stanford
Easton Messer – FAU
Targets/Game: 13.6 Adj. Target Share: 33% Adj. TD Share: 9%
Fret not, those of you who drafted Easton Messer in the late first round/early second round of your drafts. If there was a poster boy for a second-half of-season rebound, Messer is it. Messer has nearly everything you want. He leads the nation in targets with 68. He plays on an offense that averages almost 50 pass attempts per game. They score plenty of points, although not as many as people were hoping for with Zach Kittley’s history. He’s not quite as efficient as you’d want, at 9.8 yards per catch, but that has never been his game nor what we expect out of Kittley’s slot WR.
The major thing he’s missing, as is the theme of today, is touchdowns. We’re nearly halfway through the season, and the nation’s leader in targets has a singular touchdown on the year. If you’re in a PPR league, you’ve been sitting pretty, but those in standard leagues have to be frustrated with seeing only receiving yards from Messer each week. The crazy thing is, despite only having one TD, Messer is still in the top 40 WRs this year. We can consider that to continue to be his floor from here on out, as his scoring will only go up from here, barring injury, as TDs start to come his way.
Lewis Bond – Boston College
Targets/Game: 9.4 Adj. Target Share: 30% Adj. TD Share: 0%
It’s amazing what can happen when Bill O’Brien actually goes and gets a quarterback that fits his system. The Eagles’ offense at Boston College has shown a marked improvement from last year with Dylan Lonergan under center.
A huge beneficiary of that is Lewis Bond, who is the clear WR1 for them, bringing in almost ten targets a game. Bond is very much like Messer, where his efficiency is lacking despite his great volume. This, in large part, is due to Bond’s targets being so close to the line of scrimmage; it’s harder for him to break a big play than, say, Reed Harris, who often sees his targets when he’s well into the secondary. That in and of itself explains a large part of why Bond hasn’t found the endzone. It is still crazy that almost halfway through their schedule, they haven’t found a way to get this man into the endzone, even if it’s on a drag route near the goalline or a jet sweep.
If Bond had just three TDs to his name, he’d rise from WR106, where he is currently, to the top 40. The good news is Bond will continue to take advantage of an ACC schedule that still includes the likes of Clemson, Louisville, and Syracuse, as well as an out-of-conference date with UConn. Yes, Boston College’s offense completely collapsed against Pitt, but it’s hard to think that’ll become the norm for the Eagles.
Miles Coleman – North Texas
Targets/Game: 7.2 Adj. Target Share: 26% Adj. TD Share: 0%
Before the season, I claimed that Miles Coleman was heavily overdrafted because Eric Morris’ system prefers outside WRs when healthy, and Coleman was just inefficient with his opportunities. So far this season, I’ve been correct about his inefficiency, with 9.2 yards per catch. However, when it comes to volume, Coleman has been the clear WR1, with 36 targets in five games compared to Landon Sides’ 22 targets in four games.
As has been the theme today, Coleman is missing those sweet touchdown points. That has been a plague for North Texas in general this season. Last season, the Mean Green had a 1.29:1 Pass/Rush TD ratio, while this season the script has flipped to a 0.61:1 pass/rush TD ratio. People like Caleb Hawkins have been sucking up all the TDs, very much to Coleman’s detriment.
In addition, Coleman’s inefficiency and lack of explosive plays make him as limited as Bond. The scourge of rushing touchdowns that has afflicted the Mean Green lately cannot last forever, especially as North Texas heads to more shootouts in American play. This’ll allow Drew Mestemaker to bounce back. Still, more importantly, for our purposes, it’ll likely lead to a much better second half, fantasy-wise, for Coleman as he continues to be the leading target hog in this offense.
Jalil Farooq – Maryland
Targets/Game: 7.4 Adj. Target Share: 26% Adj. TD Share: 0%
Tai Felton came out of absolute nowhere last season to sock the CFF world with over 140 targets on the season as Maryland’s WR1. Felton started the season hot before falling off in the second half. May we be headed for the opposite this season, especially as players get healthy and true freshman QB, Malik Washington, gets his feet under him.
Many wondered if Oklahoma transfer Jalil Farooq would be able to fill Felton’s shoes, especially as a CFB veteran. Unfortunately, with Farooq starting the season banged up and Maryland’s offense being a work in progress, it’s clear nobody on this offense is reaching Felton’s levels. However, there is still room for a solid CFF season from Farooq, especially as he gets further away from his injury. Farooq currently leads Maryland’s receivers in targets with 37 on the year. He’s already on pace for a near 90-target season, and he could hit higher than that if he continues to see his target numbers remain where they have in recent weeks.
However, like others on this list, his efficiency and role are significantly hurting him. When Farooq moved to Maryland, he also moved from being an outside WR at Oklahoma to a slot WR at Maryland. This has tanked his production, as his ADOT has collapsed from 11.5 at Oklahoma to 5.7 this year at Maryland. Touchdowns will come just because of variance, but if Farooq is going to explode in the second half of the season, something is going to need to force him back outside.
Caullin Lacy – Louisville
Targets/Game: 7 Adj. Target Share: 23% Adj. TD Share: 0%
This is the only player on this list today that is a clear WR2 for their respective team, but Caullin Lacy is clearly still a focal point in the Cardinals’ offense this year and will almost certainly see bigger games come down the stretch. While Chris Bell is the golden boy from a CFF perspective (WR15 on the year, and 50 targets in 5 games), Lacy isn’t that far behind with 35 targets and a 23% adjusted target share.
As Bell emerges as the quintessential Brohm WR1, he is going to need Lacy to continue to produce if teams try to key in on him. Lacy has shown that he can be an excellent complement to Bell, especially in the games against Bowling Green and Pittsburgh, where he saw 10+ targets and 90+ yards in both games. The problem is, as I said, there just haven’t been touchdowns to go along with his production.
In addition to variance and regression to the mean, we should see all of Louisville’s passing game get more scoring opportunities, as unfortunately, Louisville’s running back room has turned into a hospital wing. The Cardinals are simply going to have to be more reliant on Miller Moss (a dangerous proposition, I’m aware) and their two receivers to help them in games.
The good news is that Louisville has an extremely manageable rest of the season schedule, including Boston College (94th in passing defense), Virginia Tech (80th), Cal (62nd), SMU (135th), and Kentucky (89th) as five of their seven remaining matchups.
Bonus Names To Target/Hold Onto
Kevin Coleman – Missouri
Chauncey Cobb – Arkansas State
Bryson Graves – Coastal Carolina
Duane Thomas – UCF
