Beware the Rookie WR
Published June 17, 2019
One should consider steering away from any early selection of a rookie wide receiver. Not only do most of the top rookie receivers bust or not pan out, but even the best performances are barely better than average.
Below is a list of the first five receivers taken over the past 5 years. There are a lot of receivers that pan out in the later rounds, however, the majority of early fantasy picks are geared towards those taken early in NFL drafts. Our recommendation isn’t to avoid rookie WRs completely, only to take them at a point of your draft where value can be gained.
Look at all them busts
The list is filled with a comedic amount of busts that won’t even get drafted in most leagues this year. Hell, most aren’t even in the league any more.
There are some stars in the list, but you’ll also notice that most of them come from 2014/15 (Evans/Beckham/Cooks). This is also telling that the position can really take time to develop. However, from a same-year perspective, you usually aren’t going to reap big rewards, and will usually get very little from the player.
Now let’s take at the receiver that was taken earliest in the NFL draft each of the last 5 years:
In 2018 Calvin Ridley ranked 22nd in PPR scoring formats for all wide receivers. So if you drafted him around the 10th or 11th round, there’s value there. However, any earlier than that, then you took him too early. A lot of people were drafting DJ Moore (the first WR taken in the 2018 NFL draft) a few picks earlier and he ended up ranking 36th for receivers. Not super exciting, right?
In 2017 fantasy owners were taking Corey Davis around the 8th round, and he ended up the 87th ranked receiver [sad trombone]. And if you got the top rookie in 2015 or 2016, you again got some very average fantasy results. You have to go all the way back to 2014 before the situation improves for NFL WR draft picks, but even then those aren’t numbers that will drive home a fantasy football championship.
WAIT UNTIL THE MID/LATE ROUNDS —
DYNASTY: The Exception to the Rule
If you look at the full list of “Top 5 WR Picks…”, you’ll find the majority of these players are getting drafted in fantasy leagues much higher than their value. Taking any rookie is a bit of a lottery ticket, but the numbers show that you are much better off betting on a running back. If you are going to take a flyer pick on a wide receiver, you may be better off waiting until the mid/late rounds of your draft. All this points come with one exception: That you are not in a dynasty/keeper league.
If you are in a Dynasty or Deep Keeper League format, there is indeed added value to some of these players. You just have to ask yourself whether or not you have the patience for these guys to pan out. You’ll find yourself more-often-than-not waiting several years for mediocrity to develop into something special, and most of the ending in bitter disappointment when they don’t.
