Target Share and the Value Beneath: Week Seven

Peter Howard Posted On October 27, 2018

Week seven turned out to be my second worst for projections this season. A large part of this was due to some interesting changes in usage throughout the league. No less than four players who were not averaging ten points per game before week seven jumped into the top 24 in opportunity. All but one of them are still not averaging ten points per game.

Interestingly, week three was the worse for projections. Paying attention to the small and large changes in usage can and has highlighted things before they happened so far this season. I think the three-week cycle so far in 2018 isn’t a terrible rule of thumb either. As such, I’m going to start limiting the window we judge opportunity for to three weeks moving forward.

Now let’s dig in.

Data and Links

You can see snapshots of all 32 NFL teams here: https://twitter.com/pahowdy/status/1055620705860153344

You can see the complete data with extra stats including snap percentage here: https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/11M2V-gYlAlrK74eN688NMTrZ9vAPsOanzfAzLVSFLgE/edit?usp=sharing

Source: Airyards.com and 4for4.com

Top 12

Here are the players who have led in opportunity over the last three weeks. All have played two or more games in that period.

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Notes:

I’m a big fan of Tyler Boyd and think his breakout in the early half of the season is for real. However, over the last three weeks, while seeing a consistent target share, he has seen the Air yards swing distinctly in the direction of A.J. Green. I expect this split to be common for the rest of the season. Green also has 13, nearly double Boyd’s seven, red zone targets. Boyd will be solid but Green will be the better producer in fantasy most weeks.
Stefon Diggs has actually seen the target share move in his direction in the last three weeks. He has moved from a 25% to a 32% target share. His 13 PPG over the last three weeks seems low and could be due some regression. However, he is trailing Adam Thielen in red zone targets nearly two to one (Diggs has six, Thielen 11).
Davante Adams‘ target share expanded when Randall Cobb and then Geronimo Allison were injured. In weeks one to five, he averaged 8.6 targets per game. In weeks five and six, it grew to 14. With the return of one or both players in week eight, after their bye week, this could come back down.
Marquise Goodwin has returned to the field and took back a 14% target share and a 12.6 aDot. Despite this, his points per game and low targets relative to the others on the list suggest he will continue to be a difficult fantasy start.
If/when (it’s when) Julio Jones catches a touchdown, you’ll be very glad you start him every week anyway.

Twelve Losers

Here are the players who have lost the most opportunity, and played at least two of the last three games, in the last three weeks.

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Notes:

On the positive side of the Amari Cooper trade, I think his lack of production has been more a function of his usage, not his play. Usage, however, is something you have to earn, by and large. He should see more targets in Dallas.
Alvin Kamara and Michel Thomas both saw a drop in their usage since Mark Ingram came back to the team. Since Ingram only has five total targets, this seems to be more of a shift in their playbook. I would not panic on either of them.
Phillip Dorsett had his moment in the sun to set the record straight. He now looks droppable.
Jared Cook should see a return to his (mostly inconsistent) high volume next week. However, the loss of Amari Cooper should not be overstated. He really wasn’t taking many targets.
Corey Davis and Allen Robinson’s struggles have resulted in an even greater loss of volume rather than positive regression. They are holds right now in dynasty and very difficult starts.
Nelson Agholor has lost a significant part of his job to Alshon Jeffery. He’s now outside the top 24 in opportunity and will likely be there in points as well moving forward.
Mike Evans loss of volume seems minimal despite similar reduction to Agholor. He remains well within the top 24 in opportunity because of his air yards. He does however only have four red zone targets. This ranks joint second with Cameron Brate on the team. Chris Godwin currently leads the team with eight.

Twelve Winners

These players have seen the biggest increase in their opportunity through the last three weeks.

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Notes:

The fact Tajae Sharpe has consistently been the second target and leader in value opportunity may have been missed by some. While he has never managed a consistent spree of production in the NFL, it is worth noting for dynasty that the same things we liked about Tyler Boyd in college, we liked about Sharpe.
Tairk Cohen has become the Bears most consistent weapon over the last three weeks. I think he’s a start and target in all formats. (Side note, yes I said something similar about Taylor Gabriel last week, but it turns out the Bears wants to use Anthony Miller when healthy. That could continue. This hasn’t, and shouldn’t, affect Cohen.)
Eric Ebron could have Jack Doyle to contend with again soon. But his usage has continued to be impressive.
David Moore adds “opportunity” to “an ability to score touchdowns.” If you weren’t interesting before at least as a speculative add, I think you should be more so now.
Tre’Quan Smith was good enough to help move opportunity away from Michael Thomas and Alvin Kamara. Or, at least, he gained more while they had less. That’s also impressive.

Okay, that should do it for this week. Feel free to check out each team snapshot and all the data in the links the beginning. I don’t share that spread sheet publically on social media so I hope it might provide you a continuing edge moving forward. Contact me any time with questions.

Thanks for checking this out.

SERIES NOTES

I’m using a mix of data from 4for4.com and Airyards.com
CoV = The Coefficient of Variation, it measures the variance in a sample (i.e. how much change there is week to week)
Airyards = the total distance before the player caught his targets (essentially receiving yards minus yards after the catch)
Regression = a rate should return closer to “normal” or average when it is greatly over or under that average over a long sample size
WOPR = Weighted Opportunity Rating. It weights target share by the player’s share of air yards. It is one of the most stable (week to week and year to year) opportunity metrics and has extra utility because it describes some of the value in opportunity. It’s also useful because it can highlight potential regression when compared with fantasy points
It should be noted that the WOPR calculation is my own and imperfect when compared Airyards.com. It has a slightly different player order at times, however, it is ranking them in ranges appropriately
Zeno James, from ffstatistics.com, has been invaluable in collecting this data on a weekly basis. Give him a follow at @theDude_Z on Twitter

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Peter Howard

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Peter is a Senior writer for DLF. He live streams about FFL on twitch: twitch.tv/pahowdy as well as hosts the DLF podcast Dynasty Crossroads @DynoCrossroads

UDFA's matter | British ex-pat | Writer of things

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