Three Deep-Dive-Worthy Wide Receiver Groups after Week Four
One of my favorite exercises at the beginning of each NFL season comes in updating priors, particularly in places where we can gain clarity on what appeared to be a murky situation during the off-season. Wide receiver corps often yield the most complex and interesting assessments, primarily due to the wide variety in styles and skill sets at the position, as well as NFL teams’ abilities to stockpile talent at the position without experiencing diminishing marginal returns.
Today, I’ve picked a trio of teams that entered the season with especially intriguing situations at the position. Not mentioned are the Colts and Bears, two teams who have struggled to pass such that it’s difficult to evaluate their individual receivers at this point.
Houston Texans: Stefon Diggs, Nico Collins and Tank Dell
Adding to one of the most exciting young receiver duos in the league last season, the Texans made a bold move for an established, though aging, alpha receiver in Stefon Diggs. In the 11-personnel meta of the modern NFL, it would not be difficult to get all of Diggs, Nico Collins, and Tank Dell on the field, but still, CJ Stroud would only be able to throw to one guy at a time — begging the question of the priority each of these three would get in relation to one another.
Four weeks in, the clearest and most impactful observation is that Collins has taken a leap. Following a relatively long developmental curve, Collins broke out in his third season, relatively under the radar, with nearly 1,300 receiving yards in 2023. Questions remained on how much of that could be attributed to the relative lack of target competition in an offense blessed with the presence of a phenom QB, but boy, have they been answered. Collins leads the league with almost 500 yards this season in only four games, and his play matches the production. Collins is a bona fide top-tier receiver, legitimately belonging among the superstar names of Justin Jefferson, CeeDee Lamb, and others — not to mention the lead dog in the 2024 Houston receiving game.
Diggs took a slight step back in production from his elite standards in his last season in Buffalo; paired with early indications in Houston, it appears he has indeed lost a step as the clear second option behind Collins. Nonetheless, Diggs’s B-game beats most players’ A-game, and he is overqualified as such a second option. He still shows athletic juice and frequently features as a go-to option in high-leverage downs and should retain real fantasy value in the near future.
The odd man out, so it seems, is Dell. He missed the Texans’ week four matchup with the Jaguars, but prior to that, he’s managed just 99 yards in 17 targets this season — a clear step below Collins and Diggs in terms of volume and efficiency. Diggs and Collins’ polish look to complement Stroud’s savvy game better than Dell’s more athletically focused strengths. Stroud and Dell haven’t quite looked to be on the same page within the structure of plays, when Dell is a focus at all. Further indication of Dell’s relative lack of importance in the offense, some of his biggest plays this season have come either out of structure (where he wasn’t necessarily the first or second option) or from Davis Mills in garbage time. The good news is he still offers something different to the offense than Collins or Diggs. Still, Houston could find a relatively cheap replacement for those skills if they wanted to save at the third receiver position after 2025.
Green Bay Packers: Jayden Reed, Romeo Doubs, Dontayvion Wicks and Christian Watson
An embarrassment of riches to Matt LaFleur but a nightmare for fantasy owners, the Packers have perhaps the most frustrating receiving corps to project across the league. Jayden Reed, Romeo Doubs, Dontayvion Wicks, and Christian Watson all bring promising skill sets to the table, each with their own unique strengths and roles within the offense; the importance of each changed week to week in 2023.
Reed led the team in receiving yardage last season and has defended the title well to start 2024. In a virtual tie with Wicks and Doubs for targets after week four, Reed has ridden explosive play after explosive play to a yardage total nearly twice as high as second-place Romeo Doubs. Also notably, his best games have come with Jordan Love, approaching 140 yards in each such contest. While some of the production will likely regress, particularly the explosive plays, Reed appears to be the most well-rounded athlete of the four, along with enough technical refinement to be entrusted with a variety of primary-option routes. In other words, the best bet to be the number one.
Doubs slightly outpaced Reed in targets in 2023, though his efficiency couldn’t quite match up to any of the three other receivers. Again, Doubs has been targeted at virtually the same frequency as Reed, and again, Doubs’ efficiency lags behind Reed’s. But Doubs has still put forth solid effort after solid effort and done well with what he’s provided. He has also logged a notably larger share of snaps than each of his three counterparts, perhaps a sign of production to come, or at least a sign of the trust and irreplaceability he’s earned in the offense.
Wicks led the team in yards per target last season, but that efficiency has dropped to a concerning degree in 2024. He’s dropped two passes so far on the way to a 36% catch rate and perhaps left even more on the table, according to Pro Football Focus’s usage-based expectations. The good news? He’s still got an edge on Christian Watson.
After an injury-shortened 2023, Watson appears to be the fourth banana in 2024. He’s been significantly out-snapped by each of his three counterparts, and his target rate lags even further behind, despite a relative advantage in experience. Furthermore, he’s totaled just 80 receiving yards this season, 67 of which came on two receptions. It’s hard to be optimistic about his individual prospects in Green Bay.
Carolina Panthers: Diontae Johnson, Xavier Legette, Jonathan Mingo and Ja’Tavion Sanders
It’s been tough to make precise evaluations of receivers in the Carolina offense recently, as the Bryce Young era has proven unviable. But with a couple of weeks of competent — perhaps even exciting — QB play, we’ve gained more clarity in the Panthers’ receiver room.
Diontae Johnson’s production has seen a night and day difference between Young and Andy Dalton’s starts: He managed just 34 yards in the first two games and exceeded 200 in the latter two. Johnson has always been talented, though always in a slightly unconventional way, and constantly troubled by lackluster quarterbacking. But Dalton’s competence paired with the lack of a prime target competitor like George Pickens has allowed Johnson to feast. I still wouldn’t expect Johnson’s fantasy production to be pretty — he’s averaged just 7.6 yards per target in his last two games — but it will at least be viable with a decent QB at the helm.
Xavier Legette entered the league with a strange, yet intriguing prospect profile, as a well-built late-bloomer from South Carolina, picked 32nd in the 2024 draft. Early returns have been promising, with 8 receptions and 108 yards in his last two games. He’s still relied on his raw physical advantages to get most of his production thus far, but that is a viable path to a role as a secondary target when you run a 4.39 40 and are built like a tank. Given his age, I’d like to see more complexity to his routes and targets as the season progresses, but it’s good to see Carolina getting him the ball already.
Things don’t look quite as rosy for Jonathan Mingo, last season’s top-40 pick. While an unremarkable 2023 could reasonably be attributed to Young’s struggles, Mingo has proven no more productive with Dalton than with Young, unlike Legette and Johnson. He was generally seen as over-drafted last off-season, and given a new offensive regime is in town, he’ll need to step it up at some point this season in order to not be cast off. The good news is that Mingo has still logged 64% of the team’s snaps, a proportion that shouldn’t fall much while Adam Thielen is out.
With all due respect to Thielen, he is a known commodity and declining asset at this point. He’s useful to the Carolina offense, but he doesn’t look to have a lot of fantasy relevance in a WR room with more talent than the semi-pro 2023 Panthers receiving corps.
Finally, not a receiver, but someone worth an exception to mention: Ja’Tavion Sanders has quietly recorded nearly 50% of the team’s snaps through four games. Sanders was seen as a receiving threat more than a complete tight end coming out of college, so for those previously excited by his upside as a receiver, it’s a great sign that the 101st pick of the 2024 draft is seeing meaningful snaps. He hasn’t had much of a role in the passing game, but that again points to Carolina’s apparent faith in him as someone who can perform the other duties of the tight end position.
- Three Deep-Dive-Worthy Wide Receiver Groups after Week Four - October 1, 2024
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