Baker Mayfield Better Without Odell Beckham Jr.?
4 years agoCleveland Browns quarterback Baker Mayfield had his fourth career game with a 125-plus passer rating in Week 7 against the Bengals when wide receiver Odell Beckham Jr. (knee) suffered a torn ACL. The other three games came in 2018 before Beckham was with the team. OBJ's 53.5 catch rate this year was the second-lowest among 34 receivers with 40-plus targets. Mayfield's passer rating when targeting Beckham is 71.1, which is the lowest among all players that he's targeted 20 or more times since 2019. Mayfield has also been much more likely to throw interceptions when Beckham has been on the field. The sample size is too small to draw any absolute conclusions, but Cleveland's offense has surely lost an explosive playmaker in OBJ. Mayfield may be more efficient when not trying to force the ball to Beckham, but it won't make him a QB1 for Week 8 against the Raiders, even though Las Vegas has allowed the fifth-most fantasy points per game in 2020 to opposing signal-callers.
Source: NFL.com - Kevin Patra
Source: NFL.com - Kevin Patra