2021 Target Regression Candidates - Wide Receiver

In the NFL and fantasy football, things can change as easily as the snap of a finger from campaign to campaign. One season, somebody breaks a record, and the next, they are fighting for targets and struggling to produce.

Based on game script, chemistry, and availability of weapons, targets can fluctuate for pass-catchers. In a position like WR, targets could be hard to come by at all depending on which team you are on and the competition and pecking order at the position. Just a few tight ends are real threats to get big chunks of the WRs' pie in terms of targets, but offenses packed full of wide playmakers can make it tough even for the best of those to play at the position.

Heading into 2021, there are quite a few WRs who should be due for a target regression. Let’s look at some candidates who are due for fewer targets come next season.

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2021 Fantasy Projections

Darius Slayton, New York Giants

For a second-year man entering his third season as a pro, things couldn't have gone much better. In the past five seasons, from 2016 to 2020, Slayton is one of only 14 wideouts to get 180+ targets in his first two seasons combined--that means he's gotten targeted more than the likes of Kenny Golladay, Chris Godwin, or Cooper Kupp just to name a few. You'd think he should keep it up, right? Let me doubt it for a minute with the 2021 season ahead.

You know what's going on by now. The Giants are one of the most revamped squads entering next season. And it is not just that they're adding fresh acquisitions to the fold--veteran WR Golladay, John Ross, and TE Kyle Rudolph--but also rookies (WR Kadarius Toney) and injury-returners in the shape of monster-tailback Saquon Barkley. Uh oh, talk about adding volume-eaters to a now-stuffed offense. Slayton went a bit under the radar in his rookie year, getting an ADP of WR110 in 2019 and finishing WR37, and in 16 games as a sophomore, he was worse than as a rookie, finishing WR54 while even playing two more games. He went from 12.1 FPPG to 8.8 in 2020.

With stiffer competition to beat in 2021 at every skill position, it is going to be hard for Slayton to raise his target rate in this offense, let alone outproduce his last couple of years (170 and 141 PPR points over those full seasons). When pitted against top-tier wide receivers (min. 600 snaps), Slayton's numbers jump off the page as bad. He only ranked inside the 50th+ percentile in aDOT (83rd percentile with a 13.7 aDOT) and a tightly-linked Completed AY/Target (64th; 6.2 yards). He was middling and is now facing more of an uphill battle. PFF projects Slayton to lose 40 targets in 2021 compared to his 96 last season. Temper your expectations.

Diontae Johnson, Pittsburgh Steelers

If you read above and were surprised by Slayton's target numbers in his first two seasons in the NFL, what about Johnson's? The now-third-year man has amassed a ridiculous 236 in his first two years playing for the Steelers, a mark only fellow Steeler JuJu Smith-Schuster and Michael Thomas have surpassed among players with their first two seasons taking place in the 2016-2020 span. That bit of info right there I like, and I also hate. Diontae is an outlier in and of himself, but so was JuJu... who happens to still play in Pittsburgh.

Only 12 players were able to log 140+ targets as sophomores and raise that number in their third season, JuJu among them (2018 to 2019). Even more, and if you paid real attention to last season's developments, JuJu was actually great playing for the Steelers but limited by his type of usage on short depths and almost always playing from the slot. Smith-Schuster finished the year with a massive 128 targets himself, and as the WR16 compared to Johnson's WR21 finish.

While the Steelers haven't touched a thing in their receiving corps--other than adding a backup TE in rookie Pat Freiermuth--the truth is that they're welcoming a three-down back in rookie Najee Harris. I'm not saying Najee is going to get his 100 targets or anything like that, because that'd be wild and pretty unrealistic, but he will get more than a bunch of opportunities both on the ground and on passing plays, limiting Johnson's upside and targets by extension.

While Johnson will still get his 115+ targets more probably than not, that might be his ceiling with the likes of JuJu, James Washington, Chase Claypool, and Eric Ebron still around. You can argue the latter two WRs (Washington and Claypool) have very different (deep-players) profiles, but Ebron and JuJu are clear threats to eat from Johnson's targets with Najee Harris also right there given his routes will start from the backfield.

DeVante Parker, Miami Dolphins

We move south to Florida to talk about the man who, after four full seasons in the league, seemed to get things right once and for all in the 2019 season. For one reason or another, Parker had never finished above the WR51 in any of his first four years, but he broke out in his fifth year with a tasty WR11 finish possible after scoring 246.2 PPR points and averaging 15.4 FPPG in 16 games, the first time he played a full year of games. He logged an unsustainable 128 targets in 2019, and that proved true last year as he fell to 103 in 14 games. Yes, two fewer games could explain that, but he had never before even reached 100, so you decide.

Parker's 2020 season was rather encouraging even though he fell to WR40 by year's end. Obviously, he was much better in 2019, but that was a true outlier in his career and he was definitely going to regress a bit. The problem we have with Parker entering 2021 is that he's 1) not playing under Ryan Fitzpatrick as he did for parts of 2020, 2) playing under second-year man Tua Tagovailoa who has said he was uncomfortable manning the pocket last season, and 3) facing more competition than ever with two additions at the WR position in veteran Will Fuller and rookie Jaylen Waddle.

While PFF doesn't project Parker to the largest drop in targets (from 103 to 93, a -10 drop), the truth is that they are putting him below the 100-target mark. It makes all of the sense. Last season as part of the Houston Texans, Fuller was an absolute menace down the field, getting to score 188.9 FP over the year and getting targeted 75 times in just 11 games. He was better than Parker at pretty much everything, and although he won't be there for G1 (suspension), there is nothing telling us he shouldn't be considered Miami's no. 1 WR in 2021.

As for rookie Jaylen Waddle, well... we're talking about a first-round draftee getting off the board with the sixth pick overall. In this era of deep analysis, you know what draft capital means: playing time and opportunities. Among top-10 picks playing WR since 2000 (27 players total), 18 of them logged 76+ targets in their first seasons, and 21 of them reached at least 58. Waddle is one of the most talented WRs to make it to the NFL of late, so you do the math.

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