Statistics don’t tell the whole story of a player and can only be used to present a piece of the puzzle. However I do feel they are an important piece and help identify potential targets or areas of positives or concerns with a player.
I created a spreadsheet of statistical/production data on the top receiver prospects in the draft. There are 58 receivers that include all the combine invites plus some others, I used fourteen categories and ranked the players based on their data for each category. There is a table that presents their rank in a color coded format for each category.
There are the often discussed prospects at the top such as Njigba, Addison and Hyatt. The table identifies their strong production areas and areas that could use work. Marvin Mims comes in high and him or Hyatt could be good choices in Round 2. The other area of interest are a list of potential late round or UDFAs that ranked high in this production statistical view.
Here are just a few blurbs on some players that ranked high in the spreadsheet. The first note is how they ranked in the spreadsheet.
The Front-Runners
Njigba-Smith ranked number one in four of the fourteen categories.
- In 2021, sixty percent of Jaxon’s targets made first down!
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- Smith had an 84% catch rate. The next closest rate was 7% less and the holders had over 5 yards less in yards per catch.
- Jaxon was 1st in yards per target in 2021.
- Jaxon had 43 plays of 15+ yards in 2021. This field was ranked based on the players best season for 15+ yard plays.
Addison ranked second in touchdowns / game and in 15+ play
- Addison is third among active career leaders in receiving touchdowns.
- Jordan was first in the nation in 2021 in receiving touchdowns.
- Addison was first in the nation in 2021 in receiving plays of 20+ yards
Hyatt ranked first in Touchdowns / Receptions & targets
- Among the 57 draft prospects Hyatt ranked number one in each of touchdowns per targets and per receptions for both career and last year.
- Among active career receiving touchdown leaders Hyatt ranks eighth among wide receivers in touchdowns to receptions. 17.6% of his career receptions have been a touchdown.
Marvin ranked number one in yards per reception
- Since 2000 only three receivers have had 2000 career yards with a 19 yard average, a 1,000 yard season and ran a sub 4.40 forty at the combine. They are Marvin Mims, Ja’Marr Chase and Lee Evans.
- Mims is the active career leader in yards per catch at 19.5 yards.
‘Tank’ Dell ranked number one in touchdowns per game and yards per game
- Tank ranks number one among active career touchdown leaders in touchdowns per game. At 0.914 he is getting almost a touchdown per game.
- Tank ranked second in the nation in receiving yards per game in 2022.
Potential Day Three or UDFA High Production Candidates
Cooks ranked eighth in Touchdowns / Receptions & Targets
- Cooks ranks fifth among active career leaders in receiving TDs. Eleven percent of his career targets resulted in a touchdown. That was third best among 57 leading draft prospects.
- Cooks was one of only three prospects in this sample that had no rankings in the bottom one third.
Wayne ranked second in first downs to receptions
- 73% of Jared’s 2022 total receptions converted to 1st down.
- 73% of Jared’s career 3rd down receptions converted to 1st down.
Johnson ranked tenth in career yards and in vitals
- Johnson ranks eighth among active career leaders in yards per catch. No one above him had more career yards.
- At 6’1” and 224 lbs Johnson provides sure hands and contested catch capability to compensate a lack of speed. He had 4 drops over the last two years on 156 targets.
- Johnson was one of only three prospects in this sample that had no rankings in the bottom one third.
Thornton was number one in career yards.
- Thornton, a sixth year senior, has back to back 1,000 yard receiving seasons 2021-2022 (1 of 4 draft prospects)
- Kris Thorton had a 41.5 inch vertical jump at his Pro day. That would be the top vertical by a wide receiver at the combine. His forty time was a 4.42. He may have only got ten reps, but these days when the trend is to skip combine events, you’ve got to love a 5’8” 181 lb prospect that does the bench press.
- Thornton ranks 4th in the nation in number of 20+ yard plays.
Shae was third in yards per reception.
- Shae led the nation in 2022 in number of games (8) with receiving average of 20+ yards. He had 21 receptions over those eight games for 544 yards.
- In 2022 he was 12th in the nation in average receiving yards at 19.8 yards/catch. He ranked 3rd among the 57 sampled in yards per reception and 2nd in career yards.
Matt was 2nd in first downs/receptions, Tds/receptions and Yards/receptions
- Among 57 top receiver draft prospects Matt Landers ranked first in career yards to receptions (19.6 yards) , third in career touchdowns to receptions (16.7%) and fifth in career first downs to receptions (69.2 %). Matt Landers does not show on the ncaa.org list of active career leaders for yards per catch because he only has 79 career receptions which is short of the required 100 to make the list.
- The 6’4 and 200 lb receiver had a 4.37 forty at the combine.
Keylon ranked 7th in receiving plays of 15+ yards.
- In 2022 Keylon Stokes was second in receiving plays of 20+ yards (23) and in 2019 he was eighth in receiving plays of 50+ yards (5).
- Among the 57 receiver prospects sampled the 5’10 200 lbs Stokes is the second heaviest sub 6 foot receiver. When Jaylin White, a UC Davis slot corner, was asked who was the best player he ever played against he replied – Keylon Stokes … He runs very well after the catch, pretty much turning into a RB when he gets the ball.
In the spreadsheet at the top of the table is a factor row that allows you to give a weight to each category. I have defaulted each to 1. You can download the spreadsheet and adjust the factors form 0 – 1 with fractional values or even use whole numbers. The color coded table will not change for the factors as that is a display of their rank and that would not change. What does change is an assigned grade based on the factors chosen. This allows you to see how an overall ranking would be based on the factor. The grade is a sum of the ranks equated to a value from 0 to 100 with 100 being a top grade if ranked as all 1s. You can then sort the player rows on column B.
This presents a statistical comparison of how a player ranks to his peers based mostly on production statistics. It is simply one view that could be used as input in highlighting players and their production strength/weaknesses. I am not stating that any player is a better receiver than another based solely on statistical data. This is only presenting what the data is. The evaluation of a player involves many pieces. A comparison of production data to their peers is only one piece. I would not say Trey Palmer is the best receiver because he ran the fastest forty, so too I am not saying player A is better than B based on the grades of this statistical comparison. Also keep in mind that these are mostly the top 58 players out of a couple of hundred. So a low ranked player among this peer group is probably still top 10% in the country.
Production data is only so good in evaluating a player. Many factors play into wide receiver production that cannot be captured in the data. Some extraneous factors that affect a receiver’s production include offensive scheme run, player usage, other teammates play (receivers, quarterback, offensive line), competition and snap counts. In addition there is limited visibility at the college level into statistics (unless maybe you are not too cheap to pay). The common person does not have access to stats that are available at the NFL level such as drop rates on all players, separation data and yards after the catch. Even still with all its limitations the production data provides valuable information on a player evaluation.
For Giant fans, I included Wan’dale Robinson and Hodgins at the bottom using their college data compared to this 2023 class. For Hodgins there was no target data available for other than his last college year.
The categories typically are a summation of the player’s career and last year data separately ranked and then summed and ranked. I wanted to give credit for players that performed well over multiple seasons as well as those that improved in their last year. There is an info tab that presents more info on the categories. For Smith-Njigba I used his 2021 season as his last season since he was injured and played so little in 2022. Andrei Iosivas has not been included as his first downs and target data was not available.
I realize receiver types are somewhat vague and players often lineup as various types. But receiver types do present a multi-dimensional view by skillset rather than just a flat list. I added a column called Pos which enters my take on types based on what I have ascertained from reports and combine data.
In analyzing the data you can filter the Table for category criteria such as all players with a yards per reception, yards per target and touchdowns per reception less than or equal to 19 (top 1/3rd). Another approach is to use the factors to highlight categories you deem important. The backup data can also be filtered on each individual worksheet. Hopefully the column headings are explicit. Often I include row at the bottom for averages. Keep that in mind if sorting based on a column. There is an AllData sheet that contains all the backup data on one sheet for ease of sorting and filtering.
I hope you find it useful or informative. I found the exercise either helped reinforce a view on a player, highlighted aspects of other players that I had not paid much attention or made me question my view on others. Here is thee spreadsheet.
Wide Receiver Prospects 2023 NFL Draft
