Week 4 Air Yards Report

Welcome, football fans, to the Razzball Air Yards Report. This is the place where we look at thrown footballs (both caught and NOT caught) to try and predict which receivers might have some positive and negative regression coming their way. Week 3 was another wild week in the air yards year, as you will see below.

If you want a refresher on what air yards are and how to best use them, here are my takeaways from 2022 air yards data. In this iteration of the air yards primer, we will look ahead to Week 4 of the fantasy football season and see who might be due for some positive or negative regression. I hope you will join me each and every Thursday during the regular season for our breakdown of the week that was in air yards.

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Week 3 Air Yards and Air Yards% Data

Below we have air yards and receiving data courtesy of FTN.com. Air yards is a tool that is now freely accessible everywhere, and you can find the site or format that works best for you.

This list represents the top 64 wide receivers from most to least air yards. From Davante Adams’ 240 air yards all the way down to Brandin Cooks’ 52. I color-coded this to make the referencing easier to identify. If a wide receiver was closer to the top of a category, the darker green the number would be. The bottom of the list is primarily orange into red.

Just an easy eye test from the colors on this chart gives us a significant number of takeaways from Week 3. We will dig into the five biggest things that jump out to me from this dataset.

Top 5 Takeaways From Week 3 Air Yards Data

Treylon Burks Mirage

Congratulations to Treylon Burks for cracking the top 14 in air yards for wide receivers this week and also for cracking the top five in air yards share. But this is about as clear a situation as we can find where strong air yards performance will not translate to fantasy success in the future.

Look at those targets, receptions, and yards for Burks. Six targets is fine (just fine, not great), but one reception and five yards? Good god, man, the state of Tennessee hasn’t been so embarrassed since they remembered who their Lieutenant Governor is. But this is not a Treylon Burks. This is a Ryan Tannehill problem. Or, more accurately, this is a Tennessee Titans problem.

Ryan Tannehill looks like he is deceased on the football field this year, and he looks like he would rather be looking for rappers’ phone numbers than delivering crisp passes. But with only Will Levis and Malik Willis in reserve, there does not appear to be much hope in sight. Essentially, if you drafted Burks or DeAndre Hopkins in hopes of seeing their best selves, I’m sorry.

Deebo Put In His Best Position

Deebo Samuel doesn’t show up high on the air yards list this week, even with Brandon Aiyuk missing the game, but I think all sides are fine with that. What the San Francisco 49ers did against the New York Giants was put Samuel in the absolute best position for his skills, air yards be damned.

In Weeks 1 and 2, Samuel’s average depth of target (aDOT) was 8.0 yards. That’s not earth-shattering, but it’s not where Samuel wants the ball. In Week 3, Brock Purdy gifted Samuel with a 5.8 aDOT and let Samuel do his work with yards after the catch.

In Week 3, only reception-god-in-human-form Keenan Allen had more yards after the catch (99) than Deebo Samuel (78). Even when field-stretcher Aiyuk comes back, if Deebo can grab his receptions with more room to operate, this could be a repeat of 2021 in the weeks to come.

Drake London Red Alert

It’s officially panic time on Drake London, a wide receiver with immense talent taken in the fourth round of fantasy drafts but plays for a team that passes about as much as Kobe Bryant playing with Smush Parker. Let me put it to you this way. Fifteen players had more than 98 receiving yards in Week 3 alone. Drake London has 98 receiving yards on the season. His 16% target share is the same as teammate Mack Hollins, and London’s 19.5% air yards share is just below Van Jefferson and just above Curtis Samuel this season.

Here is a partial list of players who have more than London’s 111 air yards this season: Chris Moore, Nelson Agholor, Dontayvion Wicks, Braxton Berrios and Demario Douglas. These guys were completely undrafted on fantasy teams this year. If I’m holding any Drake London shares, I am selling them for whatever I can get the next time he has a semblance of a strong game. Spin it however you want, but the deal is done, and get London off your roster.

Devonta Smith Backseat (This Time)

Last week, we commented on a curious case of A.J. Brown taking a backseat to Devonta Smith (something Brown clearly was unhappy about based on sideline interactions). Well, the squeaky wheel got the grease against the Tampa Bay Buccaneers, with Brown grabbing 14 targets, nine catches, 131 yards, and 121 air yards. Meanwhile, Devonta Smith barely outpaced Olamide Zaccheus with his own 58 air yards on five targets. It truly makes you wonder. Why doesn’t Jalen Hurts just give them both 10 targets a game and make them both happy instead of this back-and-forth nonsense?

Anyway, Brown now has 43% of the air yards, and Smith has 35%. We know these two are going to be the primary weapons through the air, and there might be some of this back-and-forth between them all year. Where this really hurts for fantasy managers is for the rest of the Eagles. For the season, Dallas Goedert has fewer air yards than Cole Kmet and Jonnu Smith. He has 10% of the Eagles air yards and now looks to be persona non grata in the offense now that D’Andre Swift is running all over everyone.

As far as Smith and Brown go, both should end the season with a target share over 26%, and both should easily cross 1,000 receiving yards. But this is what you sign up for when you roster them. It’s a roller coaster, not a train ride.

Goin’ to Carolina In My Mind

I don’t know if Jonathan Mingo didn’t pay his Andy Dalton Red Rifle Fan Clube membership dues or something, but the player who was balling out for Bryce Young in Weeks 1 and 2 didn’t make much of an appearance in Week 3. Through two weeks, Mingo had 192 air yards with a massive 14.8 aDOT. Adam Thielen and D.J. Chark had a combined 78 air yards in those games and looked like drop candidates in most leagues. And then the Bryce Young injury happened.

In Week 3, Andy Dalton flipped the script and froze out Mingo (not intentionally, I think) and only found eyes for Thielen and Chark. Chark finished the week with 188 air yards (on 11 targets), and Thielen racked up 138 (on 14 targets), both within the top 10 wide receivers on the week. Mingo had just 46 air yards on six targets. The soft secondary of the Seattle Seahawks played a factor, but this was all on Andy Dalton.

If you’re reading this and it doesn’t scream “SELL!” on Thielen and Chark, I don’t know what to tell you. Bryce Young and his 34th-ranked 4.2 yards per pass attempt will be back for Week 4, which means Thielen and Chark might just be back to “don’t matter” status. It’s possible the coaches tell Young, “Look at how good those guys are. You should throw there,” but we need to see it before we believe it.