In this new weekly column, I’ll be picking out five of the most important stats that I think fantasy players NEED to know.
I watch every game every week to collect our advanced data, and while watching, I often make notes of things that I’m eager to dig into once all of our data is fully compiled. Sometimes this will be player or team performance-based metrics, and other times this will be player usage-based metrics.
All of the stats I’m referencing today can be found using the Fantasy Points Data Suite (FREE THIS WEEK!), and I promise there is so much more to find than just these five stats.
1. Tony Pollard ranked 1st, 2nd, and 18th in YACO/Touch, Explosive Play Rate, and MTF/Touch in 2022. In 2023 he ranks 28th, 20th, and 33rd in each of those metrics.
In 2022, here were some of the running backs who had worse or the same ranking in each efficiency metric as Pollard does in 2023: Joe Mixon, Melvin Gordon, Rachaad White, and Ezekiel Elliott.
There was talk before Elliott was let go that the Cowboys did not view Pollard as the type of back that could be as explosive when getting lead-back volume… and they may have been right. Through seven games, Pollard has 134 touches which is 56 more than he had through seven games last season.
Last season, almost all of Pollard’s high-efficiency games came when he had under 20 total touches. There was only one week in 2022 in which Pollard had greater 0.20 MTF/Touch, 3 yards after contact per touch, an explosive play rate greater than 10%, and more than 20 touches. Pollard started the season with 16, 32, and 26 touch games, and his last three games have touch counts of 12, 21, and 13.
2. Diontae Johnson’s YPRR marks of 1.77, 3.29, and 2.18 in his last three games would rank 5th, 2nd, and 4th among all his weekly YPRR marks last season
Johnson is famous for not scoring a single touchdown last season on 140 targets and 10 end zone targets, and he has yet to score one this season.
But on the other hand, he is on pace to crush his last season's YPRR total, which is the most correlated receiving fantasy metric to fantasy points. So not only is he due for massive positive regression to score touchdowns from last season, but he is now further improving his efficiency with his routes which should put even more pressure on the positive regression.
He also hit a career-high in air yards last week and had a 58% target share prior to his injury later in the 3rd quarter. Johnson could be in line for some huge fantasy weeks down the stretch of the fantasy season.
3. Travis Etienne has 3.07 yards after contact per reception and 0.48 missed tackles forced per reception.
Etienne is second only to Christian McCaffrey in fantasy scoring this season at the RB position, and a large reason is he has become much more efficient in the passing game.
In 2022 Etienne had 1.6 yards after contact per reception and 0.03 missed tackles forced per reception last season on 35 catches. He already has 27 catches this season, and there is no reason to believe that will stop with how efficient he is after catching the ball.
4. Over the last three weeks, the Bills’ RBs have combined for a 6.3% target share. James Cook has only a 3.6% target share.
The Bills seem to be using their RBs in the passing game much less recently, and they just brought in Leonard Fournette, who played a lot of passing snaps for the Buccaneers last season due to his pass blocking.
This is not a great sign for Cook. Cook had a 10% target share in the first five weeks of the season.
Not only has he seen fewer targets, but his route share has also greatly decreased, with three straight weeks below 40%. We’ve pointed out in previous weeks that Cook is not heavily featured in the red zone. Losing passing snaps would make it very difficult to have consistent high fantasy outputs week to week.
On top of the lack of receiving work, Cook has also only played on just 4 of the team’s 21 snaps inside the 10-yard line.
5. Following the bye, Bryce Young posted a career-high in catchable throw rate, passer rating, and completion percentage over expectation.
When watching Young this week, it seemed to me there was a discernible change in his play. He did not look as lost in the offense, and the numbers back that up.
He threw on his first read at the highest rate of the season, and his catchable throw rate of 87.1% would be the 16th-highest mark in a single week for a QB this season. Could the increased confidence be owed to the switch in playcallers from HC Frank Reich to OC Thomas Brown?
Young may never be a top fantasy QB this season, but his putting up these kinds of numbers would be huge for his receiving weapons. D.J. Chark and Jonathan Mingo, in particular, could see better fantasy production since they work more downfield than Adam Thielen. Thielen will likely continue to be the WR1 like he was this week, but it does leave hope for a late-season rookie breakout for Mingo.
