NHL Best Bets for Tuesday (11/19)
Kenneth Le
Making tough decisions can be, well… tough. It happens every single day throughout life, but it also happens quite a bit when it comes to fantasy football. The summer is rapidly approaching, which means fantasy drafts are right around the corner. And in many drafts, you will have to decide between two closely ranked players for your team.
So here at FTNFantasy, we will take a look at two players being drafted right around each other in ADP, make the case for both and decide who should be on your roster. Today we start with two All-Pro wide receivers playing on new teams for the first time in their careers.
Davante Adams, WR, Las Vegas Raiders
The Case for Adams
After spending the first eight seasons of his career catching passes from Aaron Rodgers, Davante Adams joins former college teammate Derek Carr in Las Vegas. Over the last handful of years, no quarterback/receiver duo was as dominant and in sync as Rodgers and Adams. Green Bay’s entire passing game went through Adams, who has seen a target share north of 30% in each of his last four seasons. And over the past two years, Adams has seen an insane 256 first-read targets, while 150 of his 169 targets from this past season came as the first read. While he won’t find a better connection than the one he developed with Rodgers, his next-best connection is likely with Carr, who played with Adams at Fresno State. Adams joins a Raiders team that has more talent at wide receiver and tight end than the Packers, but I’d bet Carr still looks Adams’ way first. In 2021, 61% of Carr’s pass attempts were to the first read, while his 387 first-read passes were good for the ninth-most in the league. Expect Adams to be the first read more often than not for Carr, and while he does have more talent around him, that will also lead to less bracket/double coverage. And Adams against single man coverage is a mismatch against any defensive back in the NFL.
We have seen a small sample size of Adams playing without Rodgers. Back in 2017, Rodgers missed Weeks 6-14, forcing Brett Hundley into action. During that span, Adams averaged a respectable 15.5 PPR points per game on six receptions and over nine targets per game. He was still a top-12 fantasy wideout during that stretch. Carr may be a downgrade from Rodgers, but he is still a very good quarterback. In 2021, Carr finished fourth in the league in adjusted completion rate (77.9%) and per FTNFantasy’s advanced passing stats, Carr’s 36 highlight-worthy throws — passes placed perfectly to where only the receiver can catch it — ranked fifth in the league, behind only Rodgers, Tom Brady, Josh Allen and Joe Burrow.
The Case Against Adams
The obvious case against Adams is the fact that he is no longer the clear focal point in his offense’s passing game. Like I said, Adams has seen at least a 30% target share in each of his last four seasons — during the 2021 campaign, the next-closest player from the Packers in terms of targets was running back Aaron Jones with 65. Adams was targeted on an insane 32% of his routes last season, the highest rate in football and it isn’t too shocking considering he played alongside Allen Lazard, Marquez Valdes-Scantling and Randall Cobb, who combined for a 25% target share. Again: combined. He’ll now be playing with Darren Waller and Hunter Renfrow, and while I’d still expect Adams to lead this Raiders team in targets, the gap won’t be nearly as large as it had been with the Packers.
Tyreek Hill, WR, Miami Dolphins
The Case for Hill
In a shocking turn of events, the Kansas City Chiefs and Tyreek Hill could not agree on a long-term deal, leading to the Pro Bowl wideout moving to the AFC East. Hill now joins Jaylen Waddle and the Dolphins to form possibly the fastest offense in all of football, though things will obviously be a bit different this season. I’ll be honest, there really aren’t many positives to take away from Hill going from Kansas City to Miami. However, Hill is still an incredible football player and could be very fun in this new Mike McDaniel offense that features a ton of motion and schemed touches for the top players. We’ll likely see some of that from Hill this season, and while going from Patrick Mahomes to Tua Tagovailoa is certainly a downgrade, we saw Hill post very strong fantasy numbers before Mahomes burst onto the scene. Per the FTN Splits Tool, Hill has played in 18 games without Mahomes since 2017. During that span, he is averaging 5.2 receptions, 82.5 yards and nearly 17 PPR fantasy points per game, mostly with Alex Smith, who, like Tua, has some limitations to his game. We’ll see how much downfield work Hill gets in this Miami offense, but it was encouraging to see him still post very strong fantasy numbers during his final season with the Chiefs despite a massive drop in deep receiving numbers.
Because opposing defenses played so much two-high safety against Kansas City last year, Hill finished 2021 with the lowest air yards per target (10.4), yards per reception (11.2) and yards per target (7.8) since his rookie campaign. During the first half of the season, Kansas City faced that style of defense on around 80% of their passing plays. This led to fewer massive plays from Hill but more targets, as he set a career high with 159. So while some may be worried about the dropoff in deep passing numbers with Hill in Miami, we need to understand that we already saw that dropoff last season, and Hill still averaged 17.4 PPR points per game.
The Case Against Hill
Of course, the change in usage for Hill also led to more volume. He is coming off a season where he saw a career-high 159 targets, while seeing double-digit looks in 10 different games, also a career high. I don’t think opposing defenses show two-high looks against the Dolphins nearly as often as they did against the Chiefs, despite Miami having both Hill and Jaylen Waddle. And if that is the case, Hill won’t see as many underneath targets, especially with Waddle and Mike Gesicki there. The X-factor is how good Tagovailoa is when it comes to the deep ball, and I truly believe the verdict is still out there. Sure, Tagovailoa led all qualified passers in adjusted completion rate on deep passes last year (55.8%). However, just 6.7% of his pass attempts traveled 20 yards or more down the field, one of the three-lowest rates in football. So I’m not sure we truly know what Tagovailoa brings to the table when it comes to deep passing. And coming out of college, Waddle was an elite receiver, especially when it comes to making plays down the field. However, during his rookie season in Miami, Waddle averaged 5.5 yards before the catch per reception, the 13th-lowest mark among wideouts, while ranking 39th in the NFL in air yards. It is possible Hill is targeted in the same area of the field as he was for much of last season, but the overall volume likely drops, which isn’t great for fantasy.
The Verdict: Davante Adams
Both Adams and Hill have certainly seen their fantasy stocks drop after offseason trades, which only solidifies Cooper Kupp as the clear WR1 in fantasy. However, I still feel better about Adams, who remains inside my top five among fantasy wideouts, while Hill is outside, WR8. There are still some unknowns with both offenses, as the Raiders have brought in Josh McDaniels, while Miami has added Mike McDaniel. (That’s not confusing at all.) Anyway, I view Adams as the safer wide receiver entering the season, but I will say if Tagovailoa can take that next step, there is still obviously immense upside with Hill.
This will be fun to watch.
