Fantasy Football Stat of the Day: The target dominators

(Leading up to the 2021 NFL season, FTN’s Tyler Loechner will dive into the fantasy football numbers to bring you his Fantasy Stat of the Day, five days a week.)

People love to talk about what makes an “alpha” WR — but there’s one stat that really captures the meaning better than any other: Team target market share.

Today’s Stat of the Day article will take a look at which players saw the highest percentage of their team’s total targets last season. This stat is also known as “target market share.”

Have you tried Underdog Fantasy best ball leagues yet? What are you waiting for? Create an account with code FTN for a bonus.

Robby Anderson is a sleeper, and the target tree in Tennessee is about to get interesting

The chart below shows last year’s leading “alpha” receivers (or TEs, for some teams). This list is sorted by the players with the highest team target market share from last year.

Player	Pos	Tm	Tm Tgt Mkt Share	Tgts	Recs	TDs
Davante Adams	WR	GB	29.9%	150	115	18
DeAndre Hopkins	WR	ARI	29.4%	160	115	6
Stefon Diggs	WR	BUF	29.2%	168	127	8
Darren Waller	TE	LV	27.8%	146	107	9
Robby Anderson	WR	CAR	26.0%	138	95	3
Justin Jefferson	WR	MIN	25.6%	125	88	7
Allen Robinson	WR	CHI	25.4%	151	102	6
Marquise Brown	WR	BAL	25.2%	99	58	8
Tyler Lockett	WR	SEA	24.5%	132	100	10
Keenan Allen	WR	LAC	24.2%	148	100	8
DK Metcalf	WR	SEA	24.0%	129	83	10
Calvin Ridley	WR	ATL	23.7%	145	90	9
Travis Kelce	TE	KC	23.7%	145	105	11
Terry McLaurin	WR	WAS	23.2%	134	87	4
Robert Woods	WR	LA	23.0%	130	90	6
Mark Andrews	TE	BAL	22.6%	89	58	7
A.J. Brown	WR	TEN	22.6%	106	70	11
Brandin Cooks	WR	HOU	22.5%	119	81	6
Adam Thielen	WR	MIN	22.1%	108	74	14
Cooper Kupp	WR	LA	22.1%	125	92	3

At the top of the list, we see no surprises: Davante Adams, DeAndre Hopkins and Stefon Diggs all had over 29% team target market share, and all three saw over 150 actual targets and over 115 receptions. Adams lapped the field in TDs (his 18 were more than Hopkins and Diggs combined), but these three players will be target leaders again in 2021.

After this elite group we see two interesting names: Darren Waller and Robby Anderson. Waller is one of only three TEs with above a 22% target market share — and he’s all the way up at 28%. Anderson was the fifth-leading player in the NFL last season in terms of market share, and he was even ahead of his teammate, D.J. Moore, who most assume to be Carolina’s WR1. This data shows that Carolina really thinks they have two WR1s. Now reunited with his former QB, Anderson could jump off the stat sheets in 2021.

A little lower on the list we see A.J. Brown with a 22.6% target market share, a feat made even more impressive when considering he was only fully healthy for 12 games last season. With the arrival of Julio Jones — the league’s preeminent alpha WR over the last decade — the target tree in Tennessee becomes hugely important for fantasy. I wrote about that in a previous Stat of the Day article.

A couple of other quick hits:

As a rookie, Justin Jefferson’s 25.6% target market share stands out, especially with Adam Thielen (22.1%) also on the team. We already know Jefferson is good, but this data help reassure us that he is in a good spot to be a fantasy WR1 again in 2021.
Travis Kelce (23.7%), not Tyreek Hill (21.9%, not on chart above), was actually Kansas City’s alpha target.
Three pairs of teammates — Jefferson and Thielen, Tyler Lockett (24.5%) and DK Metcalf (24%), and Marquise Brown (25.2%) and Mark Andrews (22.6%) — made this top-20 list. Will we see Julio Jones and A.J. Brown achieve the same feat next season?