Justin Howe
Moderator
I'll preface by stating that I do, in general, like Gordon this year. In our FBG rankings, he's my PPR WR18, just below JuJu but ahead of Cooks and the Tate/Thomas/Crabtree volume crew. Tied for the highest mark on staff.
But I simply can't get on board with some of the upside projections I'm seeing. Some are truly assigning him the same ceiling he showed in 2013 - over 22 PPR pt/gm, right in line with Antonio Brown's best season - and prescribing we leverage that level of upside. But even beyond the Gordon-obvious, there are several questions in play here.
Namely, where does all of this volume come from? The 2013 Browns were an exceptionally high-paced offense, and they ran the ball a miniscule 32% of the time. Gordon's competition for WR targets was Davonne Bess and Greg Little. Conversely, these Browns are relatively slow-paced, and they're heavily invested in the run. They're also deeply, deeply invested in a perennial 90-catch slot man as an extension of that run game. We don't need to chase 2013 numbers to get Gordon value, of course, and it's not fair to demand them from a 3/4 pick. But to even project a line around 65 catches, you probably have to presuppose most if not all of the following:
- Hue and Haley move quickly away from the run, after investing heavily in Hyde, Chubb, and Tyrod.
- Haley speeds up the offense and creates significantly more snaps. This is possible, as PIT snaps ramped up gradually over his tenure, but Haley's resume is a complex and overstated one. He's captained 3 offenses that weren't led by HoF QBs, finishing 27, 13, and 28 in points.
- Landry doesn't make much of a dent. I only give him 20.9% of targets - significantly lower than his Miami tenure - and that still eats up 120ish looks.
- No other Browns make notable steps forward or dents in the pie. My numbers call for around 75 Duke targets and only tiny boosts for Njoku/DeValve, and that still keeps the WR targets relatively capped. Again, this is not a high-volume offense.
- Gordon makes a leap of 7-10% in catch rate. Doable, as that's not a very sticky stat, but we have 40 games from which to profile Gordon's efficiency. Film is film, but it feels uncomfortable to make that leap in projection right now.
- The team itself improves markedly, to the point that we can start expecting higher-efficiency throws and red zone usage and stop praying for 40-yard touchdowns. Here's the list of 8-TD wideouts over the last five years, and it's hard to find too many guys from 3-13-type teams in the bunch. Yes, Gordon was one of those guys in 2013, but that was truly an oddball season.
- Taylor shows efficiency that he struggled for in Buffalo and/or Mayfield is a surprisingly adept downfield passer from Day One. In any event, there's no offensive shakeup or dip in production when Mayfield inevitably gets starts, and the passing game continues to hum along without issue.
This is before we consider Gordon's many personal relapses, of course. Gordon is tantalizing and I'm high on him, as staff rankings suggest. But I think we can all agree his 2013 production isn't even a little bit projectable, and that there are more potential roadblocks between him and 1300-9 than many of his ADP-mates. It's a sizeable bet on Hue Jackson, the Browns, Tyrod Taylor, and Josh Gordon's sobriety. I'm a fairly proactive fantasy guy - again, I rank him as high as any other FBG ranker. But at cost, there are significantly better all-around situations to shoehorn those numbers into.
But I simply can't get on board with some of the upside projections I'm seeing. Some are truly assigning him the same ceiling he showed in 2013 - over 22 PPR pt/gm, right in line with Antonio Brown's best season - and prescribing we leverage that level of upside. But even beyond the Gordon-obvious, there are several questions in play here.
Namely, where does all of this volume come from? The 2013 Browns were an exceptionally high-paced offense, and they ran the ball a miniscule 32% of the time. Gordon's competition for WR targets was Davonne Bess and Greg Little. Conversely, these Browns are relatively slow-paced, and they're heavily invested in the run. They're also deeply, deeply invested in a perennial 90-catch slot man as an extension of that run game. We don't need to chase 2013 numbers to get Gordon value, of course, and it's not fair to demand them from a 3/4 pick. But to even project a line around 65 catches, you probably have to presuppose most if not all of the following:
- Hue and Haley move quickly away from the run, after investing heavily in Hyde, Chubb, and Tyrod.
- Haley speeds up the offense and creates significantly more snaps. This is possible, as PIT snaps ramped up gradually over his tenure, but Haley's resume is a complex and overstated one. He's captained 3 offenses that weren't led by HoF QBs, finishing 27, 13, and 28 in points.
- Landry doesn't make much of a dent. I only give him 20.9% of targets - significantly lower than his Miami tenure - and that still eats up 120ish looks.
- No other Browns make notable steps forward or dents in the pie. My numbers call for around 75 Duke targets and only tiny boosts for Njoku/DeValve, and that still keeps the WR targets relatively capped. Again, this is not a high-volume offense.
- Gordon makes a leap of 7-10% in catch rate. Doable, as that's not a very sticky stat, but we have 40 games from which to profile Gordon's efficiency. Film is film, but it feels uncomfortable to make that leap in projection right now.
- The team itself improves markedly, to the point that we can start expecting higher-efficiency throws and red zone usage and stop praying for 40-yard touchdowns. Here's the list of 8-TD wideouts over the last five years, and it's hard to find too many guys from 3-13-type teams in the bunch. Yes, Gordon was one of those guys in 2013, but that was truly an oddball season.
- Taylor shows efficiency that he struggled for in Buffalo and/or Mayfield is a surprisingly adept downfield passer from Day One. In any event, there's no offensive shakeup or dip in production when Mayfield inevitably gets starts, and the passing game continues to hum along without issue.
This is before we consider Gordon's many personal relapses, of course. Gordon is tantalizing and I'm high on him, as staff rankings suggest. But I think we can all agree his 2013 production isn't even a little bit projectable, and that there are more potential roadblocks between him and 1300-9 than many of his ADP-mates. It's a sizeable bet on Hue Jackson, the Browns, Tyrod Taylor, and Josh Gordon's sobriety. I'm a fairly proactive fantasy guy - again, I rank him as high as any other FBG ranker. But at cost, there are significantly better all-around situations to shoehorn those numbers into.
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