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WR Sammy Watkins, BAL (2 Viewers)

I'll have few if any shares of him again in my life.  I think everyone represents value at a point, but Sammy is unlikely to fall to that point for me. 

He had 52, 673 and 3.  He had 9, 198 and 3 of that in 1 game.

That's 17% of his catches, 29% of his yards and...100% of his TD's.  And sure, "If you take away everyone's best game..." but FFS, the guy didn't break 700 yards or 4 TD's.  He had 1 game with 200 yards and 3 TDs and still had garbage stats. 

You can scroll up to read about his mental health issues.  Earlier in the off-season he was talking about needing some downtime for his mental health and spirituality.  He talked about possibly sitting out OTA's. 

The Chiefs thought so much of him, they said he would have to restructure his contract to stay on the team.  And it happened. 

And all of this in the context that, as @JohnnyU pointed out--he's had 1,000 yards once.  He's not dedicated to football.  And that's fine.  He's not a bad dude.  It just doesn't scream fantasy breakout.

Sure, #2 in Patrick Mahommes offense should be good.  But he had that role last year.  He's been on good offenses with the Rams--and while he broke 10 TD's that one time--he just isn't a stud fantasy WR.  Hardman will be on his heels. 

 
I'll have few if any shares of him again in my life.  I think everyone represents value at a point, but Sammy is unlikely to fall to that point for me. 

He had 52, 673 and 3.  He had 9, 198 and 3 of that in 1 game.

That's 17% of his catches, 29% of his yards and...100% of his TD's.  And sure, "If you take away everyone's best game..." but FFS, the guy didn't break 700 yards or 4 TD's.  He had 1 game with 200 yards and 3 TDs and still had garbage stats. 

You can scroll up to read about his mental health issues.  Earlier in the off-season he was talking about needing some downtime for his mental health and spirituality.  He talked about possibly sitting out OTA's. 

The Chiefs thought so much of him, they said he would have to restructure his contract to stay on the team.  And it happened. 

And all of this in the context that, as @JohnnyU pointed out--he's had 1,000 yards once.  He's not dedicated to football.  And that's fine.  He's not a bad dude.  It just doesn't scream fantasy breakout.

Sure, #2 in Patrick Mahommes offense should be good.  But he had that role last year.  He's been on good offenses with the Rams--and while he broke 10 TD's that one time--he just isn't a stud fantasy WR.  Hardman will be on his heels. 
Good post, and even though he will likely be the number 2 WR, he is not even the number 2 option.  As long as they are healthy and playing, Travis Kelce and Tyreek Hill will get the most targets, and then everyone else is fighting for all of the targets after that.  And with Reid's knack for throwing to RB's and the rising Hardman on the roster, along with D Robinson who can make plays as well, it's just hard to see Watkins having a monster year.  Odds are he will have 2-3 big weeks and FF owners will be chasing those numbers in the weeks that follow those big games and cursing him.

 
He wasn't a max effort guy when it came to training, going back to the Buffalo days where he partied every night early in his career, led to injuries, skipped rehab, didn't care. While I'm sure he may have changed, matured, and improved, he still maintains a permanent spot on my do not draft list. 

 
JohnnyU said:
......still waiting.  One 1k year in his 6 year career.  Hard to believe he's just 27.  I wonder if people will be saying this when he's 30?
talking relative to his ADP.

don't think Godzilla here.

maybe Ebirah... 

 
One of the most physically gifted, statistically underperforming WR I can remember in my lifetime.

Still a pretty good NFL WR, you can tell the injuries over time have taken some toll. The routes definitely aren't as crisp as they once were. And why IMO the stats/targets aren't there.

 
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Mr Big Time, check back in 5 years.
Mahomes is a beacon by himself......add in Reid....and other talent on the team....people will take less money to guarantee a shot at winning the super bowl....KC should be contenders for the life of Mahomes contract.....not a ton of teams you could say that about.....free agents followed Manning to Denver even though they probably could have gotten more elsewhere......it happens....in this particular case, I think KC likes him and he likes KC, it does really feel like a good fit for Sammy who has under performed in the past.....WR2 on a team with a great WR1, solid WR's 3-4, great TE, best QB, solid group of RB's and coaching staff..... :shrug:

 
I think the angle here is take less money, and hawk the Superbowl rings.

Shrewd.

"'I sat my agent down" was his quote from the article above.    Sure you did Sammie

 
Speaking earlier this week, Sammy Watkins said he understood his numbers might not be what he wants them to be in 2020. 

Watkins made a stir earlier this offseason when he told Bleacher Report he wanted a bigger role, but he has since grown more philosophical. “As a receiver, yeah, of course, I want more balls and would love to have more balls," Watkins said. "But that’s not my focus. My focus is getting the win and going out there and having fun.” Watkins is simply acknowledging reality. Although still handsomely paid, he is only back after taking a reduction. Tyreek Hill and Travis Kelce are orders of magnitude ahead of Watkins in the targets pecking order, while sophomore Mecole Hardman screamed out for more looks as a rookie. Watkins will still have the occasional blow-up game, but he will struggle to rise above streaky WR4 status in 2020.  

SOURCE: Kansas City Star 

Aug 13, 2020, 11:06 PM ET

 
Meet the new Sammy Watkins

Same as the old Sammy Watkins:

Chiefs WR Sammy Watkins (groin) hasn't practiced in several days due to a groin injury.

Tyreek Hill is also currently dealing with a leg injury of his own. It's possible both ailments are being overblown for precautionary reasons. Either way, the situation emphasizes how easy it is for Mecole Hardman to "accidentally" land a larger role after the team brought back the same cast that limited the 22-year-old to 41 targets on 45% of the team's snaps last year. It would certainly make it easier to draft Watkins if he's able to return to practice in the next few days.

RELATED: 

Mecole Hardman

SOURCE: Adam Teicher on Twitter

Aug 20, 2020, 1:57 PM ET

 
Sammy Watkins (groin) returned to practice.

Watkins was sidelined the last few days, but there was never concern over his status. The Chiefs are likely to limit his reps leading up to Week 1. Watkins hasn’t played a full season since 2014. Sports Injury Predictor gives him a 95 percent chance of missing time.   

SOURCE: Kansas City Star

Aug 21, 2020, 4:49 PM ET

 
Sammy Watkins caught 7-of-9 targets for 82 yards and one touchdown in the Chiefs' Week 1 win over the Texans.

Watkins led the team in targets and receiving yards. Written off by many in the fantasy community in favor of sophomore Mecole Hardman, Watkins got the start and played well ahead of the speedster, out-targeting him 9-1. Watkins had a huge postseason to close out last year and picked up right where he left off in this one. As long as he holds off Hardman, Watkins has a chance to be one of the biggest steals in fantasy. He's due for major positive regression in the touchdown department after catching zero after Week 1 last regular season. Watkins plays with the best quarterback in the sport in the league's top offense. He'll be an upside WR3 for Week 2 against the Chargers.

- Rotoworld

 
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What would you bid on him for Blind bidding with a $200 as the budget?  25%? more? less?

 
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ponchsox said:
Last year I sat him week 1 vs Jax when he blew up and chased those points all year in my flex. Never again.
I also went through this last year, it sucked! With that said, in many of my 20 round drafts, there was Watkins sitting there in rounds 15-17. I couldn't pass him up at that price.

Just like last year, he was on my bench last night in every league I own him .... luckily he's a depth guy at this point. But very encouraging that he has had multiple good games in a row going back to last year. 

 
Again, he's a top candidate to go through positive TD regression. Of all the taller WRs (read: not Tyreek or Kelce, a TE) he's the one they trust the most. He's used on gimmick run plays and most weeks should get 6-9 targets on a Top 2 offense. He's as upside a guy as you can get and considering his ADP (11th round or later in 12 teamers), why not keep him on your roster? I know I will and if someone wants to give me a WR2 for him I'll listen, but I'm not aggressively trading him away for a song.

 
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Again, he's a top candidate to go through positive TD regression. Of all the taller WRs (read: not Tyreek or Kelce, a TE) he's the one they trust the most. He's used on gimmick run plays and most weeks should get 6-9 targets on a Top 2 offense. He's as upside a guy as you can get and considering his ADP (11th round or later in 12 teamers), why not keep him on your roster? I know I will and if someone wants to give me a WR2 for him I'll listen, but I'm not aggressively trading him away for a song.
This is correct.  Sometimes, it’s good not to be the speed guy with the big name that the opposing D must pay attention to on every play.   As long as Watkins is healthy, he should easily be a WR2.   You should be happy if he is rostered on your team

 
Positive TD regression? 
... I'm going to quote Daruuk from Fantasy Football Reddit last year, because I see this misunderstood constantly:
 

Positive Regression is a shortened form of the phrase Positive Regression to the Mean

Mean is the technical math term for average. Consider a thought exercise: say you had a time machine, and could watch a whole football game, then rewind time and have it played all over again. However, the second time wouldn't be the same as the first. Maybe RB doesn't slip on a wet patch of grass this time and he gets the first down instead of fumbling. Maybe the WR doesn't catch the key pass this time. Maybe the QB see the wife open TE this time. Maybe the game ends completely differently.

Now say we were to watch 1000 games. In some of them your fantasy player does well, in some of them he sucks, but when you average all the games together, you get a sense of how good the player really is. This is the mean for that player.

While we don't have a time machine, we do have ways of figuring out a players mean. There are certain facts that are always true for all players-- every player will have more yards when they get more targets (all other things equal). Rushers who get carries inside the five should get TDs often. QBs behind bad offensive lines should get sacked more than those behind good lines. If we average all these things out for a specific player, we get an idea of their mean.

Sometimes, players do much better or worse than they should have. We're in that one weird timeline-- that one weird game out of 1000 (or one weird series of games!) Where a player played better than they should have or worse than they should have. This is a player going away from the mean (where they should be)

Because it's an average, we know that given enough time, things will always go back to how they should be. If you flip a coin 10 times in a row and get 10 heads, you can be certain that after another 10,000 flips you'll be pretty close to a 50/50 split, despite the heads heavy start.

This is why experts can predict that guys like Mike Williams who scored 10 TDs on 70 targets in 2018 would not score nearly as many TDs in 2019 (0 TDs on 50 targets so far). His 2018 numbers were way better than they should have been, and so we should expect them to go back to where they should be, to regress. This has nothing to do with skill. If anything, Mike Williams is playing the same or better than he did last year, he just hasn't had the same TD luck.

So to sum up, Positive Regression means a player hasn't been performing to their own baseline standard, and we should expect them to do better to match where they already should be. It doesn't mean their skills are increasing, it means their fantasy points are below where they should be for whatever reason (usually lack of TDs)

Darren Waller is also an example of this, since he did not score a TD in weeks 1-6 despite having gobs of targets and yards. He regressed (went back to) the mean (where he should have been) in weeks 7 and 8 by scoring a TD.
Sammy Watkins had a 3 TD game in Game 1 of 2019 and didn't score a TD the rest of the regular season last year; an amazing anomaly considering the offense and his usage. You figure in that offense and with better luck, the TDs will come considering his snap rate and the declining usage of Mecole Hardman and Byron Pringle. Plus in the playoffs we saw Mahomes really start trusting him with the ball when Tyreek was being bracketed over DeMarcus Robinson (dropsies).

Considering his usage/snap rate, positive regression for him is scoring ... more than 1 TD the next 15 games. I'm not saying he's a great option; if I have to play him as more than a Flex I'm panicking that week. But this idea you gotta Sell High on him after one week I don't get.

 
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It's not that easy. He is someone that is a good addition and has upside. The narrative with Sammy is valid but has gone too far making him a value play. Someone getting 100 targets in that offense is valuable. 
Yes, but the ability to predict which weeks he will be valuable will require a crystal ball.     If you have room on the roster, 5% to 8% of FAAB tops, and then russian roulette trying to figure out when you can use him.    

 
Yes, but the ability to predict which weeks he will be valuable will require a crystal ball.     If you have room on the roster, 5% to 8% of FAAB tops, and then russian roulette trying to figure out when you can use him.    
This. 
 

and be happy when someone outbids you for him, wasting their money and causing them to have to deal with the "when do I start him?" Headache. 

 
ponchsox said:
Last year I sat him week 1 vs Jax when he blew up and chased those points all year in my flex. Never again.
Me too. I’m with you. I’m just gonna have to eat crow after how bad he was to manage last year. Missed his big games. Sucked.

 
He also had a nice three game run through the playoffs as well, when it mattered most.
People forget that and stick to the same narratives. Is Sammy high variance? Yes. Let's not keep stating the obv. Sammy is a great BB option and WR 3-5. You could do a lot worse. 

 
After week 1 last year he didn't break 65 yards or catch a TD the rest of the season. I knew it was bad but didn't realize it was that bad.

 

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