Fantasy Football Today - A.J. Brown Profile: Round 2 Pick? (07/02 Fantasy Football Podcast)

Episode Date: July 2, 2022

How will A.J.Brown do on his new team? Jacob Gibbs gives you the advanced stats that will get you pumped up to draft Brown.  You can also follow the full-length Fantasy Football Today podcast here: https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/fantasy-football-today-podcast/id261735167 Get 20% off Fantasy Football Today merch: https://store.cbssports.com/collections/fantasy-football-today%20?utm_source=podcast-apple-com&utm_medium=web&utm_campaign=buy-our-merch&utm_content=fantasy-football-collection Follow our FFT team on Twitter: @FFToday, @AdamAizer, @JameyEisenberg, @daverichard, @heathcummingssr, @ctowerscbs, @BenSchragg You can listen to Fantasy Football Today in 5 on your smart speakers! Simply say "Alexa, play the latest episode of the Fantasy Football Today in 5 podcast" or "Hey Google, play the latest episode of the Fantasy Football Today in 5 podcast." Watch FFT on YouTube https://www.youtube.com/fantasyfootballtoday Join our Facebook group https://www.facebook.com/groups/FantasyFootballToday/ Sign up for the FFT newsletter https://www.cbssports.com/newsletter To hear more from the CBS Sports Podcast Network, visit https://www.cbssports.com/podcasts/ To learn more about listener data and our privacy practices visit: https://www.audacyinc.com/privacy-policy Learn more about your ad choices. Visit https://podcastchoices.com/adchoices

What does possible sound like for your business? It's having the spend to power your scale with no preset spending limit. Redefine possible with Business Platinum. That's the powerful backing of American Express. Terms and conditions apply. Visit amex.ca slash business platinum. A.J. Brown on the Eagles. Round two pick, round three pick.

Let's find out what Jacob Gibbs thinks right now on Fantasy Football Today in five. Welcome, everybody. Jacob is a Sportsline.com writer, gets into the data, data analyst, loves the advanced stats. And I know he loves A.J. Brown. I don't even know where he's going with this. I just know he loves A.J. Brown, has for a long time. A.J. Brown went down from 76.8 yards per game in 2020 to 66.8 yards per game in 2021. Definitely some injuries factoring in there, but he lost a full 10 yards per game. Where are you right now on AJ Brown? Let's start with just the volume he gets when he's on the field. Yeah, it was definitely a disappointing season for him overall, and even on a per game basis, as you pointed out, which is why

I like to get really granular with this and look at um the per route data and like even as specific as like when aj brown was on the field like every play that he played what happened um and so that's something you can do on a true media our database is you can break it down by when this receiver was on the field um how often was he targeted um what percentage of the total targets when he was on the field did he get what percentage of the air yards um when he was on the field did he get? What percentage of the air yards when he was on the field did he get? And it came in a somewhat small sample size for A.J. Brown because of the injuries last year,

but no receiver was targeted at as high volume as A.J. Brown was when they were on the field. So when on the field in 2021, A.J. Brown took 40% of Tennessee's targets. The next highest was Devonta Adamsams 30 35 davante adams 34 cooper cup 40 aj brown air yards he saw 50 of tennessee's areas when he was on the field the next highest was justin jefferson 46 terry mclaurin 46 this is just a fun little tidbit elijah moore 44 was the next highest. Yeah. So that's just absurd really.

Like no one, no one does that. And I don't think it would be quite that high over a larger sample size. It'd probably drop a little bit. And obviously it came in a Tennessee, you know, offense that was a bit devoid of other pass catchers, but still 40% of the targets,

50% of the yards when he's on the field, that's absurd. Yeah. And if you just want to eliminate two games that he left after 50% of the yards when he's on the field, that's absurd. Yeah, and if you just want to eliminate two games that he left after 12% of the snaps and after 52% of the snaps and look at his 17-game pace without those two games,

90 catches, 1,269 yards, and eight touchdowns on 145 targets. I mean, that is much, much better than his season-long numbers. So it's just sort of manipulating the data to remove the injuries and the games that he played a full snap share, basically, or his season long numbers. So it's just sort of, sort of manipulating the data to remove the injuries and, uh, and the games that he played a full snapshot basically or his normal snapshot. All right. I'm sorry. I've been talking a lot here. So let me get back to you. Uh, you're seeing improvement. He's a three-year, a third-year guy now in a fourth-year guy. Um, now a fourth-year

guy you've seen improvement in the three years. Yeah. His trajectory has been exactly what you'd want to see from young and sitting receivers just straight up in terms of his ability to draw targets on a per route basis. 21% of his routes, he drew a target as a rookie that was up to 26% in his second season and then 30% last year. So his second season made him one of just 12 receivers since 2010 with a rate above 26% in an age 23 or younger season. Really good, really impressive. Last year, AJ Brown became one of just two receivers with a rate above 30% in an age 24 or younger season. The only other receiver to do it since 2010, Calvin Johnson.

So again, just like we're dealing with sort of small sample sizes, and we do have to be really specific here with getting into the per route data, but when you do get into the per route data, he's doing stuff that really no one has ever done before. Um, I don't know if it's going to translate exactly to Philadelphia, but it is really, really impressive. And I don't think people really know the magnitude of what he's done so far. Okay. And then finally, how does he mix with Jalen Hurts? This is the big question that we want to know. Yeah. So Hurts really, really hammers the intermediate area of the field in terms of the average depth of target that we've seen from him,

the 10 to 20-yard range. 26% of his attempts have traveled 15 or more yards. That tied with Russell Wilson for the highest in the NFL last year. And he's been more efficient on those attempts too. So on attempts that were under 10 yards, he was 6% below the league average. On attempts that were above 20 yards, he was 30% below the league average.

On attempts that came 10 to 20, he was 12% above the league average. Look at A.J. Brown, his career efficiency. He's been really, really good in that 10 to 20 yard range, 96% above the league average. So it's all speculative here we don't know exactly how all this is going to translate in a new system and everything um but there's massive upside that much is clear if the trajectory that he's on uh continues to carry that direction and

if the per route rates that we've seen you know carry into water and and do continue to sustain in a new offense and if he gels with hurts in this intermediate to deep range, like Andy's healthy that we're looking at potentially wide receiver, one type of stuff from AJ Brown. And so, yeah, if we can get them in the third round, I am taking that all day. What about the second round? I think, yeah, you can take them in the back in the second round. If you, if you are convicted about it, you are taking a risk, obviously,

like we haven't seen them put it together for a full season yet. Um, but there's lots of data. The point starts in being a top five receiver. If he's healthy. That is Jacob Gibbs. I'm Adam Azer tomorrow. We'll talk to you about Traylon Burks.

The guy may be replacing AJ Brown in that role for the Titans offense. We'll talk to you then on fantasy football today. In five.