Fantasy Football Today - Rondale Moore Profile: Untapped Potential (08/07 Fantasy Football Podcast)

Episode Date: August 7, 2022

Rondale Moore failed to reach 450 receiving yards as a rookie, but Jacob Gibbs likes some of the advanced metrics. What can we expect from Moore in 2022?  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, 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. If you like downfield threats in the passing game, this may not be the show for you, but you may find other reasons to like Rondell more.

Let's talk about it right now on Fantasy Football Today in 5. Adam Azer and Jacob Gibbs. Check out all of Jacob's work on Sportsline.com. Tremendous resource for you for fantasy, for gambling. Great stuff. And at JAGibbs underscore 23 on Twitter. All right. A 1.4 ADOT.

That is the average depth of target. When he was targeted, he averaged 1.4 yards. That is, I don't even know what that is. You tell me historically what that is, 1.4 ADOT. Yeah, we've really never had a player like Rondell Moore. Over the past 10 seasons, there have been five receivers to finish a season with 250 routes run and an average depth of target below five yards. Rondell Moore. Over the past 10 seasons, there have been five receivers to finish a season with

250 routes run and an average depth of target below five yards. Only five players in 10 seasons. Cordero Patterson, 4.8. Cole Beasley, 4.7. Tavon Austin, 4.1. Eddie Royal, 3.7. We're familiar with some of these names. We know this type of a receiver, but nobody's ever done it like Rondell Moore. 1.4. That's amazing. It's ridiculous. None of those players ever finished higher. None of those players finished higher than YGC50 in fantasy that season. None of them, you know, ever went on to be significant producers. Cole Beasley is like clearly the best name on that list in terms of fantasy production.

Well, people would say Patterson, but that's so different. Right. Exactly. Yeah. name on that list in terms of fantasy production. Well, people would say Patterson, but that's so different. Right, exactly, yeah. None of them averaged more than 1.75 PPR points per target, which is an important number we're going to focus on in more depth here as we get along. But yeah, we don't have really any historical context of a player with this type of role being productive in fantasy. One of the things, the talking points that we have for today is, should we expect Rondell Moore's ADOT to increase?

Yes! It can't get any lower. It almost literally can't get any lower. It can, but barely. It should increase, but to what? And this is obviously a huge opportunity here without DeAndre Hopkins for the first six games, but what can you expect? Right, yeah, like it should increase.

The real question I have is like, is it going to increase beyond five yards? Because that's kind of the cutoff point we've had here where it's really been hard to be relevant for fantasy. And nothing I see really points towards that likelihood. He really was not used as a downfield route runner at all. And when he was, he was totally ignored as a rookie. Only drew a target on 13% of his routes that developed 10 yards or deeper downfield.

Only 17% of his routes that developed five yards or deeper downfield. Both of those were way, way below the league average. And then, you know, when you look at short routes, his target per hour rate was elite. On routes that developed five yards or fewer downfield, he had a 33% target per hour and rate which was just below debo samuel 34 percent um jaylen waddle 32 percent so in that role he really looks like you know one of the you know potentially one of the best producers in the nfl but same thing in college um average depth of target was below five yards for his career in his final season at purdue it was below three yards um all the doubt that we have suggests that what we saw in 2021 from rondaell Moore is who he is, for now at least.

So I'm not expecting Zayda to see a significant increase, at least not in 2022. We're going to need to see more evidence before I start to believe that that's going to happen. So I thought there were some things that you did like about Rondell Moore as we were talking off the air. Yeah. Am I correct in that you know how does he become fantasy relevant i so i've typically been low on this type of a player you know juju smith schuster in pittsburgh um ronda more i've generally been lower than the market on but i really want to dig into it more and see if i could find a path to fantasy relevancy within this role like can

he do it and if so how um and i think that there might be one um so more average 1.7 points ppr points per target as a rookie even with a uh you know significantly lower average depth of target than the other guys from that group that we talked about and none of them were above 1.75 um he was you know the most efficient at creating yards after the catch of that group he was targeted at the highest rate by far and so i think it's reasonable that he could be you know by far the best player of that group. He was targeted at the highest rate by far. And so I think it's reasonable that he could be, you know, by far the best player of that group of players who have been, you know, who have had an A dot below five.

And so we shouldn't necessarily assume that just because they failed, he will also fail. And some players have averaged over 1.75 PPR points per target on targets coming five or few yards downfield. It is doable. So over the past five seasons an average of 2.8 players per season have finished with an average above 1.75 only two Devante Adams and Tyree Kill have finished with an average above two PBR points per target on the short target so we're looking at only targets that came five or few yards downfield because that's

where almost all of Rondell Moore's come and so so, yeah, the ceiling is Devante Adams, 2.33 PPR points per target on those targets, Tyreek Hill, 2.08. And again, only 2.8 players per season have averaged more than 1.75. The NFL average on these targets is 1.52. So expecting him to average more than 1.75 feels a bit unreasonable um but i think it's possible he was at 1.7 last year and so the reason i keep bringing this 1.75 number up um is because it's the number i'm going to use um to do some math here um so and then just just to stop it's 1.75 ppr fantasy points per target or per right per target on routes five yards or less? Exactly.

Okay. Okay. So if we assume that he's going to average that, how many targets would he need to be relevant in fantasy? And so to reach top 36 status, 150 PPR points, he would need 86 targets. To reach top 24, 200 PPR points, he would need 115 targets. And to reach top 12, 240 PPR points, he would need 115 targets and to reach top 12 240 ppr points he would need 138 targets um so you know how how likely is that he had 64 targets last year in a limited role um he's been targeted at a really high rate um win on the field 24 target per hour

and rate that rate spiked to 29 when either deandre hopkins or christian kirk were off the field and we're going to see him in that role to start the year. So what I did was I went with 25% target per route run rate, which I think is reasonable. I think he has room to reach up to 29 or 30% with those guys off the field. And I just did the math and found the route run thresholds that he would need to hit to reach the target thresholds that we just laid out. And all this is on Sportsline.

If you want to read about it, if it's easier for you to see all the numbers and all the thresholds rather we just laid out. And all this is on Sportsline if you want to read about it, if it's easier for you to see all the numbers and all the thresholds rather than hear them. But yeah, here are the route run thresholds that you need to hit if we assume a 25% target per route run rate, which I think is totally reasonable what we've seen from him in college when we saw him as a rookie. So at 1.75 PPR points per target, you would need 86 targets to finish as a top 36 receiver and to hit 86 targets

You need to run 344 routes to hit the top 24 You need 115 targets to get that number you need 460 routes and to hit top 12 you need 138 targets And to get to that number you need 552 routes and so how reasonable is it to expect him to get to these different thresholds? Christian Kirk ran 544 routes last year. Rondo would need 552. AJ Green ran 530 routes. In 2020, DeAndre Hopkins ran 626 routes. And this was a 16-game season.

Christian Kirk missed two games and still ran 513 routes. His 17-game pace from that season was 623. Even Larry Fitzgerald's 17- pace from that season was 623 even larry fitzgerald 17 game pace in 2020 was 581 so if rondo moore plays well at the beginning of the year with deandre hopkins out it's possible he could stick around to be a full-time player the whole year and if that is the case we've seen precedence in this offense that players can push well over 500 routes and if he averages 1.75 ppr points per target, which I think is realistic, it's possible that I think he could push up in the top 24, top 12, which sounds crazy. I never would have expected

that that was possible with, you know, the type of routes that he's running. But the math does check out. I'm really curious what you think about it. At the very least, I think it's, you can get 86 targets and be a top 36 wide receiver. Right, which is higher than where he's being drafted. Yeah, exactly. I mean, he's basically more or less free. 174th overall wide receiver, 62. So this is a guy in Rondon Moore that you should put on the end of your bench or just monitor him.

And if there's a positive development in week one or something like that, you can buy into it more than other people might and put him on your team. But if you're in a deeper league, for sure this is a guy that's going to get drafted. You should be the one to do it. All right, Jacob, thank you very much. One more thing on Rondell Moore. He forced 13 missed tackles after the catch last year. That was 13th among wide receivers.

And that was with just 59 catches. So you talked about it. He makes guys miss. He can get a lot of yak. All right. And you should get a lot of yak with a 1.48 out, I guess. All right. We'll talk to you all tomorrow on Fantasy Football Today in 5. We'll talk to you tomorrow.