Fantasy Football Today - Treylon Burks Profile: Best Titans WR? (07/03 Fantasy Football Podcast)

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Starting point is 00:00:24 Find out right now on Fantasy Football Today in 5. Another weekend episode for you here. Giving you advanced stats on a college player. How will it translate to the next level? I'm talking Traylon Burks. I'm Adam Azer with Jacob Gibbs. Okay, let's talk about Traylon Burks in the slot, what we saw at Arkansas,

Starting point is 00:00:41 and what we might see as a slot receiver, hopefully not that much much with the Titans. Yeah, so Burks was significantly less efficient when he was working from the slot, which is where Arkansas had him run the majority of his routes. Typically, we have seen, you know, designing these short yard touches, particularly from the slot, boost players' efficiency. Just in this past class, we saw it with John Meche, Wanda Robinson, Sky Moore, Kyle Phillips, the new team editor in the Berks in Tennessee. But that wasn't really the case with Berks. They kind of pigeonholed him into this short yardage gadget type role. And I really don't think that that's the best type of role for him.

Starting point is 00:01:19 And I'm hoping that's not what we're going to see from at the NFL level. So 77% of his routes at Arkansas came from the slot. The only player in the class with a higher slot rate among the 20 rookies that i evaluated was kyle phillips his new teammate um and that's just important because like he really was really good from the perimeter his numbers there it's a small sample size but his numbers are really really exciting so um the cfb average on yards per outrun on slot rates for, uh, slot routes versus non-slot routes is up 6%. Over the past five seasons, Traylon Burks, uh, saw his yard per outrun rate drop by 44% when he was in the slot.

Starting point is 00:01:55 Um, among the prospects that evaluated that was the biggest drop other than Drake London, who had the huge, you know, breakout when he moved to the perimeter in his third season. Um, so really that is huge to have be so much more efficient when running running from the perimeter and i think that um if phillips every everything's been really positive about him so far if he can earn a regular role or if robert woods just continues to spend 30 to 40 percent of the time in the slot like he has historically i think we could see burks um kind of play more of the aj brown role where he's only spending 15 to 20% of his time in the slot. And I think, as we'll hit on later here, his data outside the slot is really exciting.

Starting point is 00:02:33 And you look at routes, and you have the big four routes. So tell us about this, the big four routes that are typically seen in the NFL and how A.J. Sorry, how Traylon Burks did, maybe the new A.J. Brown, on those routes. Yeah, the routes that are used the most in the NFL and how A.J. or sorry, how Traylon Burks did maybe the new A.J. Brown on those routes? Yeah, the routes that are used the most in the NFL. I wrote about this on Sportsline in detail are go routes, hitch routes, out routes and crossing routes. And on those routes, what I call the big four, Traylon Burks saw his yard per run rate rise by 44 percent compared to all other routes that he ran. The only other players with a higher discrepancy on their big four routes, um, in this year's class were George Pickens and Drake London.

Starting point is 00:03:09 And so that is a good sign. Um, he has succeeded on NFL level routes. And again, just points to the fact that like, while Arkansas did, you know, use him in this kind of short yardage gadget role, I don't think he needs to be used that way. I think he's shown that he can succeed outside of that. Um, his 3.3 yard per hour run rate on those routes was the highest of any rookie receiver. And we saw him improve his rate every single year at Arkansas. It went from 1.96 in his first season to 3.44, his yard per hour run rate on the big four routes, and then all the way up to 4.21 last year, which was the best in the entire nation. So consistent improvement, best efficiency in the league in 2021.

Starting point is 00:03:48 And then two more just specific notes on Burke's route data and how it fits in Tennessee. He had the best efficiency on go routes of any receiver in the class. And then A.J. Brown ran a lot of go routes. He was 11% above the league average in terms of go route frequency last year. The other one is crossing routes. Burks ran a ton of crossing routes at Arkansas. His career crossing route frequency was 80% above the CFB average, and the Titans had the fifth highest crossing route frequency in 2021,

Starting point is 00:04:16 and they were 12% more likely to target crossers than the league average. So those are just two more things that are potentially a good fit here. Are there other similarities to A.J. Brown? Yeah, so like Brown, he showed an ability to succeed on downfield routes and perimeter routes and also was excellent against press coverage, all things that check out really well

Starting point is 00:04:36 for a receiver when trying to see if they can translate at the NFL level. Particularly at the downfield route running, Burks wasn't used that way often. He had one of the lower A dots of the receivers in this class, but he was really efficient when he was used as a downfield route runner. Um, among the 20 receivers that I evaluated only Jameson Williams averaged more yards per outrun on targets, uh, that came 15 or more air yards downfield than Berks.

Starting point is 00:04:59 Uh, Williams averaged 7.9 versus 7.7. Uh, no other player was above seven yards. And in 2021, uh, Berks raised that rate all the way to nine yards, which was, I think, the third best in the nation. So he's shown success when operating outside of his role, basically in every metric that I can find. And I think that, yeah, he absolutely, like, if we trust this data, it is a small sample size, but if you trust it,

Starting point is 00:05:23 it does point towards him being able to succeed at the AJ Brown role. So is he the first Titans wide receiver you would take? Cause right now, you know, he's got the asthma issue, obviously. Not, not the best off season for him in terms of getting ready for the NFL. Would you take Robert Woods or Traylon Burks? I would absolutely take Burks. There's significantly more upside with him in my opinion. I, if everything checks out with Burks over the next month or so, I'm fine taking him

Starting point is 00:05:48 as a top 30 receiver. Would he be your highest ranked rookie receiver? He's right behind Drake London. You've said a few things on this show that have made me excited about Drake London. Great. Good stuff. Thank you, Jacob. Appreciate it. Have a great weekend, man. Everybody have a great week, if you're hearing this on Sunday. That's Jacob Gibbs. Follow him at JAGibbs underscore 23. You're going to get some great, great information by following that Twitter account. And we'll talk to you tomorrow on Fantasy Football Today at 5.

Fantasy Football Today - Treylon Burks Profile: Best Titans WR? (07/03 Fantasy Football Podcast)

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