In this weekly article, Bjorn Yang-Vaernet uses the Advanced Stat Explorer and other RotoViz tools to dive deep into wide receiver usage trends. Usage is key for making waiver wire adds, start/sit decisions, and finding the next blow-up WR in DFS.

Week 14 is going to be a good one. It is the first week of playoffs for some. For others, it can impact getting into playoffs or seeding implications. All around, the stakes are high this week.

I don’t have too much more to introduce as those who have returned to read this article series probably understand the importance of underlying usage. While usage is a great indicator of success over a longer sample, anything can happen in one game. With that, I wish for all of you to have variance fall your way on this important week and let’s dig into some WRs as we head into Week 14.^[1]In another dimension, my fantasy team gets that Ja’Marr Chase touchdown turned interception.

Routes Run and Targets per Route

Routes run is the first key statistic I’ll focus on because WRs need to be on the field to produce. The second statistic is routes per target. Unlike RBs usage, targets are earned as a WR and routes per target is a helpful measure in figuring out which players are good (or which players coaches want to get the ball to).