Originally published August 5, Corbin Young reminds us of inexpensive second-year breakout candidates, including one who blew up in the first preseason game.
In a recent article, I looked at three second-year breakout wide receivers. We used Blair Andrews’ previous research to help identify players. That article included three second-year receivers ready to breakout in 2021. But none of those three players are particularly cheap, with two of them going inside the first 100 picks. Let’s look at a few receivers who have ADPs outside the top-150 picks.
As a reminder, Blair’s research found that players earn the largest increase in target share and raw target totals from their first to second seasons in the NFL — in fact for most players it’s the only year in which they should expect an increase. Blair also narrowed down two thresholds that help us locate these breakout players: scoring at least 100 fantasy points in their rookie seasons and playing their rookie seasons at 21 years of age. Below, we see the win rates for wide receivers who scored 100 points, based on their age in the previous season.
While none of the players below scored 100 points, two of the three did meet the age threshold, and all likely would have scored 100 points if they had played a full season.
