See the full version of this piece at FantasyLabs.
We’re in the second half of the 2018 NFL season, and we’re still on pace for a record-breaking campaign with an average of 24.0 points per game per team. The action continues with an 11-game main slate that kicks off on Sunday at 1 p.m. ET.
In this positional breakdown, I'm looking at the wide receivers at the top of the individual Pro Models that Jonathan Bales, Peter Jennings (CSURAM88), Adam Levitan, Sean Koerner, Chris Raybon, Kevin McClelland (SportsGeek) and I have constructed.
If you want more information on the rest of this week’s wide receivers, subscribe to FantasyLabs, where you can access the large suite of analytical DFS tools I use to research every player.
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Model Wide Receivers
This week, there are six wide receivers at the top of our individual Pro Models.
The two I am most drawn to are Cooper Kupp and Jarvis Landry.
Cooper Kupp: Los Angeles Rams (-9.5) vs. Seattle Seahawks, 50 O/U
- $6,400 DraftKings; $6,500 FanDuel
The Rams are coming off their first loss of the season, but they have hit their implied Vegas totals in an NFL-high 18 of 25 games under beard model and head coach Sean McVay since last season. The Rams averaged a league-high 29.9 points per game last season, and this season they have improved to an average of 33.2.
That will almost certainly regress, but this offense is as good as any unit in the league, and latter-day Austin Collie has a lot to do with it: For the first month of the season — before suffering a concussion in Week 5 and knee injury in Week 6 — Kupp was the No. 4 fantasy wide receiver with 18.0 FanDuel points per game. Kupp's +9.74 Plus/Minus for Weeks 1-4 was a top-five mark at the position.
In his Week 9 return to action, Kupp played 100% of the snaps and looked entirely like himself, turning six targets into a 5-89-1 receiving line. Excluding Week 6, in which he played just 37.8% of the snaps before exiting with a knee sprain, Kupp has been a strong producer over his past 16 games (including playoffs), especially those played this year.
- Week 7 (2017) -Week 9 (2018): 13.9 FanDuel points, 7.6 targets, 5.4 receptions, 75 yards, 0.63 touchdowns
- Weeks 1-9 (2018): 17.9 FanDuel points, 7.8 targets, 5.8 receptions, 87.3 yards, one touchdown
While Kupp might seem like an unlikely touchdown producer, he was his team's primary scorer in four seasons at Eastern Washington, putting up 77 all-purpose touchdowns in 52 career games.
Last year, he was top-five in the league with 23 red-zone targets, and this year he's top-10 with seven targets inside the 10-yard line even though he's missed two games and parts of two others. Even with his missed time, Kupp still leads the team with six touchdowns receiving.
Jarvis Landry: Cleveland Browns (+6) vs. Atlanta Falcons, 51 O/U
- $6,200 DraftKings; $6,400 FanDuel
Landry is first on the slate and second in the league with 101 targets, hitting a career-high 11.2 per game. Landry is actually running more of his routes out of the slot this season (69.1%) than he ran last season (64.8%), but with No. 1 overall pick Baker Mayfield at quarterback, Landry is being used much more aggressively.
For instance, this season 26.0% of Landry’s targets have come more than 15 yards down the field; in 2014-17 with Miami, he saw such targets at only an 11.0% rate. Landry’s production with Mayfield has been neither prolific nor consistent, but their connection is improving. Landry has a weak 57.5% catch rate on the quarterback’s passes, but he is locked in as Mayfield’s No. 1 option.
The rookie has targeted Landry a personal-high 73 times — tight end David Njoku is second with 42 — and Landry has been targeted 10-plus times in five of Mayfield's six starts.
Even with the schematic uncertainty in Cleveland following the departures of head coach Hue Jackson and offensive coordinator Todd Haley, Landry has an elevated floor because of his dependable and top-end target volume.
As significant home dogs, the Browns will likely need to throw to keep pace with the Falcons, and they at least have a good matchup. The Falcons are 28th in pass defense with a 27.6% DVOA and have allowed a top-six mark of 34.5 FanDuel points per game to opposing wide receivers. On top of that, middle linebacker Deion Jones (foot, IR), free safety Keanu Neal (knee, IR) and strong safety Ricardo Allen (Achilles, IR) are out.
Since the Falcons lost Jones and Neal in the season opener, wide receivers have routinely exposed Atlanta, especially in the slot…
You can read the rest of this piece on FantasyLabs.
Positional Breakdowns & News
Be sure to read the other Week 10 positional breakdowns.
• Quarterbacks
• Running Backs
• Tight Ends
For more in-depth NFL analysis information, check out The Action Network.
Matthew Freedman is the Editor-in-Chief of FantasyLabs. He has a dog and sometimes a British accent. In Cedar Rapids, Iowa, he’s known only as The Labyrinthian.
