Coby Fleener's Impending Stardom
As soon as Coby Fleener signed with the New Orleans Saints I got excited for his potential. Looking closer and using the TGT/Snap% metric, I found that Fleener could post even better numbers than most are projecting.
The first report that got me excited was this:
What made me interested and excited is the idea that Fleener will be in the Jimmy Graham Role.
So what does this “Jimmy Graham role” actually look like? Comparing Benjamin Watson in 2015 to Jimmy Grahams years in New Orleans helps to shed some light on it.
Snaps:
Watson played at least 200 more snaps than Graham did when he was on the Saints. However, his TGT/Snap % shows that Graham was targeted much more frequently.
TGT/SNAP %:
Taking a look at the differences in snaps and TGT/SNAP % you can see that Jimmy Graham played fewer snaps than Watson, but was a featured pass catcher in the offense. He was being targeted 19% and 16% of his snaps going back to 2012.
For reference, this would have been only behind Delanie Walker (20%) and Jordan Reed (16%) in 2015, who both finished as top 3 Tight Ends in PPR.
Receptions:
Graham averaged 85.3 catches a year while in New Orleans.
RedZone:
Graham was heavily featured in the Redzone throughout his time with the Saints recording 11, 9, 16, and 10 TDs from 2011-2014. Benjamin scored only 6 TDs last year.
Fleener vs Graham:
So now that we have a better understanding of what kind of role Jimmy Graham played, we have to look at whether Fleener is talented enough to fill this role or even capable. Jimmy Grahams numbers obviously weren’t a direct result of the role, as he is also an extremely talented player and elite athlete.
Here is how Fleener and Graham compare as athletes according to PlayerProfiler.com:
Both of their measurables and workout metrics are quite similar, with both excelling as pure athletes.
As far as talent goes, I haven’t seen enough out of Fleener to say he is as good as Graham, but the upside is definitely there. Here is a report showing that Brees is definitely a believer in Fleeners talent:
Fleener's capability to handle a big time role and score fantasy points is portrayed pretty accurately with his splits in indianapolis when Dwayne Allen didn't play.
I would say it is safe to say Fleener can fill a role this big, even if he isn’t as good as Jimmy Graham was.
Projection:
In order to project Fleener in this role, I looked at a range of possible outcomes. I used Grahams last 3 years of snap counts in New Orleans as the range, and both of Grahams TGT per Snap % as well as a lower projection of 14% as the deviation. I think a 14% TGT/Snap% is about the floor for Fleener in this role especially since he isn’t considered an asset as a blocker and should be targeted fairly routinely.
I made the Reception % as the average from the last 4 years of New Orleans Tight Ends as well as Fleeners from last year giving us 65%.
The results are pretty astounding. He has the upside to lead the league in receptions in a scenario that isn’t too far fetched. His floor of being 10th in receptions is not something to shy away from either. If you read my previous article you know that EVERY Tight End who finished in the top 10 in PPR, except Tyler Eifert, had over 100 targets.
Receptions are great and the main focus of this article, but it is important to convert this to a language all fantasy enthusiasts understand better, points.
So in order to convert this, I needed to add in yards and TD’s. I found Yards-per-reception the same way I did with Reception % (the average from the last 4 years of New Orleans Tight Ends and Fleeners in 2015). This gave me 12.05.
For TD's I used the average from New Orleans Tight Ends since 2012 and rounded down which gave me 10.
So using these AVERAGE variables, here is how many fantasy points Fleener could potentially score, and where he would have finished in 2015.
So given these different outcomes of snaps, you can see the possibilities for him going forward. Using these variables, the lowest finish he would have had is 6th . This is quite awesome, especially when you consider that he is going as the 7th TE off the board in drafts this year according to FantasyFootballCalculator.com
As you can tell, How many snaps Fleener will play is important to how many points he scores. Guess What? I expect Fleener to play more snaps than Graham ever did.
As you can see, Jimmy Grahams snaps increased each year since 2012. This led me to finding that the Saints top two TE’s have been playing more snaps every year since then.
Going into 2016 there is optimism that this trend will continue and that the Saints will have at least two TE’s on the field even more often. This optimism comes from the departure of Marques Colston who was known for getting those short receptions in the middle of the field from the slot. While they did draft Micheal Thomas out of Ohio State, he is a rookie and can’t possibly be expected to take this role on immediately. Josh Hill will surely play a lot, but mostly taking over as a blocking TE.
I don’t expect Fleener to come close to Watson’s 2015 snap count, but 800 offensive snaps is not unreasonable with the absence of Watson and Colston.
Having 800 snaps in this role could lead to monster numbers for Fleener in 2016. If he comes anywhere close to Grahams previous Target per Snap % he could easily finish as a top 3 TE with upside to be the #1 TE. Yes, I said it. Coby Fleener could score more points than Gronk.
Using the same set of variables, here’s what Fleeners stats could look like if he gets 800 snaps in this role:
As you can see, Fleener has the potential to finish as the #1 TE. This doesn’t even factor in the upside of him scoring more than 10 TD's or having a better YPR.
Currently going in the 7th round, Fleener's unusually high floor and ridiculous ceiling should make you excited to pick him come draft day.
