Analyzing NFL air yards for fantasy football is a valuable exercise for prognosticating what might be coming for certain receivers. If a wide receiver saw a tremendous number of air yards but fell entirely short on receiving yards and receptions, we could make an assumption that will regress in his favor in future games. Conversely, if a player saw a huge spike in receiving yards but did not see the corresponding air yards, that could mean a tremendous number of yards after the catch, which could always vary from week to week.
Looking at a player’s intended usage and not just the surface-level outcomes is a way to more accurately value players in fantasy football. I hope you will join me every week during the regular season for our breakdown of the week that was in fantasy football air yards.
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NFL Air Yards Analysis & Fantasy Football Takeaways
Below we have a chart representing air yards and receiving data courtesy of the 4for4 Air Yards App. Air yards is a tool that is now freely accessible everywhere, and you can find the site or format that works best for you.
This list represents the top 50 wide receivers from most to fewest air yards. From Jameson Williams‘ 215 air yards all the way down to JuJu Smith-Schuster‘s 44 air yards. Also included in this list are each player’s targets, receptions, average depth of target (aDOT), target share and share of the team’s air yards.
Showcasing all these pieces of data together provides an opportunity for a quick review of this chart and yields a significant number of takeaways after Week 4. In this weekly piece of analysis, we will dig into the four biggest things that jump out to me from this week’s dataset.
Week 4 Air Yards and Air Yards% Data
Top Takeaways From Week 4 Air Yards Data
Jameson Williams‘ Explosion is Coming
I would need to go back and check, but I am almost certain that a 175-yard difference between a player’s air yards and receiving yards in one week is the highest in the last two seasons. Jameson Williams’ managers have been mostly disappointed with his fantasy finishes this season (over 15 PPR points just once this season), but Sunday showed that some big games are still coming. His usage is excellent, and the Lions continue to pass at a high rate.
He is ninth in air yards, second in average depth of target (aDOT), fifth in deep targets and eighth in snap share among wide receivers. It may seem like only Jahmyr Gibbs and Amon-Ra St. Brown get all of the work and the touchdowns, but we should remain patient with Williams. If he keeps getting air yards at this rate, top-10 finishes are coming.
Don’t Give Up on A.J. Brown
We are already at two weeks of A.J. Brown making comments about his relative unhappiness with his role in the Philadelphia Eagles’ offense. The Eagles tried to get him involved on Sunday, giving him nine targets, but he caught just two for seven yards. He had a strong 119 air yards this week, but there just always seems to be a reason why Brown doesn’t produce. He has had one strong game this season. Sometimes it’s due to Jalen Hurts being inaccurate. Sometimes it’s a run-heavy game plan.
But Sunday shows they are still trying to get Brown the ball nine or ten times per game. The Eagles’ offense is too good to keep being this inefficient in the passing game. I am staying faithful to A.J. Brown until I see consistent weeks in a row where he is not getting a high level of targets or air yards.
Ja’Marr Chase is a Borderline Fantasy Option
If you sort the chart above by aDOT (average depth of target), you are going to find Ja’Marr Chase at the bottom. And I mean way, way down at the bottom. His 5.8-yard aDOT is 1.5 yards lower than any other receiver from Week 4. Even though he had a solid eight targets, the production was pitiful because Jake Browning couldn’t get him the ball anywhere far beyond the line of scrimmage.
This, of course, raises the question of what we do with Chase in the fantasy football weeks ahead. Without any kind of air yards to go along with his targets, it’s going to be hard to trust Chase going forward. Will he have usable weeks? I certainly think so because the Bengals will find ways to get him some big plays. But in the weeks ahead, I think we have to consider Chase more as a top-30 wide receiver instead of the top receiver overall, like he was drafted to be in the offseason.
Michael Pittman is on the Rise
Is there anyone who has benefited more from Daniel Jones being named Indianapolis’ starting quarterback than Michael Pittman? Even though he only had 41 receiving yards on Sunday, the rest of the numbers are absolutely elite. He had 10 targets, 158 air yards (fourth on the week), a 31% target share and a whopping 50% air yards share. Last year, with Anthony Richardson under center, Pittman had trouble all season putting together consistent fantasy games. But with Jones, Pittman is thriving.
On the season, Pittman is 21st in target share, 17th in yards after the catch, eighth in touchdowns, 24th in yards per route run and 11th in fantasy points per route run. Most importantly, his quarterback rating on his targets is 116.2, 16th-best among all wide receivers. Last season, Richardson couldn’t even complete 50% of his passes, so Michael Pittman must feel like he won the lottery getting an upgrade to Daniel Jones. What a strange thing to say four weeks into the season, but Richardson really was that bad.
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