Antonio Brown, Kelvin Benjamin, and Where Yards per Reception Goes Wrong Part II

by Chase Stuart on August 22, 2017

Brown continues to dominate the NFL.

Antonio Brown averaged “only” 12.1 yards per reception last year, although his great reception, receiving yards, and receiving touchdown totals earned him a third straight first-team All-Pro selection. If Brown wasn’t so good and just 28 years old, you might look at that average and think Brown was on the decline or at least was becoming less of a big play threat.

But that’s not really true: with 22 receptions (in 15 games) of at least 20+ yards, Brown had the third most big plays of any receiver last year, and 21% of his catches went for at least 20 yards. What really hurt Brown’s average was that he also caught a ton of short passes: he had 57 receptions of 10 or fewer yards. Kelvin Benjamin caught 63 passes for 941 yards last year, a 14.9 yards per reception average. But while that sounds good, Benjamin only caught 10 passes — or 16% of his total — for 20+ yards. How did Benjamin average nearly three more yards per catch than Brown? You probably already figured this one out: just 20 of his receptions (32%) went for 10 or fewer yards. Either Benjamin wasn’t running short routes or he wasn’t catching passes on those routes. If it’s the latter, it’s a bad thing; if it’s the former, well, it’s also a bad thing (relative to Brown, at least) that all he was doing was running long routes and Brown still caught more long balls than him!

The graph below shows the top 100 wide receivers and tight ends in receiving yards last season, sorted by number of 20+ yard receptions. In addition, I have included the percent of their receptions that went for 20+ yards, the number of receptions that went for 10 or fewer yards, and that percent as well.

Receiver	Tm	Rec	Yd	Yd/Rec	20+	20+ Perc	<10	<10 Perc
T.Y. Hilton	clt	91	1448	15.91	28	30.8%	36	39.6%
Julio Jones	atl	83	1409	16.98	27	32.5%	26	31.3%
Antonio Brown	pit	106	1284	12.11	22	20.8%	57	53.8%
Amari Cooper	rai	83	1153	13.89	21	25.3%	40	48.2%
Odell Beckham Jr.	nyg	101	1367	13.53	20	19.8%	56	55.4%
Jordy Nelson	gnb	97	1257	12.96	19	19.6%	55	56.7%
Tyrell Williams	sdg	69	1059	15.35	19	27.5%	31	44.9%
DeSean Jackson	was	56	1005	17.95	19	33.9%	25	44.6%
Michael Thomas	nor	91	1134	12.46	18	19.8%	47	51.6%
Davante Adams	gnb	75	997	13.29	17	22.7%	41	54.7%
Doug Baldwin	sea	94	1128	12.00	16	17%	63	67%
Jarvis Landry	mia	94	1137	12.10	16	17%	54	57.4%
Rishard Matthews	oti	65	945	14.54	16	24.6%	34	52.3%
Adam Thielen	min	69	967	14.01	16	23.2%	34	49.3%
Marvin Jones	det	55	930	16.91	16	29.1%	23	41.8%
Brandin Cooks	nor	78	1173	15.04	15	19.2%	43	55.1%
Pierre Garcon	was	79	1041	13.18	15	19%	41	51.9%
A.J. Green	cin	66	964	14.61	15	22.7%	32	48.5%
Kenny Britt	ram	68	1002	14.74	15	22.1%	32	47.1%
Mike Evans	tam	96	1321	13.76	15	15.6%	30	31.3%
Travis Kelce	kan	85	1125	13.24	14	16.5%	41	48.2%
Greg Olsen	car	80	1073	13.41	14	17.5%	35	43.8%
Quincy Enunwa	nyj	58	857	14.78	14	24.1%	27	46.6%
Golden Tate	det	91	1077	11.84	13	14.3%	52	57.1%
Jordan Matthews	phi	73	804	11.01	13	17.8%	45	61.6%
Delanie Walker	oti	65	800	12.31	13	20%	40	61.5%
Cameron Meredith	chi	66	888	13.45	13	19.7%	28	42.4%
Marqise Lee	jax	63	851	13.51	13	20.6%	27	42.9%
Steve Smith	rav	70	799	11.41	12	17.1%	43	61.4%
Emmanuel Sanders	den	79	1032	13.06	12	15.2%	39	49.4%
Willie Snead	nor	72	895	12.43	12	16.7%	36	50%
Coby Fleener	nor	50	631	12.62	12	24%	30	60%
Alshon Jeffery	chi	52	821	15.79	12	23.1%	17	32.7%
Julian Edelman	nwe	98	1107	11.30	11	11.2%	63	64.3%
Kyle Rudolph	min	83	840	10.12	11	13.3%	52	62.7%
Terrelle Pryor	cle	77	1007	13.08	11	14.3%	40	51.9%
Jamison Crowder	was	67	847	12.64	11	16.4%	38	56.7%
Allen Robinson	jax	73	883	12.10	11	15.1%	37	50.7%
Brandon LaFell	cin	64	862	13.47	11	17.2%	32	50%
Vernon Davis	was	44	581	13.20	11	25%	23	52.3%
Will Fuller	htx	47	630	13.40	11	23.4%	23	48.9%
Chris Hogan	nwe	38	680	17.89	11	28.9%	16	42.1%
Stefon Diggs	min	84	903	10.75	10	11.9%	58	69%
Michael Crabtree	rai	89	1003	11.27	10	11.2%	54	60.7%
Demaryius Thomas	den	90	1083	12.03	10	11.1%	47	52.2%
DeAndre Hopkins	htx	78	954	12.23	10	12.8%	40	51.3%
Mike Wallace	rav	72	1018	14.14	10	13.9%	38	52.8%
Robert Woods	buf	51	613	12.02	10	19.6%	28	54.9%
Martellus Bennett	nwe	55	700	12.73	10	18.2%	28	50.9%
Robby Anderson	nyj	42	587	13.98	10	23.8%	26	61.9%
Travis Benjamin	sdg	47	677	14.40	10	21.3%	26	55.3%
Eli Rogers	pit	42	535	12.74	10	23.8%	23	54.8%
Dontrelle Inman	sdg	58	810	13.97	10	17.2%	23	39.7%
Brandon Marshall	nyj	59	787	13.34	10	16.9%	23	39%
Jimmy Graham	sea	65	923	14.20	10	15.4%	22	33.8%
Victor Cruz	nyg	39	586	15.03	10	25.6%	21	53.8%
Kelvin Benjamin	car	63	941	14.94	10	15.9%	20	31.7%
Dez Bryant	dal	50	796	15.92	10	20%	17	34%
Kenny Stills	mia	42	726	17.29	10	23.8%	16	38.1%
Zach Ertz	phi	78	816	10.46	9	11.5%	43	55.1%
Jordan Reed	was	66	690	10.45	9	13.6%	40	60.6%
Tyler Boyd	cin	54	603	11.17	9	16.7%	34	63%
Ted Ginn	car	54	752	13.93	9	16.7%	30	55.6%
Eric Ebron	det	61	711	11.66	9	14.8%	30	49.2%
DeVante Parker	mia	56	744	13.29	9	16.1%	29	51.8%
Tyler Lockett	sea	41	597	14.56	9	22%	25	61%
Allen Hurns	jax	35	477	13.63	9	25.7%	18	51.4%
J.J. Nelson	crd	34	568	16.71	9	26.5%	13	38.2%
Larry Fitzgerald	crd	108	1028	9.52	8	7.4%	66	61.1%
Tyreek Hill	kan	61	599	9.82	8	13.1%	44	72.1%
Jeremy Kerley	sfo	64	667	10.42	8	12.5%	40	62.5%
Phillip Dorsett	clt	33	528	16.00	8	24.2%	17	51.5%
Taylor Gabriel	atl	35	579	16.54	8	22.9%	17	48.6%
Breshad Perriman	rav	33	499	15.12	8	24.2%	14	42.4%
Jason Witten	dal	69	674	9.77	7	10.1%	50	72.5%
Randall Cobb	gnb	60	610	10.17	7	11.7%	37	61.7%
Adam Humphries	tam	55	622	11.31	7	12.7%	34	61.8%
Lance Kendricks	ram	50	499	9.98	7	14%	33	66%
Gary Barnidge	cle	55	612	11.13	7	12.7%	33	60%
Brian Quick	ram	41	564	13.76	7	17.1%	25	61%
Jermaine Kearse	sea	41	511	12.46	7	17.1%	21	51.2%
Tajae Sharpe	oti	41	522	12.73	7	17.1%	18	43.9%
Hunter Henry	sdg	36	482	13.39	7	19.4%	16	44.4%
Cole Beasley	dal	75	833	11.11	6	8%	44	58.7%
Tavon Austin	ram	58	508	8.76	6	10.3%	42	72.4%
Sterling Shepard	nyg	65	683	10.51	6	9.2%	38	58.5%
Mohamed Sanu	atl	59	653	11.07	6	10.2%	35	59.3%
Jeremy Maclin	kan	44	536	12.18	6	13.6%	21	47.7%
Terrance Williams	dal	44	594	13.50	6	13.6%	18	40.9%
Anquan Boldin	det	67	584	8.72	5	7.5%	51	76.1%
Jack Doyle	clt	59	584	9.90	5	8.5%	32	54.2%
C.J. Fiedorowicz	htx	54	559	10.35	5	9.3%	31	57.4%
Zach Miller	chi	47	486	10.34	5	10.6%	29	61.7%
Antonio Gates	sdg	53	548	10.34	5	9.4%	29	54.7%
Cameron Brate	tam	57	660	11.58	5	8.8%	29	50.9%
John Brown	crd	39	517	13.26	5	12.8%	14	35.9%
Dennis Pitta	rav	86	729	8.48	4	4.7%	64	74.4%
Charles Clay	buf	57	552	9.68	4	7%	37	64.9%
Chris Conley	kan	44	530	12.05	4	9.1%	23	52.3%
Michael Floyd	crd	37	488	13.19	4	10.8%	15	40.5%

One remarkable player is DeSean Jackson. He caught a ton of short passes/screens, but he still led the NFL in yards per reception because of how many deep passes he caught. The chart below shows the amount of yards he gained on each catch last year: it is low for awhile, before spiking towards the end. He had 10 catches of 30+ yards and four catches of 55+ yards:

One player who has a low yards per reception average that *isn’t* misleading? Larry Fitzgerald. The Cardinals great saw just 7.4% of his passes go for more than 20 yards, and “only” 61.1% of his passes went for fewer than 10 yards. He simply wasn’t producing much in the way of big plays.

What players stand out to you?

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