Fantasy Football Midseason Review - Wide Receiver

To view the Midseason Quarterback Review, click here.

To view the Midseason Running Back Review, click here.

Moving right along to the wide receivers. You will see:

1) My Midseason Fantasy Football Awards - I will be naming the top performers, the best draft day steals and the duds at each position.

2) You will find a chart of the top ranked fantasy football players, divided by position. This chart compares their current totals with their draft positions to give you an idea of how everything is shaking out.

Just to preface this entire article, I ran into some surprising numbers when looking through all the WR stats from this year. Injuries have played a major part in this.

We have seen a large number of undrafted players make the top 40 in fantasy football points due largely to injuries from starters. Another factor that has had a lot to do with these rankings is injuries/poor play at the quarterback position.

Check out the table at the bottom of the post just to see how drastic this year has been.

 

Top Performers

3) Steve Smith

Nobody saw this coming. We'll get into his meteoric rise later in this article, but for now let's focus on the stats.

Steve Smith is putting up massive numbers for his team. The man is averaging six receptions and 115 yards per game. He is leading the league in receiving by 94 yards. With 46 receptions on the season, this means that he is averaging exactly 20 yards per catch. The man is going one fifth of the field every time he touches the ball.

The only thing keeping him from being the best wide receiver in the league is that he only has four touchdowns. If Carolina can keep playing at this pace for the rest of the year, it is hard to imagine that Smith will not start finding the end zone more often. He could very well finish the season with 1,500+ yards and more than 10 touchdowns.

2) Wes Welker

Welker has been kept pretty quiet for the past two weeks, which make his stats all the more impressive. Despite those two performances, he still is second in the league in total receiving yardage at 824, and first in the league in yards per game at almost 118. He has added six touchdowns to these stats.

Rest assured that the Patriots will soon find their rhythm again and Welker will begin putting up consistently enormous fantasy games from here on out. He is hands down Tom Brady's favorite target and the biggest threat in their passing game. Just like Welker has in years past, he is a major player in receptions, leading the NFL this year with 57 passes caught.

As the 16th wide receiver picked in fantasy football drafts this year, owners are getting a huge boost from a guy they thought was a gamble in the fourth round.

1) Calvin Johnson

The numbers do not lie. If over 100 yards per game and 47 receptions doesn't tickle your fancy, how about the 11 touchdowns. To put that number into perspective, here are some fun stats for you:

·      Johnson has played eight games this season, four of them have been multiple touchdown games.

·      The second most receiving touchdowns in the NFL is a two-way tie at six touchdowns.

·      In 2010, the receiver with the most touchdowns, Dwayne Bowe, had 15 total. Halfway through the year, Calvin Johnson is just four off of that number.

·      Only nine NFL quarterbacks this season have more touchdown passes than Megatron has recieving.

Johnson's worst fantasy football week was in Week 6 when he managed only seven receptions for 113 yards and no score. Pretty rough, I know.

Steals of the Draft

3) Victor Cruz

Who the hell is this kid? Cruz is a second-year, 24-year-old, undrafted wide receiver from the University of Massachusetts. He was a bigger name in fantasy football drafts in 2010 than he was this year, largely due to his outstanding 2010 preseason play, where he led the league in touchdowns and yardage. An injury set him back, and he was essentially wiped from our memories until Week 3 against Philadelphia.

Cruz busted out with 110 yards on three receptions, two of them going for touchdowns. In his past five games, he has more than 95 yards in four of them.

Cruz has literally risen from nowhere to be the 10th highest fantasy-scoring receiver in the NFL, and leads the receivers on his team in fantasy points. The future is still uncertain with Mario Manningham back from injury, but I think it is safe to assume that Cruz has made his mark on the Giants and will continue to see plenty of fantasy points.

2) Tie: A.J. Green and Pierre Garcon

Really, there are a ton of guys who could have made this list. Jordy Nelson, Eric Decker, Nate Washington. Plenty of players have played above expectation, but these two stand out for me. Neither was really considered the number one receiver on their team coming in, and both have shown that they will not be taken lightly.

A.J. Green is becoming a star early in his rookie season, and even more impressively, he is doing so with a rookie quarterback. Green has the 15th most receiving yards, is tied for third with five touchdowns, and has played a massive role in the Bengals' unpredicted success.

Green wasn't even the first rookie drafted in most fantasy football leagues, Julio Jones got that honor. But Green has become the sixth highest scoring WR in fantasy football, putting himself in elite company.

Pierre Garcon is another shocker. Taken just two spots ahead of Green in most leagues, Garcon has accumulated the 7th most fantasy football points of all receivers. Without Peyton Manning throwing for the Colts, Garcon has benefited from extended practice time with Indy backup, Curtis Painter.

Both receivers are playing with quarterbacks that fantasy football owners and experts didn't think could get the job done. And both have proven everyone wrong.

1) Steve Smith

I honestly don't believe that you can make a case for anyone else here. As previously mentioned, Steve Smith is the third highest-scoring wide receiver in fantasy football and leads the league in multiple categories. Should his quarterback, Cam Newton, walk away with Rookie of the Year honors, Steve Smith should be the first person he thanks.

Like the entire Carolina Panthers offense, Smith was largely forgotten until the later rounds when he was selected between rounds 9-12, as the 35th receiver in fantasy drafts. Those who took him are likely sitting pretty near the top of their league, and never expected at the beginning of the year that they would be cursing Steve Smith's bye week.

Duds of the Draft

Honorable Mention - Reggie Wayne

We all knew when it was announced that Peyton Manning wouldn't play that the Colts would suffer. The fans would suffer. Numerous marketing campaigns would suffer. But I doubt that anyone expected that his favorite target Reggie Wayne would be hurting the most.

As the 11th receiver drafted overall, Wayne was expected to mesh well with whoever played quarterback for the Colts this season. But eight weeks and only 55 fantasy football points later, we can all see that we were mistaken.

Wayne has taken a backseat to Pierre Garcon. While Wayne's yardage still ranks in the top 20 in the league, he has only managed one touchdown all year, greatly hurting his fantasy production.

3) Tie: Chad Ochocinco and Brandon Lloyd

I was surprised to see Ochocinco go as high as he did in fantasy drafts this season. He was generally the 19th receiver taken. And those who made that draft decision were rewarded with these numbers: nine receptions, 136 yards, 0 touchdowns. Ouch.

Another disappointment as Brandon Lloyd. Last year he led all receivers in yardage when he broke onto the scene for the Denver Broncos. in 2011, however, he was unable to find success with Kyle Orton, then was traded to the Rams where he was being tossed the ball by A.J. Feely, never good for someone's fantasy statistics.

With Bradford coming back, I expect him to rebound in the second half of the season, but that doesn't mean he hasn't been a disappointment up until now. Lloyd is 41st in WR fantasy football points this year, despite being the 18th selected.

2) Mike Williams

Could easily have been number one on the list. I was sucked into all of the hype and numbers last year, just as many other fantasy owners were. I never thought that the Bucs were really ready for greatness just yet, I didn't even have them making the playoffs, but I did foresee Williams as one of the top 15 receivers in the league, expounding on what he managed to do last season.

As the 13th wide receiver taken in most fantasy football drafts, Williams failed to even make the top 40 in fantasy production. In fact, we have to go all the way down to number 58 to find him. A difference of 45 spots. Kenny Britt was injured in the beginning of the third game of the season, and he has more fantasy points than Williams.

Williams has just 317 yards and one touchdown on the season. If you were to double his production so far this year, he would still fall outside of the top 15 in fantasy points through eight weeks.

1) The Injured

We all know how rough this year has been. Tons of starters have gone down. Some for the season, some for multiple games. It has been a heartbreak all year for fantasy owners, seeing their top picks wasting away on the bench nursing a concussion or hamstring or any other number of ailments. This is why the number one spot goes out to the injured receivers.

On the list: Andre Johnson, DeSean Jackson, Jeremy Maclin, Dez Bryant, Miles Austin, Hakeem Nicks, Mario Manningham, Santana Moss, Marques Colston, Kenny Britt, Sidney Rice, Julio Jones, Roddy White, Vincent Jackson, Danny Amendola, Hines Ward, Michael Crabtree, Jon Baldwin, Lee Evans.

Top 20 Fantasy Football Running Back Performances

The following chart is compiled of information taken from fantasyfootballcalculator.com. All draft positions were in mock drafts done in early September. Players are ranked in order of their total fantasy football points per game (FFPPG).

The Prediction bar on the right side measures whether I think the player will continue at this pace for the rest of the year, see a decline (-), or improve their rankings (+).

List does not account for time missed due to injury.

Ranking	Player Name	Draft Rank	Diff.	Fantasy Points	Predict
1	Calvin Johnson	2	+1	146
2	Wes Welker	16	+14	120
3	Steve Smith	35	+32	117
4	Mike Wallace	8	+4	110	+
5	Greg Jennings	7	+2	97
6	A.J. Green	36	+30	82
7	Dwayne Bowe	12	+5	81	+
7	Pierre Garcon	34	+27	81	-
9	Jeremy Maclin	25	+16	78
10	Victor Cruz	N/D	N/D	74	-
11	Hakeem Nicks	6	-5	73	+
12	Larry Fitzgerald	4	-8	72
13	Jordy Nelson	47	+34	71
14	Steve Johnson	21	+7	68
15	Eric Decker	N/D	N/D	66	-
15	Anquan Boldin	22	+7	66	+
17	Vincent Jackson	5	-12	65	+
18	Nate Washington	N/D	N/D	62
19	Dez Bryant	14	-5	61	+
19	DeSean Jackson	9	-10	61	+
19	Roddy White	3	-16	61	+
22	Marques Colston	20	-2	60
22	Brandon Marshall	15	-7	60
24	Miles Austin	10	-14	59	+
25	Deion Branch	55	+30	58
26	Percy Harvin	24	-2	57	+
27	Reggie Wayne	11	-16	55
27	Michael Jenkins	N/D	N/D	55
29	Plaxico Burress	28	-1	54
29	Early Doucet	N/D	N/D	54
31	Doug Baldwin	N/D	N/D	52	-
31	Torrey Smith	N/D	N/D	52
33	Antonio Brown	50	+17	51	+
34	James Jones	58	+24	50	-
35	Darrius Heyward-Bey	N/D	N/D	49	+
35	Santonio Holmes	17	-18	49	+
37	Jason Hill	N/D	N/D	48
37	David Nelson	N/D	N/D	48
37	Andre Johnson	1	-36	48	+
37	Robert Meachem	51	+14	48

Unlisted: Mike Williams (13th WR taken), Brandon Lloyd (18), Chad Ochocinco (19),  Mario Manningham (23), Julio Jones (26), Austin Collie (29), Johnny Knox (39)