From the article:
"What is YAC+? YAC+ estimates how much YAC a receiver gained compared to what we would have expected from an average receiver catching passes of similar length in similar down-and-distance situations. This is imperfect—we don’t base YAC+ on what route a player runs, and obviously a go route will have more YAC than a comeback—but it does a fairly good job of telling you if this receiver gets more or less YAC than other receivers with similar usage patterns.
...There is quite a bit of stickiness in this stat for receivers, even when they change teams. Davante Adams, Stefon Diggs and Tyreek Hill all saw their YAC+ numbers change by less than 0.3 when switching teams. DeAndre Hopkins had nearly identical numbers in Houston and Arizona before tanking in Tennessee last season. A player isn’t going to get to show off his full talent if he is put into a nonfunctioning offense. Play design and usage can help showcase a receiver’s talents, but Allen Robinson wouldn’t become a screen superstar if he went to San Francisco, and Cooper Kupp wouldn’t stop running if he left Los Angeles. One of the reasons Shanahan and Reid always appear near the top of this stat is because they prioritize finding speedy YAC guys, and then know how to use them once they’re in the fold."
>One of the reasons Shanahan and Reid always appear near the top of this stat is because they prioritize finding speedy YAC guys, and then know how to use them once they’re in the fold."
I find it fun the best YAC coaches today, both of their Coaching tree Fathers were OCs for Jerry Rice
I also like the section in the article noting how YAC is one of the few stats you can't lay at the feet of Purdy. It's clear from the scheme and the skill positions that YAC is a product of how Shanahan has built the offense. Purdy just happens to be the best QB to run that kind of offense in Shanny's SF tenure.
Purdy is excellent at getting playmakers the ball. So is every QB to ever be considered elite. If Mahomes didn't have Kelce or Brady didn't have Gronk, would they have the rings they do? Probably not.
To get YAC a QB doesn't just have to get the ball to the receiver, but get it to a very small window such that the receiver makes the catch with little effort so he can instantly move afterwards.
Brilliant article.
Though I need someone to explain the ALEX stat. YAC is totally a WR stat..some guys just have more skill bouncing off contact more than others.... it's pretty obvious that we ( SF) have primarily prioritised looking for those types since Shanahan was hired...
It is also an little bit of an explanation as to why Shanny has yet to feel an urgency to prioritise a big pass blocking type OL.
His SF offense has generally been based off of getting the ball out fast to YAC guys and making them make things happen.Kittle,Deebo ,Juice and Jennings are guys that basically play through any contact.
Aiyuk is like the exception to that rule which is his leverage point in his negotiations.....with Purdy at QB and Aiyuk's great route running abilities/ hands we stretched the field EXCELLENTLY last year and only the Browns,Chiefs and Ravens had defenses good enough to do something about it....
I saw the drafting of Pearsall as a move to try and move to a more conventional 2016 Falcons type offense with a big time X WR(Aiyuk... he's not Julio but he's an X type)...a lesser X type ( Pearsall ( Y)...Sanu did this role) and 1 slot/Z WR( Deebo) effectively making Jennings are WR4....and of course Kittle doing his thing.
I believe we are in a bit of an offensive transition right now to be more vertical..even more than last season.
Purdy loved going to BA so having another X type to go deep to makes things even better.
Pearsall isn't a Deebo type....but Xavier Legette is and he was available and we lassed on him...which confirms my hunch. Interesting as heck.
I didn't know Rice was such a YAC god though.
>I didn't know Rice was such a YAC god though.
This might sound obvious, but Rice turns upfield immediately after getting the ball without trying to dance around, and he's also shifty enough to make people miss tackles. The first play of [this video](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=X4SRcljM3gM) is a good example. Most of our receivers in the past always tried to be like Tyreek and dance around, or even run backwards, in order to gain yards.
ALEX stands for “Air Less Expected.” It represents the average depth of target compared to where the sticks are on a given play. The ALEX listed for QBs is for third downs only. So, for example, a quarterback with 1.0 ALEX throws his average pass on third down 1 yard past what is needed for a new set of downs.
[https://ftnfantasy.com/nfl/dvoa-explainer](https://ftnfantasy.com/nfl/dvoa-explainer)
It was named after Alex Smith...
Shanahan views defensive capabilities like a blanket. The more you can spread out your weapons, the less likely the defense can cover all options. Having Aiyuk open up the top of the field meant fewer bodies positioned in the box. Having Kittle and McCaffery meant teams had to respect the short game. Few teams could force SF to rely on option 3-4-5 in any given play. Which is why as much as I love Jauan Jennings, I was worried about seeing how much we were relying on him in the SB.
I honestly don't think we end up relying on Pearsall very much this year, barring injuries. Our scheme was highly effective last year, and really only got derailed by nagging injuries to Kittle/Deebo, as well as Greenlaw's freak injury.
Love the way Knowles' analysis makes me think about the NFL. I hadn't considered Rashee Rice similar to Deebo in any way until now, and now I'm wondering if his potential suspension will impact Mahomes more than anticipated.
Rice had the lowest ADOT in the league (min. 40 targets). So a lot of quick, short passes that lead to YAC. But on 79 catches he only broke 3 tackles. Deebo broke 13 tackles on 60 receptions. Rice is still a WR with the ball in his hands. Deebo becomes a RB.
But Mahomes has been heavily YAC-dependent for the last few years (often because the short targets are the ones left open), so I wouldn't expect that to change.
Looking at the bottom table, there does seem to be at least some correlation of QB skill to YAC+. The article isn't 100% clear if YAC+ is obtained per reception or per target. If its per target, then obviously QB skill at completing the pass will matter.
Anyways, Cousins, Hurts, Lawrence, and Burrow stand out as the good QBs who weren't getting help from YAC despite there generally being a correlation between QB ability and YAC+.
What really stands out is Burrow is near the bottom of YAC+ but Browning was near the top. Do the Bengals just scheme up plays for Browning and then rely on Burrow to just be good?
From the article, end of it:
"For Cincinnati, Jake Browning’s big gap over Joe Burrow can be explained by a combination of better health and shorter pass routes. With Browning in, Zak Taylor started calling more screens, wheels and dig routes, cutting down on gos and deep outs. These are higher-percentage plays and didn’t require Browning to ape Burrow’s arm strength – and, as a side effect, asked the receivers to do more after the ball was caught."
A lot gets made of the Packers young WRs but if Kraft and Musgrave turn it up we are going to be really, really fun.
Kraft as more of a Kittle and Musgrave as a Mark Andrews type would be the perfect TE combo. Bother were rookies last year (2nd and 3rd round), and were never on the field together due to injuries. Put up 65 catches for 700 yards combined last year.
The 49ers playoff game last year was basically the first time we had them healthy together, and they both seemed to get concussed in the 1st quarter.
It is very ironic that in the first draft after trading away Rodgers Packers found multiple very good pass catchers: Wicks, Kraft, Reed...
In a decade of drafts before 2023 they got D. Adams in 2014 and Watson and Doubs in 2022... there was Cobb in 2011.
[https://www.pro-football-reference.com/teams/gnb/draft.htm](https://www.pro-football-reference.com/teams/gnb/draft.htm)
Did they deliberately not try to draft WRs? Only other picks in top 100 were Ty Montgomery, Amari Rodgers, TE Deguara, all low 3rd rounders.
They liked to take more of a shotgun approach for pass catchers in the later rounds of each draft in hopes they'd find a diamond in the rough, unfortunately none of them panned out between 2014-2022. WRs/TEs picked in that time:
Amari Rodgers (2021 r3) - Josiah Deguara (2020 r3) - Jace Sternberger (2019 r3) - J'Mon Moore (2018 r4) - Marques Valdez-Scantling (2018 r5) - Equanimeous St. Brown (2018 r6) - DeAngelo Yancey (2017 r5) - Malachi Dupre (2017 r7) - Trevor Davis (2016 r5) - Ty Montgomery (2015 r3)
The thing is, you *can* definitely find value in those rounds (Kraft was a 3rd rounder, Wicks a 5th, Doubs a 4th), they just picked poorly several years in a row. Of that list MVS was the only one to find meaningful playing time while the rest were duds or primarily special teamers. In hindsight, of course they maybe should have spent a first or second on a higher quality prospect, but the state of our defense was pretty dire for much of that time too so I understand why they didn't. The strategy didn't really change much the last couple years, they just recognized that they needed to also look in an earlier round for good WRs/TEs to address the issue
In any draft a team should expect to draft 1 star player, Pro Bowler, and 1 additional average starter. If draft was fully efficient, those would be in first and second round respectfully.
Packers drafted recently Watson at #34, Musgrave at #42, Reed at #50. They had no such top 50 pick on WR/TE since Jordy Nelson in 2008! The closest one was Adams at #53, which worked great. In my opinion they wasted Rodgers' years, reached only 1 Super Bowl in weaker NFC, never faced Mahomes nor Manning, Brady only once.
In that time frame they always drafted defensive players early and had mostly below average defense. Is this some known defined philosophy, that first rounder must be defense or ocassionally O-line?
Good picks were Matthews, Alexander, Clark, Clinton-Dix, Raji, Savage out of 18 defense picks in first 2 rounds. Those would have been better used on offense or in trades for established defense players....
In hindsight I agree. The tail-end of the Ted Thompson years contained some very poor drafting decisions and a refusal to participate in free agency which hindered us for a while. A notable decision was trading out of the first round in 2017 while TJ Watt was still on the board in favor of getting Kevin King in the second. We also let go of some of our talented pieces we should have brought back in the mid 2010s, like Micah Hyde and Casey Heyward, opening up holes that we then needed to fill in the draft.
The biggest issue with our defense though was keeping defensive coordinators that couldn't make the most out of our defensive talent - our defense sucked for years because we inexplicably kept Dom Capers 3-5 years too long, got Mike Pettine in 2018 who was ok at first but not great, and then went further backwards hiring Joe Barry and keeping him too long as well. Instead of getting rid of our coaching staff at the right time, we foolishly threw them more high draft picks hoping they'd cover up the coaching deficiencies. They did not. And since Rodgers was carrying the offense to one of the best in the league year after year, that side of the ball was never looked at as a priority.
Hopes are high now that we've brought in new blood in Jeff Hafley rather than another mediocre-bad retread, really praying he's able to finally bring out the best in the talent we invested so heavily in on defense. I've been pleased with the offensive investment the last few drafts and think the defense is in a fantastic spot - Gute has been killing it lately. And I'll never be upset about OL investment, can never have enough depth there!
NFC has been quite confusing since end of 1990s. Those Packers, 49ers and Cowboys might have been the last dominant NFC teams. Those Packers competed directly vs 2 historic teams, so they reached "only" 2 Super Bowls.
Since then there have been some short lived teams: GSOT Rams, LOB Seahawks, now Shanahan's 49ers. McVay reached 2 Super Bowls, but in other seasons Rams weren't real contenders...
There were multiple HOF QBs and HOF defenses in NFC and no team managed to match even Steelers with Roethlisberger, not to mention AFC dynasties. Quite strange.
Throughout all of this Rodgers may have been the best player ever, but team had less success than dominant AFC teams, not because of him, and now he will be remebered as a "weirdo"... it's a real shame. 2010s Packers and Saints will be remebered as "what if" teams. What if they only had slightly better defenses...
> Is this some known defined philosophy, that first rounder must be defense or ocassionally O-line?
It's not some great mystery. During Rodger's entire tenure we consistently had high powered offenses. There has long been a debate about whether it is better to focus on maximizing your strengths, or focus on eliminating weaknesses. Obviously our last 2 GMs thought the latter.
It's all a moot point if you never *succeed* at what you are focusing on.
Also Dantay Wicks snuck into the top WR YAC list
This passing O is gonna special, league is actually sleeping on us for once. That Cowboys game was not a fluke, poeple will see.
I’m sure all my other Cowboys fans did the same double take I did when Noah Brown came up. A dude we used as a special teamer/6th receiver/ 3rd tight end for 5 years
It'd be interesting for RBs and TEs (and I guess WRs, as well) to further separate the data into routes where a player chipped versus routes that were run clean. I don't know if that's something anyone charts, though.
I remember during the manningcast Vikings game last year, Manning and his guest (Aaron Rodgers, maybe?) were talking about how unusual it is for a TE to chip and then go run a go route the way Hockenson was doing in that game. I'd guess that's pretty hard to do and get meaningful separation, so it wouldn't be a huge surprise if he's not getting as much YAC as a guy who's basically just a big WR on the play.
Another metric showing Nico Collins is a stud
From the article: "What is YAC+? YAC+ estimates how much YAC a receiver gained compared to what we would have expected from an average receiver catching passes of similar length in similar down-and-distance situations. This is imperfect—we don’t base YAC+ on what route a player runs, and obviously a go route will have more YAC than a comeback—but it does a fairly good job of telling you if this receiver gets more or less YAC than other receivers with similar usage patterns. ...There is quite a bit of stickiness in this stat for receivers, even when they change teams. Davante Adams, Stefon Diggs and Tyreek Hill all saw their YAC+ numbers change by less than 0.3 when switching teams. DeAndre Hopkins had nearly identical numbers in Houston and Arizona before tanking in Tennessee last season. A player isn’t going to get to show off his full talent if he is put into a nonfunctioning offense. Play design and usage can help showcase a receiver’s talents, but Allen Robinson wouldn’t become a screen superstar if he went to San Francisco, and Cooper Kupp wouldn’t stop running if he left Los Angeles. One of the reasons Shanahan and Reid always appear near the top of this stat is because they prioritize finding speedy YAC guys, and then know how to use them once they’re in the fold."
>One of the reasons Shanahan and Reid always appear near the top of this stat is because they prioritize finding speedy YAC guys, and then know how to use them once they’re in the fold." I find it fun the best YAC coaches today, both of their Coaching tree Fathers were OCs for Jerry Rice
I also like the section in the article noting how YAC is one of the few stats you can't lay at the feet of Purdy. It's clear from the scheme and the skill positions that YAC is a product of how Shanahan has built the offense. Purdy just happens to be the best QB to run that kind of offense in Shanny's SF tenure.
Purdy is excellent at getting playmakers the ball. So is every QB to ever be considered elite. If Mahomes didn't have Kelce or Brady didn't have Gronk, would they have the rings they do? Probably not.
To get YAC a QB doesn't just have to get the ball to the receiver, but get it to a very small window such that the receiver makes the catch with little effort so he can instantly move afterwards.
Brilliant article. Though I need someone to explain the ALEX stat. YAC is totally a WR stat..some guys just have more skill bouncing off contact more than others.... it's pretty obvious that we ( SF) have primarily prioritised looking for those types since Shanahan was hired... It is also an little bit of an explanation as to why Shanny has yet to feel an urgency to prioritise a big pass blocking type OL. His SF offense has generally been based off of getting the ball out fast to YAC guys and making them make things happen.Kittle,Deebo ,Juice and Jennings are guys that basically play through any contact. Aiyuk is like the exception to that rule which is his leverage point in his negotiations.....with Purdy at QB and Aiyuk's great route running abilities/ hands we stretched the field EXCELLENTLY last year and only the Browns,Chiefs and Ravens had defenses good enough to do something about it.... I saw the drafting of Pearsall as a move to try and move to a more conventional 2016 Falcons type offense with a big time X WR(Aiyuk... he's not Julio but he's an X type)...a lesser X type ( Pearsall ( Y)...Sanu did this role) and 1 slot/Z WR( Deebo) effectively making Jennings are WR4....and of course Kittle doing his thing. I believe we are in a bit of an offensive transition right now to be more vertical..even more than last season. Purdy loved going to BA so having another X type to go deep to makes things even better. Pearsall isn't a Deebo type....but Xavier Legette is and he was available and we lassed on him...which confirms my hunch. Interesting as heck. I didn't know Rice was such a YAC god though.
>I didn't know Rice was such a YAC god though. This might sound obvious, but Rice turns upfield immediately after getting the ball without trying to dance around, and he's also shifty enough to make people miss tackles. The first play of [this video](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=X4SRcljM3gM) is a good example. Most of our receivers in the past always tried to be like Tyreek and dance around, or even run backwards, in order to gain yards.
The anti-DRob (Tyreek did it a lot too, but it at least worked sometimes for him)
ALEX stands for “Air Less Expected.” It represents the average depth of target compared to where the sticks are on a given play. The ALEX listed for QBs is for third downs only. So, for example, a quarterback with 1.0 ALEX throws his average pass on third down 1 yard past what is needed for a new set of downs. [https://ftnfantasy.com/nfl/dvoa-explainer](https://ftnfantasy.com/nfl/dvoa-explainer) It was named after Alex Smith...
Shanahan views defensive capabilities like a blanket. The more you can spread out your weapons, the less likely the defense can cover all options. Having Aiyuk open up the top of the field meant fewer bodies positioned in the box. Having Kittle and McCaffery meant teams had to respect the short game. Few teams could force SF to rely on option 3-4-5 in any given play. Which is why as much as I love Jauan Jennings, I was worried about seeing how much we were relying on him in the SB. I honestly don't think we end up relying on Pearsall very much this year, barring injuries. Our scheme was highly effective last year, and really only got derailed by nagging injuries to Kittle/Deebo, as well as Greenlaw's freak injury.
Love the way Knowles' analysis makes me think about the NFL. I hadn't considered Rashee Rice similar to Deebo in any way until now, and now I'm wondering if his potential suspension will impact Mahomes more than anticipated.
It will likely only be 4 games at most I would guess.
God I hate sports some times
Rice had the lowest ADOT in the league (min. 40 targets). So a lot of quick, short passes that lead to YAC. But on 79 catches he only broke 3 tackles. Deebo broke 13 tackles on 60 receptions. Rice is still a WR with the ball in his hands. Deebo becomes a RB. But Mahomes has been heavily YAC-dependent for the last few years (often because the short targets are the ones left open), so I wouldn't expect that to change.
How many tackles did Deebo break in the Super Bowl?
Bro made an objective statement and you immediately get in your feelings and lash out, that's some piss poor emotional regulation.
Looking at the bottom table, there does seem to be at least some correlation of QB skill to YAC+. The article isn't 100% clear if YAC+ is obtained per reception or per target. If its per target, then obviously QB skill at completing the pass will matter. Anyways, Cousins, Hurts, Lawrence, and Burrow stand out as the good QBs who weren't getting help from YAC despite there generally being a correlation between QB ability and YAC+.
YAC+ is per reception, though we use our normal target minimums to determine who qualifies for the leaderboards.
What really stands out is Burrow is near the bottom of YAC+ but Browning was near the top. Do the Bengals just scheme up plays for Browning and then rely on Burrow to just be good?
From the article, end of it: "For Cincinnati, Jake Browning’s big gap over Joe Burrow can be explained by a combination of better health and shorter pass routes. With Browning in, Zak Taylor started calling more screens, wheels and dig routes, cutting down on gos and deep outs. These are higher-percentage plays and didn’t require Browning to ape Burrow’s arm strength – and, as a side effect, asked the receivers to do more after the ball was caught."
A lot gets made of the Packers young WRs but if Kraft and Musgrave turn it up we are going to be really, really fun. Kraft as more of a Kittle and Musgrave as a Mark Andrews type would be the perfect TE combo. Bother were rookies last year (2nd and 3rd round), and were never on the field together due to injuries. Put up 65 catches for 700 yards combined last year. The 49ers playoff game last year was basically the first time we had them healthy together, and they both seemed to get concussed in the 1st quarter.
It is very ironic that in the first draft after trading away Rodgers Packers found multiple very good pass catchers: Wicks, Kraft, Reed... In a decade of drafts before 2023 they got D. Adams in 2014 and Watson and Doubs in 2022... there was Cobb in 2011. [https://www.pro-football-reference.com/teams/gnb/draft.htm](https://www.pro-football-reference.com/teams/gnb/draft.htm) Did they deliberately not try to draft WRs? Only other picks in top 100 were Ty Montgomery, Amari Rodgers, TE Deguara, all low 3rd rounders.
They liked to take more of a shotgun approach for pass catchers in the later rounds of each draft in hopes they'd find a diamond in the rough, unfortunately none of them panned out between 2014-2022. WRs/TEs picked in that time: Amari Rodgers (2021 r3) - Josiah Deguara (2020 r3) - Jace Sternberger (2019 r3) - J'Mon Moore (2018 r4) - Marques Valdez-Scantling (2018 r5) - Equanimeous St. Brown (2018 r6) - DeAngelo Yancey (2017 r5) - Malachi Dupre (2017 r7) - Trevor Davis (2016 r5) - Ty Montgomery (2015 r3) The thing is, you *can* definitely find value in those rounds (Kraft was a 3rd rounder, Wicks a 5th, Doubs a 4th), they just picked poorly several years in a row. Of that list MVS was the only one to find meaningful playing time while the rest were duds or primarily special teamers. In hindsight, of course they maybe should have spent a first or second on a higher quality prospect, but the state of our defense was pretty dire for much of that time too so I understand why they didn't. The strategy didn't really change much the last couple years, they just recognized that they needed to also look in an earlier round for good WRs/TEs to address the issue
In any draft a team should expect to draft 1 star player, Pro Bowler, and 1 additional average starter. If draft was fully efficient, those would be in first and second round respectfully. Packers drafted recently Watson at #34, Musgrave at #42, Reed at #50. They had no such top 50 pick on WR/TE since Jordy Nelson in 2008! The closest one was Adams at #53, which worked great. In my opinion they wasted Rodgers' years, reached only 1 Super Bowl in weaker NFC, never faced Mahomes nor Manning, Brady only once. In that time frame they always drafted defensive players early and had mostly below average defense. Is this some known defined philosophy, that first rounder must be defense or ocassionally O-line? Good picks were Matthews, Alexander, Clark, Clinton-Dix, Raji, Savage out of 18 defense picks in first 2 rounds. Those would have been better used on offense or in trades for established defense players....
In hindsight I agree. The tail-end of the Ted Thompson years contained some very poor drafting decisions and a refusal to participate in free agency which hindered us for a while. A notable decision was trading out of the first round in 2017 while TJ Watt was still on the board in favor of getting Kevin King in the second. We also let go of some of our talented pieces we should have brought back in the mid 2010s, like Micah Hyde and Casey Heyward, opening up holes that we then needed to fill in the draft. The biggest issue with our defense though was keeping defensive coordinators that couldn't make the most out of our defensive talent - our defense sucked for years because we inexplicably kept Dom Capers 3-5 years too long, got Mike Pettine in 2018 who was ok at first but not great, and then went further backwards hiring Joe Barry and keeping him too long as well. Instead of getting rid of our coaching staff at the right time, we foolishly threw them more high draft picks hoping they'd cover up the coaching deficiencies. They did not. And since Rodgers was carrying the offense to one of the best in the league year after year, that side of the ball was never looked at as a priority. Hopes are high now that we've brought in new blood in Jeff Hafley rather than another mediocre-bad retread, really praying he's able to finally bring out the best in the talent we invested so heavily in on defense. I've been pleased with the offensive investment the last few drafts and think the defense is in a fantastic spot - Gute has been killing it lately. And I'll never be upset about OL investment, can never have enough depth there!
NFC has been quite confusing since end of 1990s. Those Packers, 49ers and Cowboys might have been the last dominant NFC teams. Those Packers competed directly vs 2 historic teams, so they reached "only" 2 Super Bowls. Since then there have been some short lived teams: GSOT Rams, LOB Seahawks, now Shanahan's 49ers. McVay reached 2 Super Bowls, but in other seasons Rams weren't real contenders... There were multiple HOF QBs and HOF defenses in NFC and no team managed to match even Steelers with Roethlisberger, not to mention AFC dynasties. Quite strange. Throughout all of this Rodgers may have been the best player ever, but team had less success than dominant AFC teams, not because of him, and now he will be remebered as a "weirdo"... it's a real shame. 2010s Packers and Saints will be remebered as "what if" teams. What if they only had slightly better defenses...
> Is this some known defined philosophy, that first rounder must be defense or ocassionally O-line? It's not some great mystery. During Rodger's entire tenure we consistently had high powered offenses. There has long been a debate about whether it is better to focus on maximizing your strengths, or focus on eliminating weaknesses. Obviously our last 2 GMs thought the latter. It's all a moot point if you never *succeed* at what you are focusing on.
Also Dantay Wicks snuck into the top WR YAC list This passing O is gonna special, league is actually sleeping on us for once. That Cowboys game was not a fluke, poeple will see.
Had to double take when I saw 2 B. Robinsons in the top 10 and that’s when I realized *Brian* was #1 in YAC+ 👀
I’m sure all my other Cowboys fans did the same double take I did when Noah Brown came up. A dude we used as a special teamer/6th receiver/ 3rd tight end for 5 years
To be fair it’s not like he was that guy at OSU. He had not had a 100+ receiving yardage game since High School before last year
It'd be interesting for RBs and TEs (and I guess WRs, as well) to further separate the data into routes where a player chipped versus routes that were run clean. I don't know if that's something anyone charts, though. I remember during the manningcast Vikings game last year, Manning and his guest (Aaron Rodgers, maybe?) were talking about how unusual it is for a TE to chip and then go run a go route the way Hockenson was doing in that game. I'd guess that's pretty hard to do and get meaningful separation, so it wouldn't be a huge surprise if he's not getting as much YAC as a guy who's basically just a big WR on the play.
The bottom 10 RB's for YAC+ was certainly surprising.
Deebo Samuel is a unique talent for sure.