Fansided

Why Brandin Cooks is the Texans WR to draft, not Will Fuller

By Ben Grivas

LOS ANGELES, CA - DECEMBER 29: Wide receiver Brandin Cooks #12 of the Los Angeles Rams runs on to the field for the game against the Arizona Cardinals at the Los Angeles Memorial Coliseum on December 29, 2019 in Los Angeles, California. (Photo by Jayne Kamin-Oncea/Getty Images)
LOS ANGELES, CA - DECEMBER 29: Wide receiver Brandin Cooks #12 of the Los Angeles Rams runs on to the field for the game against the Arizona Cardinals at the Los Angeles Memorial Coliseum on December 29, 2019 in Los Angeles, California. (Photo by Jayne Kamin-Oncea/Getty Images) /
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LOS ANGELES, CA – DECEMBER 29: Wide receiver Brandin Cooks #12 of the Los Angeles Rams runs on to the field for the game against the Arizona Cardinals at the Los Angeles Memorial Coliseum on December 29, 2019 in Los Angeles, California. (Photo by Jayne Kamin-Oncea/Getty Images) /

Opportunity

Fuller

Now, proponents of Will Fuller will point out that he’s been playing behind DeAndre Hopkins his whole career and if he gets more targets, his numbers would proportionally increase. Let’s see if this has merit. Fuller has averaged 2.15 fantasy points/target over the past three seasons. So if he got 115 targets, a number similar to a typical Brandin Cooks season, he would finish with 245 fantasy points, good for WR12 last year. That looks impressive, right?

The issue here is that’s not how it works. First off, 115 targets is a lot for someone who is primarily a deep ball receiver. It’s also a lot for someone who averages 10.5 games/season. But the most important part is his fantasy points/target is over performing due to his insanely high touchdown rate. The idea that his production will scale to a full season of high targets, leading to a WR1 season, can not and will not happen in this universe. Considering these factors, I’m projecting Fuller for 90 targets and 6 touchdowns over 14 games, which still gives him a TD rate of 6.7%, but he comes in as my WR44.

Cooks

Brandin Cooks was horrible last year, but that’s why he’s being ranked so low this year. The reason he was so bad was his lack of targets, as he received 72, or 42 less than any other full season of his career. It was an anomaly season, as the only time in his career that Cooks hasn’t performed well. It can be attributed to Jared Goff struggling with a bad offensive line, the lack of a strong running game, and Goff having many other options to throw to.

When Cooks gets targets, he performs to the tune of four straight 1,000 yard seasons, and he did that under three different quarterbacks. He’s shown the ability to perform no matter who is throwing him the ball and he’s been working out with Deshaun Watson for over a month. Watson is better than Goff, and I see no reason as to why Cooks shouldn’t get his usual target load of 115-130 targets. He’ll return value on his ADP will less targets than that.

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