Welcome back to the Next Gen Advantage, where each week we dive deep into the advanced statistics created through NFL Next Gen Stats player-tracking data to find little edges for fantasy managers. This week, we're diving into route profiles and how they match up with Week 13 opponents, plus some sack projections.
Route profiles and matchups
One concept we've looked at in this space this season is route profiles: the rate at which each receiver runs each route type -- on all routes run, not just targets. Some route profiles are more productive on average than others -- a high rate of deep crossers is a lot better than a high rate of go routes, for example -- but at this point I think those are probably pretty baked in to a receiver's fantasy value unless there's been a significant shift for a player midseason.
There's another factor that changes on a weekly basis: the opponent. And certain routes have a natural advantage against certain coverages in terms of yards per route run. It's a small edge, but isn't that what we're here for? Let's check out the matchups at the extremes in Week 13.
Upgrade: Terry McLaurin vs. Giants' Cover-1
McLaurin runs drags, deep outs, digs and deep crossers at a high rate relative to other wide receivers.