Michael Thomas Will Be Elite Again In 2021 Fantasy Football
Stats and metrics referenced in this article can be found at PlayerProfiler.com.
Michael Thomas was the consensus WR1 in 2020 drafts, coming off a historic season. Now, he can often be had in the third round on Underdog (23.8 ADP on Sleeper). What changed? He suffered a bad ankle sprain in Week 1, struggled to play through it when he returned, and reaggravated it later in the season. He’s back to full health now, though, thanks to offseason surgery and rehab.
Looking back to that incredible 2019 campaign, Thomas was a monster producer. He set the record for most catches in a season (149) on an unbelievable 186 targets. That’s a 9.3 receptions per game average. His 1,725 receiving yards were the most in the league and his nine touchdowns were top-three. Thomas was not just compiling stats, though, he was super efficient even on a high number of opportunities. While commanding a league-high 33.2-percent target share, Thomas maintained an 80.1-percent catch rate. Even more impressive, when factoring out un-catchable targets, his true catch rate (PlayerProfiler.com) was nearly 95-percent. He was even dominant after the catch with 550 of his yards coming post-reception. It’s no surprise that Thomas led all wide receivers in fantasy points per game (23.4) and was No.3 in yards per route (3.17).
Even while battling injury for basically the entirety of the 2020 season, Thomas maintained much of his high usage and efficiency rates. His target share dipped to 27.8-percent but it was still the fourth-highest rate of any wide receiver in the league. He managed to lead the league in air yards share (42.5-percent) and was No.2 in true catch rate (97.6-percent). Thomas averaged 50-percent fewer yards after catch per reception in 2020 than 2019. We have to equate that to the injuries making it more difficult for him to cut and slip through tackles.
Quarterback…Upgrade?
It’s now obvious that nothing has changed in Thomas’ game that should be causing this dip in ADP across platforms. He’s still an elite player at his position and he proved that last year even while severely hobbled. But what about the quarterback situation in New Orleans? Drew Brees officially retired this offseason, turning the keys over to either Jameis Winston or Taysom Hill, or a combination thereof.
Should we be worried about Thomas playing without Brees? The narrative is that Brees is the reason why Thomas was able to be so dominant. That fact is, though, we have a fairly decent sample size of Thomas playing without the future hall-of-famer. Remember, five (31.3-percent) of his games during that fantastic 2019 campaign came with Teddy Bridgewater at quarterback. In those five games, Thomas averaged 23.02 fantasy points per game which is almost exactly what his season average came out to be. He racked up 42 receptions for 551 yards and three touchdowns over that stretch. If we extrapolate that out to a full 16-game sample, it would come out to 134 receptions for 1,763 yards and 10 scores.
If that’s still not enough, Thomas, while less than 100-percent healthy, endured four games with Taysom Hill at the helm in 2020. Over that span, Thomas scored out as the WR15 with 16.1 fantasy points per game and a 31.6-percent target share. And in one of those games, the Saints barely had to throw the ball because they were playing against a literal quarterback-less Broncos team due to COVID-19 protocols. Clearly, Thomas will produce just fine without Brees. He’s an excellent receiver and we have to start respecting that more and not giving all of the credit for his production to his quarterback.
It’s nearly a lock to be Winston taking most of the QB snaps and, while that may have Saints fans feeling a bit uneasy, it’s exciting for us fantasy gamers who expect to roster New Orleans pass-catchers in 2021. For fantasy purposes, Winston is actually an upgrade from what we got from Brees over the last two years. As we saw in his Tampa Bay days, Winston is much more comfortable (and capable) chucking the ball down the field compared to noodle-arm Brees. Winston has averaged 7.7 yards per attempt for his career, with a 4.7-percent touchdown rate (No.12 among active quarterbacks) (CBS). As the Bucs starter in 2019, Winston threw for 5,109 yards and had a 10.5 Air Yards Per Attempt average. Both numbers were league-highs. In comparison, Brees averaged 6.8 Air Yards Per Attempt in 2019 and 5.9 (No.39 among all qualifying QBs) in 2020. He attempted a career-low 18 Deep Ball Attempts (No. 38), averaging a league-bottom 1.5 per game. (PlayerProfiler)
2021 Outlook
We saw what Winston can do for wide receivers back in 2019 when both Mike Evans (No.5) and Chris Godwin (No.2) finished as top-five receivers in fantasy points per game. Even Breshad Perriman had two top-three scoring weeks at the end of that year. Thomas doesn’t have an Evans or Godwin on the other side of the field to take away targets from him. There is no target competition in New Orleans. Emmanuel Sanders departed for Buffalo in free agency, Jared Cook is with the Chargers, and the Saints did nothing to replace either one of them. Instead, it’s just Tre’Quan Smith, Adam Trautman, and Marquez Callaway playing in those secondary target roles. That ensures Thomas will continue to command one of the highest target rates in the NFL.
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Imagine what he, as the NFL’s leader in air yards share last season, will be able to do now that he’s not limited to catching passes in the short areas of the field. He’ll now be a threat to actually catch passes in the intermediate and deep quadrants because he has a quarterback who can throw it there. So even if the efficiency numbers come down with a less calculated passer, the yardage and touchdowns will go up.
In seasonal leagues, Thomas is a locked-in top-10 wide receiver. He’s an excellent pick in the middle of the second round, though he often slips into the early third. He has a high floor with an even higher ceiling. There is no reason to be concerned about his production without Brees—we’ve debunked that myth. With Winston at quarterback, Thomas can absolutely finish as the overall WR1 again and be even better than 2019.
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