It took until late-April, but the Tampa Bay Buccaneers kept the entire Super Bowl band together with the move to re-sign wide receiver Antonio Brown. Brown played eight regular season games for Tampa Bay last season, with 45 catches for 483 yards and four touchdowns. He had two touchdown catches in the playoffs, including one in the Super Bowl.
It seems like forever since Brown was a top-end fantasy wide receiver. But in 2018 with the Pittsburgh Steelers, he was WR2 in standard scoring, WR5 in full PPR and WR4 in half-PPR. There are a lot of mouths to feed in the Buccaneers’ offense, so those Steelers’ days are not coming back for Brown. And that’s leaving aside he’ll turn 33 before the 2021 season starts.
Counting the playoffs, here’s how Brown stacked up in target share with Tampa Bay’s top two wide receivers-Mike Evans and Chris Godwin.
ESPN’s Mike Clay added Evans had a 22 percent target share in the seven regular season games the wide receiver trio played together. Since regular season is what matters for fantasy football, let’s go back to that.
From Week 9-Week 16, when Brown was in the fold, here’s how Evans, Godwin and Brown ranked among all fantasy wide receivers.
Evans: WR5 (standard scoring), WR6 (half-PPR), WR7 (full PPR)
Godwin: WR25 (standard scoring), WR25(half-PPR), WR26 (full PPR)
Brown: WR49 (standard scoring), WR45 (half-PPR), WR41 (full PPR)
With Evans out most of the game, Brown had a huge game in Week 17 (11 catches for 138 yards and two touchdowns). That boosts his overall numbers, and the the fantasy rankings of Godwin and Brown if you widen to Week 17. Godwin also had a big regular season finale (five catches for 133 yards and two touchdowns). But Week 17 is meaningless in a lot of fantasy leagues.
Brown’s total numbers over 11 games (counting playoffs) were 53 receptions for 564 yards and six touchdowns. Projected out to 16 games, that would’ve been good for WR24 in full-point PPR last year (214.4 fantasy points).
Pro Football Focus did not credit Brown with a drop in 62 regular season targets. A WR-high 24 percent of his targets were screens, but he was top-20 among wide receivers in yards after catch per reception (5.7, according to Next Gen Stats).
Antonio Brown 2021 Fantasy Outlook
The pecking order for Buccaneers’ wide receivers is pretty clear. In fantasy terms, Evans is no worse than a high-end WR2. Godwin is a notch below, in WR2 range (low-end if you’re a pessimist). Then there’s Brown, with an early ADP and general ranking in the early to mid-40s. That’s WR4/flex range.
It will take a multi-week injury to Evans or Godwin for Brown to be more than a flex option in leagues with 12 or more teams. If last year is any indication, there will be some boom weeks (meaningless Week 17 or not). Then, there’ll be some weeks he comes in shy of even modest projections and expectations. But when it comes time to draft a low–end WR3/WR4/flex, there will be worse ways to go than Brown. Just don’t get caught up in any lingering nostalgia attached to his name. This is 2021, not 2014-2015.
