Fantasy Football Buy Low: Wide Receiver Breakout Candidates (Week 15)

There are a lot of ways to value NFL players for fantasy football.

Of course, how many fantasy points they score is paramount, and no amount of regression analysis or film grinding will ever change that.

However, players can overperform and underperform in certain games and timeframes, and it's important to find some sort of balance.

Is a receiver coming off of a six-target, two-touchdown game? He's probably someone we should expect to take a step back in the production department. But what if he's slotted into an elite matchup with a high game over/under?

Or if a wideout leads the league in unrealized air yards (basically a lot of high-leverage targets without as many catches as he should have), he's easy to pinpoint as a breakout candidate. But what if he's outdoors in heavy winds against a top-tier pass D? Maybe next week is his week.

For that reason, I assembled a three-tier breakout model for wide receivers.

The Breakout Score model accounts for three key things:

1. Expected Fantasy Points: Based on things like targets, air yards, red zone targets, and end zone targets, we can assign a value to a player's actual workload.
2. Game Environment: By combining some key variables such as opposing pass defense, wind, game total, and more, we can see who is in a spot actually primed for a breakout.
3. Weekly Volume Projections: Sometimes, a player gets a lot of extra volume and high-leverage looks but is in line for a role reduction with a starter returning. We can help account for that by relying on numberFire's fantasy football projections and projected rushing and target volume.

With all that out of the way, let's dig in.

Note: All NFL odds via FanDuel Sportsbook.

Week 15 Buy Low Wide Receiver Targets

Here are the top candidates whose Breakout Score is noticeably higher than their actual FanDuel points per game output over their last three games leading into Week 15.

Let's highlight a few names.

Deebo Samuel

We may have reached some sort of breaking point with Deebo Samuel at this point.

There's a bit of a squeaky wheel narrative going on with Samuel, who has averaged 34.6 scrimmage yards per game in five post-bye contests.

Samuel is facing a bottom-tier adjusted pass defense in the Los Angeles Rams this week and is at home.

There are potential wind concerns (though nothing totally damning), but everything else here points to a breakout waiting to happen.

numberFire is projecting Samuel for over 6.6 targets early in the week plus 2.3 carries.

Samuel has also become a big touchdown regression candidate and has 1.9 fewer touchdowns this season (per my model) than he should have based on his usage.

With regression expected and plenty of room for more volume, Samuel could be a fantasy football difference maker in the playoffs.

D.K. Metcalf

D.K. Metcalf hasn't exactly been a lineup lock of late and is generally ranked as a high-end WR3 entering Week 15.

He hasn't had more than 100 scrimmage yards since Week 4 but is coming off of a game where he led the Seattle Seahawks in targets among the pass-catchers (with a 20.7% share).

Alhough he's got some neutral-to-slightly-negative boosts in terms of wind, pass defense matchup, and implied team total, Metcalf will be at home in a big-time game.

Metcalf's touchdown numbers aren't that out of whack, though he should have roughly 1.0 more than he currently does even with a subpar red zone role.

Amari Cooper

In Josh Allen's historic Week 14, Amari Cooper had some solid production (95 scoreless yards).

Better than the stat line, though, was the workload.

Cooper saw 14 targets (a 37.8% share), and 9 of those targets were downfield looks. He had a top-five air yards game among all players this season.

This week, the Buffalo Bills square off with the Detroit Lions in a game with a massive total.

Detroit's defense rates out first in the NFL by numberFire's adjusted metrics, but we very well may have seen Cooper's ascension to Buffalo's WR1 in a game where the production was fine but not elite.

Despite that, he's opening up the week ranked around the WR40 most places.

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The above author is a FanDuel employee and is not eligible to compete in public daily fantasy contests or place sports betting wagers on FanDuel. The advice provided by the author does not necessarily represent the views of FanDuel. Taking the author's advice will not guarantee a successful outcome. You should use your own judgment when participating in daily fantasy contests or placing sports wagers.