We are almost one week away from the start of the 2022 fantasy football season which means the more fantasy football drafts we see completed and the more questions people have regarding certain players. You can take a look at the fantasy football player rankings and get a feel for things so long as they are routinely updated like we do here in our free fantasy football draft guide. You can also look at things like fantasy football ADP and fantasy football mock drafts to help gather some public opinion, but there is still that inkling of doubt/concern that creeps into your mind. This is why we are doing this series of fantasy football player debates – to answer those questions.

What can we expect from Skyy Moore this season in fantasy football? He's one of the trendier rookie profiles we've examined and his landing spot with the Kansas City Chiefs only helps to fuel some of that fire. With an ambiguous receivers room containing JuJu Smith-Schuster, Marquez Valdes-Scantling, and Mecole Hardman, will Moore be able to navigate around those veterans and find his footing early?

 

 

 

You Cannot Pass Up Skyy Moore in Drafts at ADP

By: Colby Conway

Kansas City used a second round draft pick on Skyy Moore to add to its wide receiver room this offseason. Let’s get this out of the way immediately: he is not Tyreek Hill, and he isn’t going to be expected to replicate Hill’s presence in the offense. Moore is more fast than quick, but he was incredibly productive in his three seasons at Western Michigan. For his career, he amassed 171 receptions for 2,482 yards with 16 touchdowns through the air, good for an average of 5.7 receptions for 82.7 yards and 0.5 touchdowns per game. Moore may not have faced teams in the SEC or another premier college conference, but his game will translate well to the National Football League, and he’s tied to a great quarterback in Patrick Mahomes in an Andy Reid offense.

If Mecole Hardman is going to scare you off, Skyy Moore isn’t going to be the guy for you and your fantasy football team. Talent wins out, and Moore will quickly show that he’s the second-best receiver on this team behind JuJu Smith-Schuster. His ability to win inside and out in college gives Reid, Mahomes, and Co. plenty of versatility when lining him up. He also took one snap out of the backfield, so let that pique your interest, but check out his usage this preseason compared to his time at Western Michigan.

 

% Slot

% Wide

2021 (W. Mich)

34.5%

65.3%

2022 Preseason (KC)

38.6%

61.4%


 

Moore crushes the intermediate routes, and he has the ability to make tough, contested catches. However, when you look at his college numbers, one thing really stands out as to why the Chiefs coveted Moore in the draft, and used premium capital to get his services.

What defense do the Chiefs see a good bit of, or at least last year they did? The answer is two safeties high zone coverage, or at least two safeties high, to attempt to mitigate the big play that fuels Kansas City. Well, guess what receiver in college last year with at least 25 targets against zone coverage posted the highest receiving grade, per Pro Football Focus? You guessed it! Skyy Moore, with a grade of 91.5, per PFF. His ability to excel against zone and in the intermediate part of the field is going to be imperative to this Kansas City offense. Again, courtesy of PFF, take a look at Moore’s receiving chart from 2021, and look where he dominated.

For a rookie breakout, Moore will need to cement himself as one of the top two receivers on the team, so that he doesn’t lose snaps when the Chiefs go to two-receiver sets. Reid will covet his versatility and Mahomes will quickly realize that he has a tough receiver that will make contested catches at parts of the field where he and this team needs it most. At Moore’s current ADP, the potential ROI is something you just cannot pass on.

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An Unclear Path to Targets for Skyy Moore

By: Andrew Cooper

Here’s the thing about partying. You can get into the party but not have fun. But you DEFINITELY can’t have fun if you aren’t partying. And that’s kind of how targets work in terms of fantasy football success. Last season, every single top-24 wide receiver got 100+ targets. In fact, the only wide receiver to finish top-30 without 100+ targets was Adam Thielen and he scored 10 touchdowns before getting hurt. Now, there were some guys that got 100+ targets and DIDN’T finish as high end wide receivers - like Robbie Anderson who got 110 but finished as WR49. He’s basically the dude who goes into the party but doesn't have any fun. But, the moral of the story here is that you really need to get 100+ targets just to get into the party in the first place.

Why does this matter? Well, last year, according to Pro Football Focus, no NFL team had three pass catchers that all got 100+ targets. The Cowboys were the closest and they were a top-five team in pass attempts. We’ve been monitoring this for years now and it’s not the first time this happened (in 2017 there was no team that did it). It’s happened roughly three times over the last five years and the Chiefs haven’t been one of those teams. And when it does happen, a lot of times the third target isn’t even that good in fantasy like 2020 AJ Green or 2018 Sterling Shepard. Here is that list:

That creates the biggest barrier to entry for Sterling Shepard. Because we know Travis Kelce is going to get his targets. Over the last four years, Travis Kelce has gotten no less than 134 targets which makes it nearly impossible for the third target on the team to get 100+ unless he gets hurt. So that really leaves one more invitation to the party - the invitation that used to go to Tyreek Hill every year. That means that you realistically need to choose ONE guy from the list of rookie Skyy Moore, JuJu Smith-Schuster, Mecole Hardman, and Marquez Valdes-Scantling to potentially get 100+ targets. And keep in mind - 100+ targets doesn’t necessarily mean that the player is going to be fantasy relevant either. Cole Beasley got 112 targets last year, how much fun did he have at the party?

I’ll tell you what I’m doing. Drafting guys in that range that have a clearer path to targets and a higher upside. If you forced me to take a wide receiver from the Chiefs, that would obviously be JuJu Smith-Schuster, not Skyy Moore. Juju has multiple seasons in this league with over 120 targets and he has a season with 1,426 receiving yards on his resume. If he can do that with Big Ben, he can probably do pretty well with Patrick Mahomes. And, if Juju and Kelce get targets anywhere close to what we’ve seen, that slams the door to the party on Skyy Moore.

Now that you've heard both sides to the argument, which one speaks to you the most? Tell us on the Fantasy Alarm Twitter page!

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