Here are comparative ranking and ratings for NFL wide receivers and tight ends through week 11.
There were 88 wide receivers and 30 tight ends in the ESPN rankings, so I am going to stick with those same 118 players. I will post the ESPN scores in the very last columns next to the comparative grades. You can check out the ESPN rankings here: ESPN Analytics RTM
With all the grades and players this is quite a long article. So much so that I can only going to post about 1/4 of the article here on Reddit due to images, pdf links and formatting issues.
Here I will post the section about creating the rankings and ratings for all the wide receivers and tight ends while keeping math to an absolute minimum. If you are interested in any/all of the other 3 parts, you can read the entire article here:
NFL 2023 - Wide Receiver & Tight End Ratings & Rankings
As a quick sysnopsis the full article can be looked at in 4 parts:
- Attempting to dissect the ESPN Analytics Receiver & Tight End metric scores and how they are derived.
- The metrics & grades for all the wide receivers and tight ends compared against their fellow peers. Thus wide receivers are compared to wide receivers, tight ends to tight ends.
- Grading all the wide receivers & tight ends as one large receiver group. This could be looked at as almost a fantasy football list(and is the way ESPN presents their list).
- Attempting to mimic ESPN Analytics wide receiver scores by including the sub scores of OPEN CATCH & YAC.
Before starting, note that the unusual team abbreviations come from Pro-football-reference.com. I know they are a bit odd but you should be able to figure them out.
TLDR: Just look at this first chart. It shows the percentile rank of each team’s wide receivers & tight ends. In this chart, wide receivers are ranked against all other wide receivers, and tight ends against all other tight ends.
NFL 2023 Wide Receiver & Tight End Percentile Ratings by Team
Top 20 Wide Receivers & Tight Ends Litmus Test
The chart below shows the NFL top 20 receivers & tight ends through 11 weeks. One list is from ESPN, the other list are these rankings.
The players the two lists agree on are color coded. The receiver ranking lists agree on 11 players: Brown, Aiyuk, Lamb, Moore, Kittle(TE), Allen, Collins, Dell, Hill, Evans, Metcalf.
Let’s set them aside for a moment and look at who they disagree on for Top 20 rankings.
The 9 players from the left list are: Thielen, Beckham, Bourne, Raymond, Flowers, Downs, Meyers, Andrews(TE), McBride(TE).
The 9 players from the right list are: Jefferson, St. Brown, Chase, Kelce(TE), Waddle, Nacua, Diggs, Shaheed, Samuel.
Which ranking list do you think is a more accurate, or more flawed? It is fine to think they are equally accurate, or equally flawed.
The list on the left is the ESPN Analytics Receiver Rankings. The list on the right are the ratings and ranking you will read about here.
The Comparative WR/TE Receiving Metrics
Here is the list of metrics I chose to use for rating the wide receivers and tight ends.
- 1st Downs / Game
- Yards Before Catch / Reception
- Yards After Catch / Reception
- Average Depth of Target
- Drop % (inverse - lower drop % score higher)
- Passer Rating when Targeted
- Target % (Targets/Routes)
- Reception % (Receptions/Targets)
- Receiving Yards / Route
Now you may have read the other ratings articles I’ve done and noted how ratings are often done by Standard Deviation(StDev in sheets) Units. Let’s do something a little different and use Normal Distribution(normdist in sheets) instead of StDev. Just remember, like all of the ratings done here, the wide receiver & tight end ratings are COMPARATIVE.
In comparative ratings, scores are generated by the performance of one receiver against all receivers, and same for tight ends. Basically, each receiver reeieves a score between 0 - 0.999 for each metric, based on their position in that metric compared to their peers. The player with the highest score in a metric may get 0.98 score, while the lowest may get a score of 0.02. This is quite different from almost all other NFL ratings and rankings, but useful in that it shows who is the best among the position groups when compared to each other, not some standard or formula.
The Wide Receiver & Tight End Metrics & Ratings
So take a look at these charts. One is ranking the wide receivers, the other is ranking the tight ends. Here is the important info:
- Next to each metric is the normalized score for that stat.
- Add up the scores for each of the 9 metrics to get a final score.
- Normal Distribution is used on the Final Scores to generated a percentile for each receiver & tight end.
- For this portion of the ranking & ratings, receivers are measured against receivers, & tight ends are measured against tight ends.
- Thus the percentile score of a wide receiver is the percentile of wide receivers they fall into, and same for tight ends.
- The last 4 columns are ESPN Analytics scores and rankings for comparison.
- There will be PDFs available as some images don’t scall well, particularly on mobile devices.
NFL 2023 Comparative Wide Receiver Ratings PDF
NFL 2023 Comparative Tight End Ratings PDF
NFL 2023 Wide Receiver Ratings through week 11
NFL 2023 Tight End Ratings through week 11
Let’s try to go one step further and estimate the quality of each team’s wide receiver unit. To do so we are going to simply average out their wide receiver scores and compare those averages. It would be better to try to do weighted averages that take into account share of targets or completions in some way, but it would be much more difficult and would require determining the best way to weigh each receiver’s input. So let’s cheat a bit and just look at simple averages and see how accurate they are.
In this pivot table you will see each teams rated receivers, along with the team average. I also included a table showing each team’s receiver ratings based on those averages. In this ultra simple look at it, the best receiving units are San Francisco, Miami, & Philadelphia. The worst are the Jets 3rd from bottom, Washington, & Carolina is last.
Average Wide Receiver Ratings by Team
Now that we have the receivers all sorted by team, let’s add in the tight ends. Some teams did not have a qualified tight end. If this happened, then it is shown as N/A. Other teams had 2 tight ends who qualified for rankings. If this was the case, both are included.
To makes things easy for you to find your team and ratings, the info has be broken down by conference, by division, and by team. This should make comparing and contrasting easy and allow you to focus on your team, division or conference as you see fit.
NFL Wide Receiver & Tight End Ratings by Team
Now let’s simply change the scores into percentiles using normal distribution, then multiply by 100, so you can see where each receiver ranks against other receivers, and where each tight ranks against their fellow peers. Remember a WR is compared against all WRs, and a TE against all TEs
The second chart just rounds off the percentiles for easier reading. The charts are broken down into conferences, divisions, and teams to make it easy to read and digest.
NFL Wide Receiver & Tight End Percentile Ratings by Team
NFL Wide Receiver & Tight End Rounded Percentile Ratings by Team
Best & Worst Receiving Units
Using the final rounded percentiles, we can see that the San Francisco 49ers have the best combination of receivers & tight end. Aiyuk is the #1 rated WR in the 99%, Samuel is a very strong 76% and Kittle is #1 Tight End at 98%.
Other teams with strong receiving units:
- Houston: Collins 96%, Dell 86%, Schultz 81%
- Miami: Hill 96%, Waddle 80%
- Minnesota: Jefferson 98%, Addison 69%, Hockenson 87%
- Baltimore: Beckham 66%, Flower 60%, Edwards 94%
- Philadelphia: Brown 97%, Smith 69%, Goedert 62%
- Detroit: St. Brown 89%, Reynolds 54%, LaPorte 75%
The Bears are quite good with 2 of 3 places set in Moore 96% & Kmet 76% but Mooney 31% is a weak link.
Team with weak receiving units:
- Carolina: Thielen 66%, Chark 14%, Hurst 8%
- Washington: McLaurin 40%, Samuel 30%, Thomas 46%
- NY Jets: Wilson 43%, Lazard 7%, Conklin 56%
- NY Giants: Slayton 37%, Robinson 32%, Waller 70%
The Chiefs are ranked between the Jets & Giants overall but they have Kelce 93% and Rice 63% so they are thin but not hopeless.
So there you have it. A non proprietary comparative ranking of NFL wide receivers & tight ends through week 12. I look forward to reading your thoughts & criticisms in the comments below.
I hope everyone enjoyed their Holiday weekend. Enjoy the football today!
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This doesn’t attempt to remove quarterback play from the equation which is such a big factor. This is more an analysis on the passing game influence on individual receivers rather than individual receivers influence on the passing game.
I think it adjusts for Pittsburgh well enough
I disagree because most of the guys at the top are space creators when you watch them with the naked eye. So even on plays when they don’t get the ball…you can still analyse whether they influenced the play or got open and just didn’t get targeted.
That 5% on Juju is an overestimate at best
it is sad to see our best receiver is Logan Thomas. Either this is because Howell has no time to throw, the WRs get no separation or both.
How is Scary Terry doing. I would think he’s doing well with how many yards Howell has.
I like the work here, but sometimes you need to check if the rankings make sense.
For example: If you make a QB ranking system and it says Mahomes is a mid QB, then it is more likely that you are missing something that matters or accounting for something that doesn’t matter than it is that Mahomes is actually mid tier.
In this ranking system, I noticed players like Bourne and Thielen were rated higher than a couple of the best WRs in the game in Kupp, Adams, and Terry.
It’s possible that all 3 of those players are washed, but it’s more likely that something is undervaluing those WRs in this ranking.
I kind of answered this below, but this is ranking players based solely on their 2023 statistics as compared to their peers. Unfortunately injury and who is throwing the ball is going to play into the statistics accumulated this season, and thus the player’s current rating.
Look at these as a picture, not an engraving. If I ran the stats last week or next week, ratings could/would change.
Boo, you didn’t read.
I appreciate the effort, but it’s a terrible metric.
You have all this data and you decide that 3 factors are enough to rank receivers? Low volume doesn’t seem to bother you at all. Beckham at 10? That’s a hot take. But even within your own metric and data, it’s incomprehensible how you generate your scores.
For example lets compare AJ Brown and Tyreek Hill:
Hill (ngs) Hill (your score) A.J.Brown (ngs) A.J. (your score) SEP / Open 3.3 86 2.5 86 Catchrate % 73.33 59 70.83 99 YAC 6.2 46 4.8 61 You may have used xYac/R +/- as yac data, which makes some more sense.
Hill (ngs) Hill (your score) A.J.Brown (ngs) A.J. (your score) YACOverExpted 1.1 46 2.1 61 But even if you chose xYAC/r +/- that’s 1 out of 3. Catchrate and Openness are still incomprehensible.
Why didn’t you use, for example, yds/route run as an additional input, that’s a nice handy score to work with. Instead you’ve gone with separation, which is a terrible indicator of WR skill because it depends on how a receiver is covered, so there’s always a second person influencing the data. Bad receivers -> bad coverage -> easy separation. Good receivers -> better coverage -> harder separation. Elite receiver -> best coverage + game plan adjustment -> hardest separation. Not all seperations are created equal.
I wouldn’t mind if your metric produced some reasonable results, but if you compare your results to dvoa or dyar for example, you’ll see how far off you are from those stats.
This post is why I always complain that we are not passing the ball enough. (SF fan)…Aiyuk has been eating DBs alive all season long and Kittle is THAT dude yet we are bottom 3 in pass attempts…SMDH.
People be saying CMC is the engine of our offense when in reality the trio of Purdy-Aiyuk-Kittle has been the main basis of our explosive offense…those 3 have great chemistry and have been excellent all year.
Nice to see BA and Kittle on these graphics…if anything we have underutilised our pass game from a volume standpoint.
I don’t necessarily agree with this, I think that having such a strong running game opens up a lot for the passing game, and McCaffrey being a receiving target opens up a lot of the field for Aiyuk. Instead of being able to drop fully back in coverage, LBs have to deal with the threat of a check down to McCaffrey which opens up a lot of space for Aiyuk to cook and for Purdy to feel confident throwing with anticipation. We also work so much out of play action, and that only works if there is such a threat to run from McCaffrey. He consistently chunks the D for big time runs and that opens up so much of the offensive capabilities. Dude’s also just a touchdown engine, every time he touches the ball it’s electric.
Game script has been the single biggest reason we are bottom 3 in pass attempts. We have had multiple games where we basically stopped throwing in the 4th quarter. Purdy’s most attempts were against the Giants because their blitzing was stopping the running game early and he threw the ball a ton in the first half. I think we should throw a little bit more though, especially against the Eagles next week.
People be saying CMC is the engine of our offense when in reality the trio of Purdy-Aiyuk-Kittle has been the main basis of our explosive offense…those 3 have great chemistry and have been excellent all year.
I don’t watch enough of your games to have an opinion but isn’t it possible that teams focus on defending McCaffrey, opening up opportunities for the others? McCaffrey is probably first ballot HoF. The other guys aren’t on that level imo. Honestly, with his it went when Deebo was out, an argument could be made for him imo.
Brandon fucking Aiyuk, baby.
I wish he could go to LAC or KC where he could get fed.
Keep wishing 🤣
He leads us in targets though.
So it’s not like he’s not getting fed…but whn you have the best RB in the league plus a top 2 TE…on top of being ahead in games a lot,there’s not much to go around
…huh? He’s fed all the time, we just have other weapons that work better against certain teams. He’s not gonna be Marvin Harrison in this offense, but he gets to eat. You miss those highlight TDs of his over the last few weeks?
Stop being a homer dude
All these 49er fans are absolutely insufferable!
I don’t know what you mean. If Riley was balling out…wouldn’t you be happy?
I don’t understand y’all
Sorry you’re still upset from 2 weeks ago. What makes us insufferable? We are pro our team, especially when folks try to disparage and discredit statistically great play?
Sorry we ground your little team into paste, get over it.
The script always says that the skill position players make Purdy look good, but why is it never the other way around? Aiyuk can’t do what he does without a QB that gets the ball to him consistently.
Which ranking list do you think is a more accurate, or more flawed?
Your ranking list is way better because it ranks the guy on my team in the top 10
I’m sorry, but Odell Beckham is not a top 10 receiver.
I love posts like this and it’s a shame that they never get much traction here. Great read, OP!
Something I’ve always been curious about is a list of greatest revivers of all time strictly measured by how they compare to their peers in each season they played.
In chess, for example, everyone has an Elo rating so you can really easily just compare them to the average of the rest of the top players to get a near perfect quantifiable description of dominance. How difficult would it be to go back each season and figure out a ranking of receivers based on a set of criteria, give points to each receiver based on their position in the rankings, and then calculate who is the best based on these points?
Panthers oh my god 🥴
Ceedeez nuts, amirite?
I’ll never get over trading AJ Brown. That’s one of the dumbest fucking moves in the history of the NFL. Fuck Jrob, he could have retired with a decent run as GM but no the stupid fucker had to trade an elite talent because he wanted to be cheap, after getting approved to pay him!
I hope there’s a time where we rank performance based on not numbers, but rather actual performance. Consistency, correct routes run, reads and adjustments, balls caught when they should have been versus over/underthrows, performance against top secondary players, etc. It seems beyond silly to take overall numbers and then stack them up blindly against one another.
There are a lot of fans and somewhat professionals putting out performance reviews on players, and that’s the real tell. It’s harder (more tedious) to show the garbage time stats for players, but I feel like ranking people by just regular numbers takes away from actual high performers versus people that were just targeted more and allowed more yards based on softer defenses (either bad defenses overall, or defenses playing some version of Prevent, where you’ll get a bunch of extra yards and whatnot).