Garrett Wilson has been a dynasty favorite since emerging as the top WR from the 2022 class, but he wasn’t always seen that way. Drake London, Treylon Burks, and Chris Olave had higher rookie ADPs, while Jameson Williams, George Pickens, Skyy Moore, and Christian Watson trailed closely.
Wilson has been the best of the group through three seasons, finishing as WR21, WR25, and WR9. His first two years came with a revolving door at QB — mostly Zach Wilson, one of the NFL’s biggest busts — making his sins seem pardonable. In year three, he caught passes from Aaron Rodgers — past his prime and recovering from an Achilles tear, but still the best QB he’d played with. Unsurprisingly, Wilson was far better with Rodgers, nearing the positional apex, and cracking the top 10.
Among the top-10 WRs from the 2022 class, Wilson leads in PPR, targets, receptions, yards, and expected points (EP) but has the worst fantasy points over expected (FPOE). His heavy imbalance toward EP suggests a reliance on opportunity rather than maximizing production beyond expectations. Many would paraphrase this by saying that Wilson earns targets but fails to make the most of them.
Wilson has the seventh-worst FPOE of any WR in their first three seasons since 2000, trailing only Peter Warrick, Greg Little, Bryant Johnson, Mohamed Massaquoi, Greg Lewis, Zay Jones, and Brandon Gibson — not exactly elite company. Wilson is the most fantasy-productive among the 20 worst WRs since 2000 in three-year FPOE to start a career, and his peers are uninspiring.
On the other hand, the top 20 players with the best three-year FPOE to start a career are a who’s who of fantasy stars. (Torry Holt and Randy Moss achieved the feat in fewer than three eligible seasons since Moss was drafted in 1998 and Holt in 1999.)
FPOE is a valuable stat but not one of the most predictive based on correlation coefficients. It’s also highly volatile—big plays and touchdowns, though rarer than receptions, opportunities, passing attempts, and yards, heavily impact fantasy scoring. This volatility has led some to use FPOE to signal potential incoming regression.
The problem with using FPOE to predict regression is that it assumes every player’s baseline should be zero, ascribing high or low FPOE more to luck than talent. But that’s not the case. Every top-20 FPOE producer on the above list has been good for fantasy, many among the most talented of their respective generation. Conversely, nearly every bottom-20 FPOE producer has been a bust or afterthought, with few exceptions.
It’s not an exact science, and there are certainly exceptions, but we regularly see a pattern where the elite fantasy producers maintain a pattern of sustained double-digit FPOE year after year, often right off the bat.
