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Odell Beckham Jr.

WR, Browns

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Odell Beckham hasn’t been the elite receiver he used to be for the last three years, largely due to injury. Last year Beckham had 74 receptions for 1,035 yards and 4 touchdowns while playing through a serious sports hernia injury for the entire season. He was also on a new team, and history shows that wide receivers on new teams don’t tend to play as well as they typically do in their first season with the team before rebounding in their second year. Beckham had to both learn a new offense and develop chemistry with Baker Mayfield while playing through a major injury. Despite those obvious roadblocks he was still able to get over 1,000 yards, so it’s reasonable to assume that if Beckham can be fully healthy for the entire season (which is a big if considering his injury history), he can begin to produce like he used to. The obvious risk is that we don’t know if Beckham has fully recovered from his past injuries and even if he is, he has proven to be very injury prone and there’s no guarantee he avoids injuries this season. The other risk with Beckham is the fact that this Browns offense seems like it will be more run-heavy next year with Kevin Stefanski coming in. Stefanski comes from the Vikings, who ran the ball 48% of the time last year, and now has both Nick Chubb and Kareem Hunt to work with. The Browns will definitely be a run-first team. In addition they brought in Austin Hooper who will take some targets from Beckham. The increase in targets Beckham will get because he will be open more often (since he knows the offense better, has more chemistry with Baker Mayfield, is healthier than last year, and should be double-teamed less with more teams deciding to load the box because the Browns are running it a lot) should compensate for the increase in rushing attempts and targets to Austin Hooper, so Beckham should see at least as many targets as he had last year. The receiver more likely to be hurt by Hooper’s arrival and increase in rushing attempts is Jarvis Landry because Hooper will be another receiver in the middle of the field and the Browns will be doing more play-action deep shots and Landry is a slot receiver. Couple that with the increase in efficiency that Beckham will likely see if he is healthy, and he could return to his elite form. Overall, Odell Beckham has massive upside but is a big risk because of his injury issues and uncertainty surrounding the Browns offense, so he is worth drafting in the third round if you are gutsy.

Standard Analytics-Based Projected Points: 147.5

PPR Analytics-Based Projected Points: 252.8

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