Analyzing air yards for fantasy football is a valuable exercise in predicting what might be coming for certain receivers. If a wide receiver is getting a tremendous amount of air yards but is completely off in receiving yards and receptions, we could expect this to work in his favor in future games. Conversely, a player who sees a huge increase in receiving yards but isn’t getting the air yards to match could mean a tremendous amount of yards after the catch, which can always vary from week to week.

Looking at a player’s intended usage rather than just superficial results can help you more accurately evaluate players in fantasy football. I hope you’ll join me every Wednesday during the regular season for our analysis of the week in fantasy football air yards.

Week 1 Air Yards Analysis and Fantasy Football Insights

Below we have a chart that represents Air Yards, with data courtesy of the 4for4 Air Yards app. Air Yards is a tool that is now accessible for free everywhere, and you can find the site or format that works best for you.

This list includes the top 50 wide receivers ranked by most to fewest air yards. From Amari Cooper’s 170 air yards down to Gabe Davis’ 48. Also included in this list are each player’s targets, receptions, average depth of target (aDOT), target share and share of the team air yards.

Putting all of this data together allows for a quick eye test using this table and gives us a lot of insights from Week 1. In this weekly post, we’ll look at the four main things that jump out at me from this dataset.

Air Yards and Air Yards% data for Week 1

Key takeaways from week one Air Yards data

Hanging out with Amari Cooper

The league leader in air yards after a week of play isn’t Cooper Kupp or Tyreek Hill or Nico Collins. It’s Amari Cooper with an incredible 170 air yards in his first game. What makes this even more unusual is that Cooper had a truly terrible game for fantasy purposes with just two catches for 16 yards and zero points. Deshaun Watson threw nine passes to him, but they didn’t do much. This clearly wasn’t an Amari Cooper problem, as nine passes, 170 air yards and 18.9 aDOT are usually a recipe for success in fantasy football. But Amari Cooper’s managers should be concerned about Deshaun Watson going forward.

Watson had the sixth-lowest pass completion percentage of any quarterback, he managed the most sack yards (32) over the weekend and ranked 31st in adjusted new yards per pass attempt, according to Fantasy Points Data. Of the 169 passing yards he managed on Sunday, a full two-thirds were the result of yards after the catch. Those are wide receivers’ strengths, not Deshaun Watson’s. Given all of that and the new legal issues that have surfaced this week, I would be very concerned about adding a Browns pass catcher to my roster.

Fill my cup with goals

Wow. Twenty-one targets. That’s the most targets a wide receiver has seen since Antonio Brown had 23 in November 2015. We now know that was a direct result of Puka Nacua leaving the game with a knee injury, but it’s clear that Cooper Kupp will be the primary receiver filling that void while he’s gone. That makes Kupp’s high air yards almost a fluke. This is one case where the number doesn’t tell the whole story. Kupp’s air yards were fourth among wide receivers because he had nine more targets than any other player.

His aDOT was 7.3 yards, meaning he was the only wide receiver in the top 25 in air yards to have an aDOT of less than nine yards. In his career, Kupp has trailed the Catch Master by yards and is an accumulator with tremendous volume. He may have up-and-down weeks in terms of air yards, but they don’t impact his performance as much as they do other receivers.

Moore throws forward, please

A 32% target share for DJ Moore was one of the best of any wide receiver in Week 1, but that’s not much consolation for fantasy managers, who only recorded five catches for 36 receiving yards on the game report. Frankly, it’s a surprise he ended up with 36, considering Caleb Williams only threw for 92 in the entire game. Even with eight targets because Williams couldn’t get the ball far, Moore’s 53 air yards ranked 47th at the position.

It certainly wasn’t a great debut for the No. 1 overall pick. Although his defense and special teams bailed out Caleb Williams, the Bears’ receivers suffered. With 88% of routes run, Moore played well ahead of Keenan Allen and Rome Odunze. His eight targets were second best on the team. All of these are encouraging signs, but the team needs to get Williams more throwing skills before “Moore” is no longer the Bears’ best receiver.

Jameson Williams has arrived

Things are definitely looking up for Jameson Williams. He led all wide receivers this weekend in air yards (127), targets (nine), target share (32%) and air yard share (68%), only George Pickens and Calvin Ridley were ahead. But perhaps the most encouraging sign was that he didn’t have an astronomical aDOT – it was a manageable 14.1 yards. Williams can do a lot after the catch, and it seems like the Lions have finally learned that. He doesn’t have to catch every ball 35 yards down the field.

Detroit seemed to find ways to get the ball to him in all areas of the field, not just deep passes. A deep pass did get him his touchdown catch, but it’s nice to see that Detroit views Williams as an all-around receiver, not just an occasional home run threat.