WR Stats with Experience

Using some of the methods outlined in previous posts, we took a look at WR trends over the past 3 seasons. First, we calculated the yards per catch for receivers based upon experience:


So there is a little up-and-down over the first 10 years, but it is pretty subtle (an 8% drop between years 6 and 10). Again, we see an actual increase after year 10, which I attribute to only the better receivers remaining on teams after 10 years in the league.

If we look at TDs as a percentage of receptions, we get:

So just as with running backs, it appears that wide receivers are able to get into the end zone much more often as a percentage of touches. For the rest of the career, players tend slightly upwards. The spike in year 10 is just an anomaly.

Now, let's take a look at how wide receivers improve from year to year in terms of catches.

So here we see the development cycle of receivers. There is a 4-to-1 improvement from the rookie season to year 2, and a 1.7-to-1 improvement from year 2 to year 3. So a rookie that gets 10 catches could be expected to get 40 catches in year 2 and 68 in year 3. This pattern of improvement actually continues through year 7.

Next up: calculating the error.