It’s that time of year once again! Football Absurdity will bring you a breakdown of every notable fantasy football-relevant player throughout June, July, and August. We continue with the wide receivers. Today, we take a look at Tyler Lockett, who had a definite quarterback downgrade this offseason. Does that make him completely hands-off for fantasy football? Let’s find out in his 2022 fantasy football player profile!
Tyler Lockett ADP and AAV:
Average Draft Position: WR37, 88 overall
Average Auction Value: $1.9
Tyler Lockett Statistics:
| Year | G | GS | Tgt | Rec | Yards | TD | Tgt/G | Rec/G | Rec% | Yds/Tgt | Yds/Rec |
| 2021 | 16 | 16 | 107 | 73 | 1175 | 8 | 6.69 | 4.56 | 68.2% | 10.98 | 16.10 |
| 2020 | 16 | 16 | 132 | 100 | 1054 | 10 | 8.25 | 6.25 | 75.8% | 7.98 | 10.54 |
| 2019 | 16 | 16 | 110 | 82 | 1057 | 8 | 6.88 | 5.13 | 74.5% | 9.61 | 12.89 |
| Year | Std Pts | HPPR Pts | PPR Pts | Pts/G | HPPR Pts/G | PPR Pts/G | Pts/Tgt | HPPR Pts/Tgt | PPR Pts/Tgt |
| 2021 | 168.4 | 204.9 | 241.4 | 10.5 | 12.8 | 15.1 | 1.57 | 1.91 | 2.26 |
| 2020 | 165.4 | 215.4 | 265.4 | 10.3 | 13.5 | 16.6 | 1.25 | 1.63 | 2.01 |
| 2019 | 153.2 | 194.2 | 235.2 | 9.6 | 12.1 | 14.7 | 1.39 | 1.77 | 2.14 |
| Year | Air Yards | aDOT | YAC | YAC/Tgt | YAC/Rec | AYMS | Tgt MS |
| 2021 | 1567 | 14.6 | 277 | 2.59 | 3.79 | 37% | 24% |
| 2020 | 1285 | 9.7 | 327 | 2.48 | 3.27 | 29% | 24% |
| 2019 | 1364 | 12.4 | 308 | 2.80 | 3.76 | 28% | 21% |
2022 Tyler Lockett Fantasy Football Overview:
I was going to start off by quoting a bunch of Tyler Lockett statistics but, to be honest with you, those are all entirely useless without Russell Wilson throwing him the football. In Lockett’s career, he’s played 91 games with Russell Wilson, and 4 games without him. All four games last year when Wilson suffered from a mallet finger then came back way too early and tanked the Seahawks because he’s a Try Hard Dork. In those four games, Lockett averaged just 4.5 receptions for 50 yards per game, compared to… 4 receptions for 54 yards per game in a career with Russell Wilson. While that’s virtually the same, I said his statistics don’t matter, and I said they don’t matter for a reason.
That reason is Andrew Lock. Not Andrew Luck, Drew Lock. The Seahawks traded for Lock in the Russell Wilson trade and have an intention to utilize him as their starting quarterback this season, and it’s for that reason that I’m out. It could be that simple, but let me complicate matters a bit. Lock has spent his career underutilizing talented wide receivers like Courtland Sutton and Jerry Jeudy, and now he gets to underutilize D.K. Metcalf and Tyler Lockett.
How bad has Lock been at utilizing his targets? Well, Jerry Jeudy had an average depth of target of 10.5 yards downfield, and Sutton had the second-highest average depth of target in the NFL (15.7 yards per target). But, if you dig a bit deeper, even that advanced statistic doesn’t tell the whole story. If you look at completed air yards per reception versus incomplete air yards per incompletion, you get a whole different story with Drew Lock at the helm. Last season, both Jerry Jeudy and Courtland Sutton landed inside the top five wide receivers in the difference between unrealized air yards per incompletion versus realized air yards per reception. That is, Drew Lock mostly completed short passes to Sutton and Jeudy, and gave them futile downfield targets.
So, now Drew Lock is the presumptive starter for the Seahawks, and Lockett has to contend with that little Lock problem. Given that Lockett has had an aDOT of 13.5 or higher in two of the last three seasons, I fear that Lockett will fall into Lock’s “can’t complete a deep pass” trap, and he will be a massive headache to have on your fantasy roster all year long.
2022 Tyler Lockett Fantasy Football Draft Strategy:
Tyler Lockett Salary Cap Value: $2
Draft Ranking: Find out for your league settings in a Beersheet!
Friends don’t let friends draft, Tyler Lockett. That is, unless they’re in a league together, in which case, friends will actively encourage their friends to draft Tyler Lockett. I just don’t see a world where he isn’t anything but a headache and a roster clog for your redraft squads. And for all of that effort, you get to take him at WR37, and pick 87 overall? While I acknowledge that he’s been a top-20 wide receiver in each of the last four seasons, I can’t fathom a universe where I correctly choose the boom weeks for who will be a boom-bust receiver in 2022. He was such with Russell Wilson, notching 45% of his games outside of the top 36 over the last four seasons.
How high will that number be with Drew Lock? No thanks! In salary cap drafts, I can’t stop you from getting a $2 receiver like Lockett, but I can certainly discourage it. At a certain point, a roster spot is more valuable than a guy who finishes as WR36 off of six top-30 games, a top-ten game, and ten games outside the top-50 wide receivers.
Best Case Scenario:
Lock and Lockett lock it up and lock it in, and Lockett finishes as a top-20 wide receiver.
Worst Case Scenario:
Tyler Lockett goes the way of Ricardo Lockette and disappears entirely from the NFL landscape.
Check out all our 2022 player profiles, here.
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[Statistics are sourced from pro-football-reference.com, airyards.com, and ftnfantasy.com]
