Welcome to Week 3 of SB Nation’s Rookie Watch, a series meant to track and analyze rookie player performances throughout the season. Making the jump from college football to the NFL is notoriously difficult. Rookies have to learn new schemes, new systems, figure out new coaches, new teammates, and play against bigger, faster and better opponents across the board.
John Brown, Jordan Matthews highlight a big week for rookie receivers
A handful of rookies have made immediate impacts in the first month of the NFL season, but perhaps none helped their teams win more than John Brown and Jordan Matthews last week. Here’s a look at that duo, plus a few more receivers that stepped up big this week.
Christian Petersen
Bottom line, more than 230 players get drafted every year, and even if you’re taken in the first few rounds, the odds aren’t great that you’ll become an effective starter. That makes any productive rookie that much more impressive.
Week 3 was all about rookie receivers, and several came up big or stood out for their respective teams. Let’s take a look.
The Saints are wasting no time in making Cooks a featured part of their offense. In their Week 3 win over the Vikings, Cooks was targeted 10 times, coming up with eight receptions for 74 yards. The dynamic rookie out of Oregon State has 18 catches over his first three games, meaning he'd be on pace for 96 catches on the year. That's impact.
Cooks has been so dangerous in New Orleans’ offense because his speed and elusiveness have been used in a wide variety of ways -- as a slot receiver, on the outside, moving prior to the snap, and even lining up in the backfield.
The Saints traded Darren Sproles over the offseason, mainly a cap-saving move, and are now looking to Cooks to be that similar type of versatile threat. One example of how he was used on Sunday (on a third-and-7) can be seen below.
Starting in the tight slot, Cooks motions across the formation prior to the snap, and you can see that No. 52, linebacker Chad Greenway, has been tasked with picking up any leak route out of the backfield in the zone defense the Vikings are playing. This is the type of mismatch that coordinators looks to create.
Of course, Cooks gets some great blocking for what’s essentially a bubble screen, and picks up a first down, and then some. I’m not saying that Cooks is the same type of player that Darren Sproles is or is even as quick as Sproles, but there’s definitely something in the way he moves that’s reminiscent of the Saints’ former playmaker.
People were very split on Benjamin's prospects for the NFL prior to the Draft. He's too slow, he drops too many passes, his maturity came into question; well, after three games, I doubt the Panthers are regretting their decision to take him with the 28th overall pick. He had eight receptions for 115 yards and a touchdown on 11 targets in a losing effort on Sunday night against the Steelers, and looked every bit the part as a jump ball, physical, box out target.
With 16 catches for 253 yards and two touchdowns in three games, his current full season pace is 85 catches for 1,349 yards and 10 touchdowns. That obviously may not hold for a whole season, but it tells you a little about his immediate impact in the Panthers’ offense.
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The story out of Jacksonville this season, at least when it comes to receivers, has been UFDA surprise Allen Hurns, who leads the team in touchdowns at the moment, but Allen Robinson has definitely made his presence felt as well, leading the team in catches and targets.
The absurdly athletic rookie out of Penn State had seven receptions for 79 yards on 11 targets in a losing effort against the Colts, and looks like a true breakout candidate after being eased into action the first two weeks of the season with a hamstring injury.
With Blake Bortles taking over the quarterbacking duties in Jacksonville, look for Robinson to be one of his go-to guys.
Rookie Watch
Matthews, the rookie out of Vanderbilt and the cousin of the G.O.A.T., Jerry Rice, broke out in Week 3 with eight catches for 59 yards and two touchdowns on nine targets for the Eagles. His two scores really utilized his size and speed running out of the tight slot in Chip Kelly's offense.
His first was a classic play-action seam route. The fake inside handoff to Darren Sproles sucked the linebackers up and in toward the line of scrimmage, and Matthews was able to run a little seam route into the end zone. This was an easy read and easy score for quarterback Nick Foles.
Matthews’ second touchdown was significantly higher degree of difficulty for both quarterback and receiver. Matthews runs a route right up the hashes and again gets a linebacker on him in coverage. He makes a quick inside juke before heading to the back of the end zone, and as soon as Foles sees that linebacker turn his back to trail, he pulls the trigger on the throw.
A lot of credit to Foles here for putting the pass right where it needed to be: right above the linebacker’s head and inside of the now-pursuing safety. Matthews’ height and catch radius comes into play, as Foles can trust that his big redzone target will come down with a higher pass. Matthews makes the catch in traffic, and gets two feet inbounds.
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Brown was the toast of training camp and the preseason as he made spectaculars plays left and right, and the rookie out of small school Pittsburg State came up big for Arizona in their win over the Niners. The rookie reeled in four receptions for 52 yards on six targets, and his two touchdowns ended up being the difference in the game as the Cardinals mounted a second-half comeback.
Brown was used in a variety of roles, but his speed was an obvious factor on his two touchdowns. Here was one, which pulled the Cardinals to within one point in the 3rd quarter:
The Cardinals use Brown initially way on the outside, then motion him in to a bunch formation before snapping the ball. With Michael Floyd and Larry Fitzgerald next to Brown, I can't say I blame the Niners' defense all too much for focusing in a little too long the Cardinals' two big downfield threats. In what looks like either a miscommunicated coverage assignment caused by the motion, or simply a late break by safety Eric Reid as he keyed in on Floyd and Fitzgerald, Brown is able to scurry across the field on a crossing route and easily gets the angle.
Brown would grab another touchdown pass on Arizona's next drive, sneaking past rookie Jimmie Ward, who thought he had help over the top.
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The training camp superstar came up big when it mattered.
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