Why 5 NFL rookie receivers can and can’t keep balling out all season

Week 1 of the 2019 NFL season came with plenty of surprises, but one of the coolest was seeing so many rookie wide receivers show out. On Sunday, they even combined to set an NFL record. The league saw four first-year players reach at least 100 receiving yards, marking the first time three or more rookies have done so in NFL history.

In terms of yards, this year had the top three rookie Week 1 games in the past decade, including five of the top 10.

As exciting as these debuts were, a big question remains: can the five most productive rookie receivers keep this up all season long? Let’s take a look at why each player can or can’t.

The second-round pick from Ole Miss led the Titans in receiving with 100 yards in a road win against Cleveland. He had three catches, including this nifty 51-yard gain:

Morgan Moriarty: While Brown wasn’t the first receiver drafted this year — he was the fourth, in fact — his play on Sunday should be surprising. Don’t forget, Brown was Ole Miss’ most reliable receiver. From Bill Connelly’s 2019 NFL receiver projections:

No, when Ole Miss quarterbacks — be it Shea Patterson (before he transferred to Michigan) or Jordan Ta’amu — needed a completion, they knew to go to A.J. Brown. He not only provided pretty easy pitch-and-catch opportunities out of the slot, he also actually did something with those catches.

That should mean something, shouldn’t it? Metcalf is an exciting downfield threat and looks extraordinary with his shirt off. But he’s like a one-pitch reliever — an intimidating, Lee Smith-level one, for sure, but still a reliever. Brown was the staff ace. (And, to be fair, is not exactly chopped liver as a specimen.)

Brown finished his Ole Miss career as the school’s all-time leading receiver with 2,984 yards in just three seasons. With his steadiness under a number of Rebel quarterbacks, I don’t think he’s just a flash in the pan.

Christian D’Andrea: Brown thrived against Cleveland’s biggest defensive weakness, exploiting an uneven secondary that seemed shocked a man so wide could run so fast. More impressively, he put up a 100-yard game while playing only 43 percent of the Titans snaps. Sunday’s game was evidence he’s due for more targets, but it won’t be that easy.

Over the next two weeks, he’ll face much tougher defenses — the Colts and Jaguars — ready to derail his hype train. The rookie’s big performance came on a day the Browns focused much of their attention on limiting Corey Davis, who only earned three targets for no receptions that afternoon. Davis will see extra targets going forward as other clubs realize the Titans are more than a one-man band at wideout, and that’ll cut into Brown’s numbers as well.

The first receiver selected in this year’s draft, Marquise “Hollywood” Brown, helped the Ravens score the most points in franchise history on Sunday against the Miami Dolphins. Brown finished with 147 yards and two touchdowns, including this dope 83-yard connection from Lamar Jackson:

Morgan Moriarty: Brown hit his stride as a consistently productive receiver at Oklahoma during the Sooners’ 2018 season. During his final year in Norman, he had at least 100 yards receiving in six games. In the games that he had fewer than 100, he still managed to average over 10 yards per reception in all but one.

While Brown suffered a foot injury that kept him out of combine drills and his pro day, he isn’t showing any signs of that holding him back. On Sunday, he set an NFL record by being the first player to score two 40+-yard touchdowns in his first game.

The Ravens do have a tough schedule ahead — including games on the road against the Chiefs, Steelers, Seahawks, and Rams— but even if Brown isn’t putting up huge numbers every game, I expect him to still be a reliable target for Jackson.

Charles McDonald: Like Morgan said, this is what Brown did in college. He got open deep, he took slants to the house, and did everything in between. Eventually, the Ravens will run into a team that decides to play a safety deep, but Brown should continue to rip off big plays throughout his rookie year.

There is going to be some variance with him this year, though it’s an encouraging sign that his first NFL game looked identical to his career at Oklahoma.

Christian D’Andrea: Brown took advantage of a Miami defense that seemed to forget he existed in stretches. Having career performances against the 2019 Dolphins is going to be a trend this fall. The Oklahoma star underwhelmed in the preseason while rehabbing his foot injury, sliding down the depth chart and then playing just 14 snaps in Sunday’s explosive debut. His struggles against the Ravens’ secondary in practice are more in line with what we can expect from him early on versus actual NFL teams this season.

Washington’s third-round pick had a breakout season during his senior year at Ohio State, and on Sunday, he finished with more receiving yards than he ever had in a collegiate game. In his first NFL start, he totaled 125 yards on five receptions and had a nice 69-yard touchdown.

Christian D’Andrea: McLaurin was on the field for 93 percent of Washington’s snaps Sunday and would have had a bigger day had Keenum not overthrown him on another wide-open route downfield in the second half. While he’s going to see more defensive focus as the most dangerous weapon in a depleted WR corps, he has the speed and separation to make things work. Keenum has his flaws as a passer, but his big arm and ability to throw the ball into windows deep downfield make this a sustainable combination.

Charles McDonald: The only thing that can get in the way of McLaurin having a star-making rookie season would be his quarterback. Case Keenum had a dynamite game to open the season, but given his track record, it’s fair to wonder if he can keep that up. McLaurin was lethal during the days that I was at Washington’s training camp, and that transferred right over to his first game. The sky is the limit for him, but quarterback play can absolutely end up hindering him.

The Lions taking a tight end at No. 8 overall might have worked out for them. Hockenson had 131 yards and a touchdown during his debut against the Arizona Cardinals. He owns a new NFL record, too:

Christian D’Andrea: The Lions need weapons beyond Marvin Jones and Kenny Golladay, and Hockenson immediately stepped into that void to be one of Matthew Stafford’s top targets. The Iowa standout earned nine targets in his debut — as many as Golladay and second only to Danny Amendola. After burning first-round picks on limited returns from Eric Ebron and Brandon Pettigrew, there’s plenty of pressure on Detroit to make a Day 1 tight end finally look like a franchise building block. Hockenson has the chops to be that guy. Stafford will give him every opportunity to earn that spotlight.

Morgan Moriarty: The Lions took a risk taking a guy like Hockenson so high (in fact, Hockenson was the highest-drafted TE since Vernon Davis went No. 6 in 2006), and I’m not so sure it’ll pay off all season. Hockenson’s numbers were great, but he didn’t have production like that much in college. During his last season at Iowa in 2018, he put together just two games with over 100 yards receiving, and the year before that he had none. Those were the only two seasons he played in college.

Don’t get me wrong — Hockenson is a talented tight end, and a solid weapon for Stafford. But I think he needs a year or two in this system to get these types of performances week in and week out.

The draft’s biggest (and somehow, one of its fastest) wideout showed up in a big way for Seattle’s offense, hauling in four catches for 89 yards — more than double any other Seahawk’s receiving output. He also had the most receiving yards by a Seattle rookie receiver in a debut. The 230-pounder was dinged for a shallow route tree in college, but had no problem finding ways to burn Cincinnati’s secondary in a Week 1 victory.

Morgan Moriarty: Ahem —

His jacked physique aside, he was able to show off some real value to his game on Sunday, hauling in two third-down passes and making a couple difficult catches.

Not to mention he did all this after missing the Seahawks’ last three preseason games with a knee injury, and had surgery for it a few weeks before the season. That’s absurd!

Christian D’Andrea: Metcalf will get plenty of opportunities in a Seahawks offense that’s light on targets, but he doesn’t have much of a resume to fall back on. The burly wideout had only 67 catches in 21 career games at Ole Miss, finishing his final NCAA season with a 26-569-5 line in seven games. After battling injuries throughout college and into the preseason, there’s a good chance he fails to play a 16-game slate as a rookie.

That limited route tree is concerning, too. Metcalf wasn’t asked to get too tricky in his debut (and didn’t need to in order to find space against the Bengals). Better secondaries will swallow him up if he can’t diversify his downfield portfolio.