In 2025, certain wide receivers faced low catchable target rates, impacting their fantasy football performance. Changes in quarterbacks or coaching staff may improve their prospects for 2026.
Not all targets were created equal, or even close to equal. Some pass catchers have the luxury of being pelted with short-area looks from hyper-accurate quarterbacks while others are subject to the whims of variance on downfield throws from passers who can somehow miss the broadside of that nearby barn.
Below is a look at wide receivers who in 2025 had some of the lowest rates of catchable targets. Some of them have new quarterbacks or coaches or both, and might bounce back in 2026 if they see a few more catchable footballs come their way.
At the risk of angering the powerful and frightening Caleb Williams Truther Committee, DJ Moore is set to see a major quarterback upgrade in 2026 after the Bears sent him to Buffalo in a trade.
Williams in his breakout 2025 season was almost as erratic as he was as a rookie. That’s reflected in almost every data point. It’s not that Williams is bad. He’s not. He’s just … high variance, and Ben Johnson seems willing and able to accept that variance and harness it in effective ways.
Anyway, Moore saw one of the lowest catchable ball rates and on-target rates last season in Chicago. Moore, as fantasy analyst Scott Spratt pointed out, last year saw an on-target rate of 64.7 percent, the tenth lowest among heavily targeted wideouts (probably this had something to do with Moore’s average depth of target jumping from 7.3 in 2024 to 12.6 in 2025). Moore’s rate of catchable looks was also in the bottom ten.
Wide receivers like DJ Moore had some of the lowest catchable target rates in 2025, with a rate of 70 percent.
Quarterback changes can lead to improved catchable target rates for receivers, potentially enhancing their fantasy football value in 2026.
A low catchable target rate indicates that a receiver is not receiving accurate passes, which can significantly hinder their performance and fantasy scoring.
Factors include the quarterback's accuracy, the type of routes run, and the overall offensive scheme, which can all influence the number of catchable passes a receiver sees.
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NFL: DEC 07 Titans at Browns
A deep dive into targets per route, first-read targets, and other metrics identifying tight ends who routinely command targets.
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That Josh Allen is a more accurate passer than Williams might not bowl you over. He’s more accurate by a long shot though. Last year Allen’s 79 percent on-target passing rate was one of the league’s best. Only four QBs had a higher completion rate over expected than Allen (Williams ranked third to last). No quarterback had a higher catchable ball rate than Allen in 2025.
The stench of Moore’s wretched 2025 campaign will linger into fantasy drafts this summer. Good. The value will be real and it will be spectacular.
I’m on record as saying new Bolts offensive coordinator Mike McDaniel is just the guy to let McConkey cook in 2026.
Freed from the restraints of Greg Roman’s vanilla and mostly outdated offensive scheme, I think there’s every reason to believe McDaniel -- who has been given total control of the team’s offense -- will use McConkey in inventive ways which will lead to cool stuff like receptions and yards and fantasy points.
McConkey in 2025 had one of the league’s 12 lowest rates of catchable targets. It wasn’t that Justin Herbert was particularly off-target last season: He ranked 14th out of 35 qualifying quarterbacks in on-target rate (77 percent), just ahead of Dak Prescott and Joe Burrow, and above league average.
Los Angeles Chargers v Las Vegas Raiders
A few Chargers players might be in for bounce-back seasons in McDaniel’s offensive system.
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McConkey simply did not see the easy-button looks from Herbert that he saw during his outstanding 2024 rookie campaign, when he ranked in the top-10 in yards per route run. His rate of short-area targets fell along with his slot usage. It was, as McConkey drafters would tell you, a bad combination.
And it’s not as if McConkey has never seen a high catchable target rate. In 2024 he had an 87 percent catchable target rate, sixth highest among receivers who had at least 30 targets. McConkey was also a higher priority in the passing attack as a rookie, sporting a solid 22.9 percent target per route run rate. That plunged to 18 percent in 2025.
You may remember Worthy from such offseason analyses like the one showing just how awful he’s been at converting air yards into real yards while catching passes from the greatest quarterback to ever play the game.
I mention him here because Worthy’s miserable 2025 catchable target rate was well below his 2024 rate of 75 percent, though a rising average depth of target and air yards per target could help explain why Worthy’s 2025 looks weren’t as good as they were in 2024. To connect these dots one would have to admit that Patrick Mahomes had a pretty crappy 2025 campaign (Please don’t be mad at me: Daniel Jones had a higher dropback success rate and EPA per dropback than Mahomes).
Worthy’s profile was quite different in 2025. After 70 percent of his targets came within nine yards of the line of scrimmage in 2024, Worthy saw 49 percent of his looks come in that range last year.
Assuming Mahomes is fueled by the nonexistent doubt about his return from last year’s season-ending knee injury, Worthy could see a nice little bump in catchable target rate this season. Rashee Rice’s role as an underneath safety blanket will take away a lot of easy-button opportunities for Worthy, however.
At the risk of further angering the powerful and frightening Caleb Williams Truther Committee, Odunze ran cold in 2025 thanks largely to Williams’ less-than-stellar accuracy metrics.
Here’s the thing about Odunze’s (very) low catchable target rate in 2025: It was higher than his 2024 rate (65 percent), which ranked as the fifth lowest among receivers who saw at least 40 targets that season. Part of this is Odunze’s role as Williams’ primary downfield target. Williams has been atrocious at placing the deep ball over his first two NFL seasons. Air yards from Caleb are truly prayer yards.
Williams, I suppose, would have to improve as a downfield passer if Odunze is ever going to see a slightly higher rate of catchable footballs.
This one is a bit of a stretch, but worth exploring with Nailor — the former Viking — shaping up as the No. 1 wideout in the Vegas offense this season (The Athletic’s Sam Warren recently said Raiders coaches expect Nailor “to take a big leap in a more featured role.”)
You won’t believe this but Nailor’s low catchable target rate might be related to JJ McCarthy being terrible. This comes as quite the surprise for a lot of folks despite McCarthy never having been good at any level.
McCarthy in 2025 was especially atrocious on intermediate throws (between 10 and 19 yards). That’s where the speedy Nailor saw nearly half of his targets last season in Minnesota. Nailor did a lot with a little though, averaging 15.4 yards per catch in the dead-on-arrival Minnesota offense.
A far more accurate Kirk Cousins (or Fernando Mendoza) should be enough to bump Nailor’s catchable target rate in 2026. That could matter a lot considering the Raiders’ total lack of target competition outside Brock Bowers.