The 2023 fantasy football season is here, meaning now is the time to dive into Cincinnati Bengals WR Tee Higgins’ fantasy projections to determine whether or not managers are receiving a value on draft day. Can he close the gap with his teammate, and should Higgins be a player you draft this year?
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Tee Higgins’ 2023 Fantasy Projection
Higgins would be the No. 1 option on the majority of teams, but in Cincy, he’s the high-upside 1B to Ja’Marr Chase.
Higgins finished the season as the WR18 overall and WR16 in points per game at 14.9 PPR. Playing in all 17 games for the first time in his career, Higgins caught 75 of his 110 targets for 1,042 yards with seven touchdowns.
With an 80.8% route participation, Higgins’ numbers could improve if he played on more than 69.4% of the snaps. If that does rise, his 56% top-24 finish rate will improve as well.
Are his stats better when one of the best players walking this Earth is not on the field? Yeah, of course. In the four games without Chase on the field, Higgins averaged 9.0 targets, 6.5 perceptions, 92.75 yards, 0.5 touchdowns, and 18.77 PPR per game.
In the other 26, he recorded 7.04 targets, 4.69 receptions, 67.27 yards, 0.42 touchdowns, and 14.1 PPR. Those are still incredible numbers. They are nearly identical to star wideout CeeDee Lamb at 5.3 receptions, 69.3 yards, and 0.4 touchdowns.
Cincinnati knows who they are as an offense. The Bengals were fifth in passing success rate thanks in large part to QB Joe Burrow, who was sixth in true completion percentage (72.8%) and EPA+CPOE, fifth in red-zone accuracy, and second in deep accuracy.
It’s one of the most efficient offenses in the NFL, and it had volume to match, throwing at the fourth-highest rate (66%) in 2022, which was also +7.6% above expectation (second). The Bengals were also second in 11 personnel (3WR/1RB) at a staggering 88% on first downs, with 66% of those plays coming from shotgun. Neither volume nor efficiency is an issue here.
It also means that, despite Higgins playing alongside Chase, he will remain one of the higher-volume players you can draft in fantasy with one of the safest floors. Not to mention the ceiling, especially if anything happened to Chase and Higgins receives multiple games of the No. 1 treatment.
Higgins is a top-15 wide receiver in PPR fantasy formats. Assuming relative health, a baseline projection of around 80 receptions for 1,100 yards and seven touchdowns fits nearly perfectly with what we have seen over the last three seasons. You don’t need to reinvent the wheel for some players or teams. Higgins and the Bengals’ offense fits the bill.
Should You Draft Tee Higgins This Year?
The NFL is a passing league, and fantasy has adapted over the years. Where running backs once ruled the day, this is the age of wide receivers, and managers who continuously find success are those who are loading up on WRs early in the draft to establish not only a higher floor but also a higher potential weekly ceiling.
Here’s an example: A typical run equates to roughly 0.61 PPR points, where a target to a WR is around three times higher at 1.81.
In leagues where starting three wide receivers is a requirement — up to five when Flex spots are added — chasing targets becomes paramount when building a well-rounded team.
Ideally, in 1QB formats, two of my first three picks are wide receivers. I try to have three in my first five rounds to get arguably the most important positional group established.
Whether going RB early with Christian McCaffrey, Jonathan Taylor, Austin Ekeler, or Bijan Robinson in the first round or going heavy on WR with Justin Jefferson, Cooper Kupp, and A.J. Brown, securing Higgins as my WR2 in the mid-third is a plan I will have in my head in case drafts pan out this way.
Sure, there are several other options in this same tier that will be available. But Higgins is sitting near the top of that list. While it is harder for a team’s No. 2 to perform like a No. 1 regularly, Higgins is one of the few who has the skill and opportunity to do so while having a path to top-five upside should anything happen to Chase.