It’s a wild ride rostering Deebo Samuel Sr.; few players have his level of game-breaking upside. He’s also liable to disappear any given week … or get hurt. How should fantasy managers approach the San Francisco 49ers WR in fantasy football drafts?
Should You Draft Deebo Samuel Sr. in 2024?
Rostering Samuel is not for the faint of heart. The boom weeks are loads of fun, but you have to endure the inevitable games where he’s not part of the game plan or gets hurt before scoring a single point.
Samuel has always been an efficient player. He’s been in the top 15 in yards after the catch every year of his career. The 49ers’ offense is noticeably worse when Samuel is not on the field.
And through five years, Samuel has been a WR1 twice, a middling WR3 twice, and mostly injured once. But oftentimes, players can be viewed through rose-colored glasses.
Samuel’s 2021 season was the stuff dreams are made of. He averaged 21.5 fantasy points per game, finishing as the overall WR3. It’s fair to argue he was the most valuable player in fantasy football that season, given his cost in fantasy drafts.
It was that 2021 season that put Samuel on the map as a truly elite player. He caught 77 passes for 1,405 yards and six touchdowns while adding 365 rushing yards and eight rushing scores.
The problem with evaluating Samuel is the difficulty of repeating his 2021 season. As a result, he was certain to underwhelm in 2022, but a decrease of 8.2. fantasy points per game was more than anyone expected.
That created a difficult proposition entering the 2023 season: Which Samuel was the real one? As it often is, the answer was somewhere in the middle.
Samuel averaged 16.3 fantasy points per game, finishing as the overall WR12. He wasn’t a consistent producer, but you knew that when you drafted him. Samuel had six games with 11.5 points or less, including four in the single digits. The reason you draft him, though, is for things like his legendary run from Weeks 12-15 when he scored 22.4, 35.8, 34.0, and 21.9 fantasy points, respectively.
One of the main concerns with Samuel is his fantasy profile’s reliance on efficiency. Volume is king in fantasy football, and Samuel is never going to see it.
Samuel only saw a 22.5% target share — 5.3% lower than in his 2021 season. Even if the rushing production slows, there’s room for an increase in target volume, but Samuel will need to continue being elite after the catch to produce given his low aDOT (average depth of target), which was only 6.6 yards last season.
Is Samuel capable of being a clear WR1 and a 30% target-share guy? I think so. But while playing on a team with Brandon Aiyuk, George Kittle, Christian McCaffrey, and now Ricky Pearsall, will it ever happen? I doubt it.
The 49ers had the 11th-highest neutral-game-script run rate let season, as well as — by far — the slowest pace of play. The 49ers averaged 31.1 seconds per snap in a neutral game script, 1.2 seconds more than the second-slowest team.
Samuel’s WR13 price tag is awfully expensive. He’s not his team’s top target and his rushing output isn’t predictable, especially when the team has the best running back in the NFL.
I have Samuel ranked as my WR16. Taking him at No. 21 overall, with all the talented players around him, is not something I can endorse.
Samuel has the potential to blow away his ADP. We’ve seen his upside, and it’s magical. However, this is a game of probabilities. The most likely outcome is he finishes as a low-end WR1 at best. That’s exactly where he’s being drafted. Samuel is a fine selection, but I will likely be looking elsewhere when his name is atop draft boards.
