After another fascinating week of football, the tastes of the takes are beginning to become more defined. With age, tastes get more complex. This edition of “Hot Sauce Hot Takes” deals with things complex and unpredictable.
What would a player who’s never had to be a WR1 look like in that role? What happens when a notoriously erratic quarterback seemingly puts it all together? How fast should you move to gameplan around an older player who has shown some regression?
These are all important discussions with difficult answers. Luckily for the reading public, I am dousing myself in hot sauce like Conan O’Brien for your reading pleasure.
Swamp Dragon Private Reserve: I’m ready to drop the big bucks on Tee Higgins.
Featured on 2 Chainz Most Expensive TV show, Swamp Dragon Private Reserve is one of the most expensive hot sauces in the world. This take is about someone who should see a massive pay raise this offseason.
Tee Higgins has a track record of success in a Bengals offense with Joe Burrow and Ja’Marr Chase. Though he has missed several games this year, that Bengals group is near the top of the league in expected points added per play despite sporting a winning percentage well under .500. Looking a bit deeper, this offense really goes supernova when Higgins is on the field. In the 5 games Higgins has missed, Burrow has added just under an expected point and a half per thirty passing dropbacks. When Higgins is in the lineup, that ups to around a touchdown.
That being said, there are still questions as to whether Higgins is a premier wide receiver in this league, or whether he is simply coasting on the success of Burrow throwing to him and Chase attracting massive amounts of attention.
I’d like to plant my flag strongly on the hill that I think that Higgins will be worth the value in free agency this year, should the Bengals let him go. Here is my argument. Tee Higgins is:
- 8th out of 147 qualifiers in SumerSports’ Advanced AI all-in-one metric,
- 10th in yards after catch over expected by SumerSports’ calculation,
- Above the 80th percentile in route running,
- Above the 75th percentile in run blocking (!),
- And, if you need multiple sources, he is also 12th among wide receivers in ESPN Analytics’ overall receiving score
All of this is being done at a high usage rate too, as Higgins is 8th in target share.
I’m really interested in what it would realistically cost on the open market but given Higgins’ injuries in the past two years and his lack of leaguewide accolades, it would make sense to see Higgins garner a contract near an average of about 10% of the cap over the years of the contract at the time of signing. That range puts him in a spot around where Nico Collins and DeVonta Smith signed this past offseason, and both of those deals look like steals now.
At that value, I’m all the way in on Higgins, and he can be my WR1 any day.
Zab’s Original: Anthony Richardson will be the best quarterback from the 2023 NFL Draft.
A little sweet with a slow burning heat, this take has been cooking for a while and has had some ups and downs. Moreover, Zab’s says it is doing for the Datil Pepper what Tabasco did for the Tabasco Pepper. This take highlights how a player may be filling out into a new archetype of quarterback in the National Football League.
Anthony Richardson’s first two years have been marred by injury, tapping out, and Joe Flacco. By most metrics, he has been a bottom level quarterback in the league this year. In SumerSports’ Advanced Metrics, he sits firmly in the bottom of the league in completing big throws and production over expected. Worse yet, he is dead last in accuracy.
Pulling back the onion a little bit more shows this dilemma to be a little bit more complex though. Richardson, in great contrast to the above, is:
- Third best in the league in timing,
- Sixth best in decision making,
- And above average in sack avoidance.
For reference, Richardson sits behind only Lamar Jackson and Tua Tagovailoa in timing. Most all of the players in the top half of the league in decision making are veterans, and Jayden Daniels, Spencer Rattler, and Bo Nix all sit in the bottom half.
It seems that, literally, Richardson’s only issue is that he is inaccurate. And there was a glimmering light of hope for the young 22-year-old quarterback on Sunday against the Jets. He hit all the same beats as he has this season by:
- Hitting 96th percentile in timing
- And near the 80th percentile in decision making.
But he also added:
- 70th percentile accuracy,
- 70th percentile production over expected,
- And a tasteful 75.8 QBR out of 100.
At least as the metrics are concerned, there is only one hole in Richardson’s game right now: accuracy. Moreover, it seems like the film is marrying up to the metrics, as resident film expert Shawn Syed sang Richardson’s praises in his Monday Morning Mashup.
To conclude with this take, I never want to drive false equivalencies, but I do want to note that the last quarterback who was this physically imposing, yet similarly as vexing was named Josh Allen. Josh Allen’s first 320 attempts resulted in a 52% completion rate, 10 touchdowns, 12 interceptions, and a QBR near the bottom of the league. Through 247 attempts in Richardson’s career, he sits… at a 52% completion percentage, with 8 touchdowns, and 8 interceptions. I’m not calling him Josh Allen, I’m just saying the resemblance is uncanny.
Mrs. Renfro’s Carolina Reaper Salsa: Christian McCaffrey needs a running mate.
Given this one is about a surefire hall-of-famer and a perennial all-pro candidate, it certainly has a little bite to it. Nonetheless, just as everyone wants chips with salsa, this take concerns a situation where a backfield partner could be warranted.
Christian McCaffrey is a hall-of-famer and a generational tailback. He is awesome to watch play. Heck, he even had over 100 all-purpose yards in his first two appearances of the 2024 season while logging near 90% of all offensive snaps.
But at least right now, this is not looking like the same Christian McCaffrey we knew.
In his first two games, McCaffrey was only solidly above average in one metric. He logged a near 80th percentile game in the passing attack in Week 10.
Other than that, regression has come for McCaffrey post-injury. He struggled badly in elusiveness, performing in the 13th percentile in his first game and the 43rd percentile in his second game. That led to two solidly subpar performances in both our rushing all-in-one metric and the accumulation of rushing yards over expected.
But with every problem comes a solution, and that solution is simply to give more snaps to Jordan Mason. Mason has seen his snap share fall from logging several 80% games to having only 5 snaps in the last two games. For the year, Jordan Mason is 9th in rushing yards over expected according to SumerSports’ internal calculation and 77th percentile in our rushing all-in-one metric.
For that reason, I pose the following question made iconic by the El Paso Taco girl.
“¿Por que no los dos?”
Especially as we get into the stretch run, I’d love to see Mason be used a bit more in that devastating Shanahan run game. Let’s put both of them on the field! San Francisco already loves 21 personnel, so put in Kyle Juszczyk too and go with 31 personnel!
All I’m saying is that it is highly unlikely that McCaffrey, who was consistently around the 80th percentile in SumerSports’ 40-yard dash estimate but has dipped to 20th percentile in his first two games, can bear the same load that he always has.
