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John Brown is the Arizona receiver you want in fantasy

Arizona Cardinals wide receiver John Brown (12) scores a touchdown as Baltimore Ravens cornerback Jimmy Smith (22) defends during the second half of an NFL football game, Monday, Oct. 26, 2015, in Glendale, Ariz. (AP Photo/Rick Scuteri)

The Arizona Cardinals threw the fifth-most passes to wide receivers last year, yet fantasy owners of Larry Fitzgerald, Michael Floyd and/or John Brown undoubtedly wanted to see each of their guys get more individual looks. The question in the fantasy community, then, is which of these three wide receivers do you want on your fantasy team?

With no significant pass-catching tight end on the Arizona roster, the team’s passes are focused primarily on the receivers and running back David Johnson. Last season, the Arizona wide receivers were targeted 371 times. The team’s next-tier receivers, Jaron Brown and J.J. Nelson, could take as many as 60 targets in 2016. So if you forecast a slight bump in wide receiver targets to 380 (which I do), that leaves roughly 320 to split between the big names. Quibble about the specifics either way, but ultimately the three of them, assuming health, should end up within a stone's throw in either direction of that target total. Below, I'll explain why, if you're taking one of these receivers in 2016 drafts, you should make it John Brown.

The candidates

Early in 2015, it looked clear that Fitzgerald was the easy answer to “which one of these guys should I have?” He was the hottest player on the planet, scoring 63.3 standard fantasy points over the first three weeks. While that averages out to a little bit over 21 fantasy points per game, Fitzgerald didn’t top 13.0 points in a single game over the rest of the season, despite totaling 118 targets in those 13 games (9.08/game).

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