• Zay Flowers put up his biggest numbers in the playoffs: He was WR6 during the last two weeks of the fantasy playoffs and posted a career-high 115 receiving yards in the divisional round of the NFL playoffs.
• Flowers should play more in the slot: His 2.08 yards per route run from the slot is among the best for wide receivers. He would benefit from lining up in the slot more consistently in 11 personnel.
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Estimated Reading Time: 5 minutes
The fantasy football player profile series gives the most in-depth view of a player using the best data points at PFF’s disposal. We will look at how well the player has performed, the player's competition for touches and how teammates and coaches will impact the player's performance.
Last updated: 7:15 a.m. Tuesday, Aug. 6
Player Performance
The Ravens made Flowers the 22nd overall pick in the 2023 NFL Draft, and he was instantly a starter. There were a few games throughout the season in which he played nearly 100% of snaps. For most games, he played at least 84% of snaps.
This led to some decent cumulative stats and per-route stats. He started the season strongly, with at least 50 receiving yards in each of his first seven games and sitting at WR23 at that point. He then hit a wall, posting 25 yards or fewer in four of his following seven games.
Flowers ended the season on a high note during the playoff push. He scored 41.8 PPR points during the fantasy championship and fantasy semifinal weekends, ranking sixth among wide receivers during those two weeks. During the NFL playoffs, he caught nine passes for 156 yards and a touchdown over two games.
The situations where he played well lined up perfectly with what you would expect for a Z receiver. He did well in single coverage against zone when he wasn’t pressed. He also did well when lined up in the slot. His route tree was also somewhat limited as a rookie.
Competition for Touches
Flowers is the clear top wide receiver for the team for a second straight season. Last year, Rashod Bateman and Odell Beckham Jr. split time as the X receiver, Flowers was the Z and Nelson Agholor played in three-receiver sets. This season, fourth-round rookie Devontez Walker replaces Beckham on the depth chart, and he will likely play more of an X position despite featuring in a Z role last season. The Ravens have several players fighting for the fifth and potentially sixth spots.
Flowers will have no problem getting his targets, but the biggest question is how much he will line up in the slot.
One concern is that the Ravens might not use as much 11 personnel this season after how well tight end Isaiah Likely played last year. If the Ravens want to have their best receivers on the field, that would mean Flowers, Mark Andrews and Likely are all playing, in which case Flowers would line up out wide the vast majority of the time.
He is competing with Agholor for slot snaps in 11 personnel. Agholor ran 276 routes from the slot in 11 personnel, compared to 118 for Flowers. Agholor was primarily an outside receiver early in his career, from 2015-2016, as well as from 2020-2022. We may see Agholor outside more with Flowers in the slot more.
Impact of Teammates
Flowers will continue playing in Todd Monken’s offense with quarterback Lamar Jackson. There is a general concern they might run the ball even more with the newly signed Derrick Henry at running back, but the Ravens also didn’t have a problem keeping Flowers on the field in all passing situations in 2023, so that might not be a huge concern. Jackson hasn’t been the most accurate passer, but that doesn’t matter as much for Flowers and his low average depth of target.
Bottom Line
Flowers is WR27 by ADP, which is perfectly fair. He flashed WR10 potential at the end of last season, but the consistency from one week to another wasn’t there — and it might not be there this year if the Ravens bully some teams in the run game to victory. It’s possible that Flowers will improve significantly in his second year or that he will play in the slot more often, which would make him a steal. In any case, there isn’t much reason to expect his 2024 season will be any worse than last year.
Footnotes
- Statistics for the tables and charts were generally chosen based on their ability to predict future fantasy performance on either a per-game or per-opportunity basis, or chosen for their ability to describe the player relative to other players at the same position.
- Opportunities for this purpose are defined by passing dropbacks, rushing attempts and receiving routes run.
- Numbers are either by season or based on the past three years. For rookies, only college numbers are included. For non-rookies, only NFL numbers are included, even if they played in college in the past three years.
- Because college competition is relatively easier than NFL competition, most rookies will see a decline in their NFL numbers compared to their historical numbers.
- For all of the tables in this article, colors range from blue (good or high) to red (bad or low).
- All percentiles or colors are comparing the given player to other players with a large sample of opportunities. Generally, it’s one-third of the possible opportunities given the sample. If the player in question doesn’t have enough opportunities, they are still compared, even though a player could look very good or bad on that small sample size, which might not be as predictive.
- Information on running back utilization classifications and importance can be found here, wide receiver here and tight end here.
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