2023 Fantasy Football Player Profile: Justin Jefferson is top wide receiver

Justin Jefferson was the best fantasy football receiver last season: He scored over 25 more points than any other wide receiver.
There is still room for improvement: Jefferson could see a higher target share this season, score more touchdowns, and stop getting shut out from some games.
Kirk Cousins could stop him from repeating at WR1: Cousins started showing signs of decline last season, and at his age, that could be a trend instead of a one-time thing.

Estimated reading time: 5 minutes

The fantasy football outlook series takes an in-depth look at a single player’s fantasy outlook for the 2023 season. For help on draft strategy, rankings or for more details about other players, check out the rest of my summer content below. For rankings with better filtering along with auction values, check out our draft rankings page.

Last updated: 7:15 a.m. Friday, August 11

Justin Jefferson‘s player outlook

Jefferson has put together the best three-season start for a wide receiver in NFL history.

Jefferson has caught 324 passes for 4,825 yards and 25 touchdowns in his three seasons.
The next closest receiver over their first three seasons was Randy Moss at 4,163.
He already ranks 23rd in terms of career receiving yards among wide receivers currently on active rosters despite only being 24.
Jefferson’s 92.5 career receiving grade is the second-best among all wide receivers since 2006, only behind Michael Thomas.
His receptions and yards per game have steadily increased in each season.
He ranked first last season on a per-game basis in targets (10.3), receptions (7.5), yards (106.4) and PPR points (21.7).
Part of this was simply volume. His 40.6 routes per game ranked third among wide receivers.
It’s hard to be one of the best at rate stats on a high sample, but his 2.62 yards per route run was second-most last season among the 73 wide receivers that ran at least 345 routes.
He’s also been among the best at making big plays, with the best rate of receptions of at least 15 yards per route.
The one concern is there were a few games where he was pretty well shut down. He was held under 20 receiving yards in two games and held at 48 or less in another four games. He gained 98 or more in every other game, so there were good games and bad games, and no in-between.
Jefferson turned 24 years old this summer, so we may not have seen Jefferson’s peak yet.

Competition for touches

Minnesota made some changes to their offense that could benefit Jefferson this season.

His primary competition for targets comes from T.J. Hockenson, who received at least eight targets in seven of his 10 games with the Vikings last season.
K.J. Osborn remains one of the three receivers and is a fine third-receiving option to see four or five targets each game.
Minnesota let go of long-time veteran Adam Thielen, who ended up getting paid by the Carolina Panthers, and replaced him with first-round pick Jordan Addison.
While Addison should have a bright future in the NFL and make a great tandem with Jefferson, the swap could benefit Jefferson’s touchdown total.
He averaged 0.471 receiving touchdowns per game last season, ranking 10th.
While that would be a great number for most receivers, there is room for improvement for Jefferson to have a historic season.
Jefferson’s achieved a 24.8% target per route over the last three seasons from the Vikings' one-yard line to the opponent's 11 while Thielen’s at 17.4%.
When the Vikings are within 10 yards of scoring, Thielen has the higher target share and has 20 touchdowns compared to Jefferson's nine when they are that close to scoring.
Jefferson is now the biggest of the three Vikings wide receivers and could see even more targets near the goalline this season.
The Vikings also made a swap at running back from Dalvin Cook to Alexander Mattison.
Mattison hasn’t graded as well as a receiver to Cook and has slightly lower targets per route. This should have a minimal impact on Jefferson.

Impact of teammates

Jefferson should benefit from having Kevin O’Connell as his coach for a second straight season, but Kirk Cousins at quarterback again is the biggest cause for concern.

The talk last season was Jefferson playing more of a Cooper Kupp role with O’Connell coming from the Los Angeles Rams, but that didn’t necessarily come true.
Jefferson didn’t play in the slot more often, but he has been more efficient from the slot in his career.
He averaged 2.90 yards per route run from the slot in his career compared to 2.51 yards per route run when lined up out wide. His grade is above 90 in both spots.
He could also see a higher target share now that he’s more comfortable with the offense.
His 0.255 targets per route run ranked ninth last season. Kupp’s had a higher target share both out wide and in the slot.
Back at the combine, O’Connell said that he and Jefferson “have just scratched the surface of where we want to go as an offense, particularly with him as our premier receiver”.
The one big concern is Kirk Cousins. His 77.4 offensive grade last season was still above average for a starter. as he ranked 13th, but it was also his worst overall grade since joining the Vikings.
Cousins is turning 35 years old this month, which is past the age when quarterbacks tend to decline.
It’s more likely that Cousins takes another step back this season rather than rebounding.
Jefferson could easily be a top-10 fantasy receiver even if Cousins slips to a below-average quarterback, but it might be harder for him to repeat as the top fantasy wide receiver.

Bottom line

Jefferson was the top wide receiver in fantasy football last season, and there is a chance he could be even better this season.

He’s the consensus top wide receiver this season, and there is no need to overthink it.