Over the past couple of years, I have dedicated several hundred hours to properly analyzing data and advanced metrics in order to determine what correlates with NFL success for WR prospects and how to accurately predict prospect success.
The comprehensive model I developed evaluates each prospect through a quantifiable assessment of numerous variables, with each metric thoroughly analyzed and weighted based on its significance and correlation to NFL success.
The model includes multiple composite scores that play a pivotal role in determining a prospect's overall grade, each composite score being derived from a distinct set of weighted metrics. I will provide the Top 5 Rookie WR Rankings based on the model grades.
Model Composite Scores and Weighted Metrics
Productivity Score: Evaluates a prospect's overall college production which accounts for both total production and per-game production.
Efficiency Score: Measures a player's overall effectiveness and per-route efficiency using a set of advanced Per-Route-Run metrics such as Yards (YPRR), First Down (FDPRR), Touchdown (TDPRR), and Quarterback Rating (QBR) when targeted
Film Score: Accounts for quantifiable film grades such as PFF Grade, WAR (Wins Above Replacement), consensus rankings, and compiling evaluations from multiple trusted scouting sources in order to generate a quantifiable film score.
Athletic Score: Quantifies a prospect's athletic testing measurables to gauge their physical traits and overall athleticism relative to NFL standards.
Checklist Score: An assessment of how a prospect measures up against key metric thresholds based on historical data, identifying traits and benchmarks that have been indicative of success for NFL wide receivers. Essentially, quantifying how a prospect "checks off all the boxes" which include size, athletic measurements, productivity, advanced metrics, etc.
Prospect Profile Breakdown
Grades/Scores: A visual representation of how a prospect measured up in the various composite scores and overall prospect grade.
Color Scale: A simple gradient-based scale indicates different performance levels. Green represents the strongest performance, while yellow, orange, and red indicate progressively lower outputs.
Player Comparison Card: Provides two player comps - a high-end comp and a low-end comp - based on a prospect's playstyle, college production, athletic testing, size, and other additional advanced metrics.
Scatter Plot: A visual representation of the relationship between two key metrics (e.g., Deep Threat Score vs YAC Score and Production vs Efficiency) stacked up relatively with the entire 2025 Draft Class. The orange marker indicates where the prospect ranks among the draft class.
Side-By-Side Advanced Metrics Bar Charts: Visually compares a prospect’s performance in key advanced metrics alongside their class ranking for each category.
Donut Charts: Depicts the prospect’s performance in a given metric relatively. The filled portion of the chart represents the prospect’s standing—for example, a 70% completion rate would result in 70% of the donut being filled.
Pos. Rank (Class): Prospect ranking relative to 2025 WR Class (33 prospects)
Pos. Rank (Ovr): Prospect ranking relative to all WR prospects included in model data set dating back to 2019 (174 prospects)
Jayden Higgins - ISU
(WR5)
Strengths
Standing at 6-foot-4 and 210 pounds, Jayden Higgins is a physically imposing target with a well-rounded skill set and a prototypical outside receiver build. But his greatest strength might be his hands, and the data backs it up. Higgins has only 3 drops on 210 career targets, an incredibly impressive 1.4% drop rate.
Pair that with a contested catch rate above 50%, Higgins is one of the most reliable receivers in the draft class. His high-end comp to Tee Higgins isn’t because they share a last name, they have eerily similar analytical profiles.
Higgins ended his collegiate career with 2,168 receiving yards, 140 receptions, and 15 touchdowns. His 10.59 air yards per target (rank: 5) and 1,483 total air yards (Rank: 10) highlight his ability as a downfield target. His analytical profile highlights his potential to become a reliable possession receiver with great contested-catch ability and downfield potential.
With a YPRR 2.97 vs Zone and 2.84 vs Man, Higgins can thrive against both soft coverages by finding open spaces effectively and beating his man 1-on-1 on the outside. Higgins is above most statistical thresholds you like to see which gives confidence that he can be an immediate impact type of player in his rookie season.
Weaknesses
Higgins’ after-the-catch ability does leave a lot to be desired as his overall YAC ranks near the bottom of the class, as does his number of avoided tackles. Higgins gained only 685 yards-after-catch on 140 career receptions, a YAC-per-reception below 5 yards.
His QBR when targeted of 108 also leaves a lot to be desired, although many like to point out that might be more of a QB stat than WR. There is a lot of historical context pointing towards high QBR when targeted having some strong positive correlation with WR prospects.
Higgins will also be 23 years old before his rookie season and, historically, 23 years old rookies have not found a lot of success in the NFL apart from a couple outliers like Rashee Rice and Zay Flowers. I don’t necessarily see Higgins as a developmental prospect, so if he struggles to find a role early on in his career, I’ll have some doubts with him being able to improve enough to make an impact. But all the talent is there for Higgins.
Luther Burden - MIZ
(WR4)
Strengths
- Luther Burden is possibly the most dynamic receiver in the class, and his analytical profile highlights his elite YAC skills and elusiveness
- Burden’s 7.26 YAC per reception (Rank: 4) and 64 avoided tackles (Rank: 2) shows he has elite playmaking ability with the ball in his hands.
- Target Share: 27.95% on routes run, Burden was a focal point of his offense.
- Productive college career, putting up 2,283 yards, 193 receptions, and 21 touchdowns.
- Burden's sophomore season was particularly impressive, where he had 1,209 yards and 9 touchdowns in 13 games.
- He had a bit of a disappointing junior season, but the talent is still there for Burden. What’s most encouraging is Burden will be 21 years old for the almost the entirety of his rookie season.
High-End Player Comp: Brandon Ayiuk
Weaknesses
- Air Yards & Depth of Target: Ranked 29th in total air yards (882) and 33rd in average depth per reception (4.57 yards), indicating he was a limited deep-threat presence in college.
- Burden ranks relatively average in many advanced metrics, including overall production, drop rate (5.09%), QBR (Rank: 16), YPRR (Rank: 12), Zone YPRR (Rank:17), and Man YPRR (Rank: 14).
Low-End Player Comp: Laviska Shenault
Tetairoa McMillan - Arizona
(WR3)
Tetairoa McMillan, the big-bodied dynamic receiver from Arizona, is seen as the consensus top receiver prospect from this year’s class. While this ranking may come as a surprise to some, it is in no way indicative of McMillan not possessing top-level talent or that there are major red flags in his analytical profile.
That said, McMillan finds himself in a spot where he’s not quite at the same level as some top receiver prospects in prior classes, but he still possesses an excellent overall analytical profile.
Strengths
- McMillan’s prospect grade of 8.03 places him third among WRs in this class and 29th overall among prospects in the model dating back to 2019. His prospect grade places him in a similar tier of guys such as Rome Odunze, Brian Thomas Jr., and Drake London.
- McMillan’s analytical profile paints a picture of a field-stretching nightmare for opposing defenses, highlighted by his elite production and deep threat advanced metrics.
- In his 3 years at Arizona, McMillan amassed 3,414 receiving yards (Rank: 5) and 26 touchdowns (Rank: 5).
- One of McMillan’s greatest strengths is blending his elite size (6’5, 212 lb) with an impressive after-the-catch ability. While he ranks 8th in total avoided tackles (42), McMillan had the 3rd most tackles forced among receivers in 2024.
- What likely stands out the most is McMillan’s deep-threat ability, with 2,252 air yards and an impressive 10.72 AY per reception. Pair that with a 50% contested catch rate and a drop rate <4%, McMillan is one of the most reliable and QB friendly receivers in the class.
High-End Player Comp: Drake London
Weaknesses
- McMillan’s catch rate of 62.46% is respectable but not elite, suggesting room for improvement in securing targets under pressure. While his contested catch rate is strong, his analytical profile indicates he could improve in his ability to consistently bring down the ball, especially given his high target volume (341 targets, Rank: 5).
- A YAC/Rec of 5.46 (22nd) and overall efficiency score of 5.41 is a bit of a cause for concern in terms of overall efficiency metrics.
- If you’ve followed any of my work, you would know how much I emphasize the importance of performance vs Zone when analyzing a prospect’s advanced metrics. While 2.30 YPRR vs Zone isn’t necessarily awful, it falls below the typical threshold I like to see and puts him in a territory of receivers that have been a lot more hit or miss, despite decent analytical profiles.
- While his 2.92 YPRR vs Man can be seen as impressive, historical data shows that there is very little correlation to performance vs Man, especially if the receiver doesn’t have the zone production to pair with.
- McMillan also ranks average in other metrics such as QBR when targeted (rank: 12), Fantasy Points Per Route (rank: 13), and overall YPRR (rank: 10), not to mention his 21st rank in YPRR vs Zone. None of these metrics are particularly a cause for major concern, they do showcase why McMillan did not grade out as well as some other elite receiver prospects we’ve seen (or as well as the two receivers ahead of him)
Low-End Player Comp: JJ Arcega-Whiteside
Tre Harris - MISS
(WR2)
Tre Harris stands out as an exceptional deep threat with impressive advanced metrics and one of the best production profiles in the class. Harris' skill set thrives in stretching the field while maintaining strong YAC metrics. While this ranking may come as a surprise to some, it’s easy to understand why he’s ranked here once we dive into the numbers.
Strengths
- Harris’ prospect grade of 8.10 places him second in the class and 25th overall among prospects in the model dating back to 2019. His grade is bolstered by his elite efficiency metrics, film score, and overall production profile.
- Quarterback-Friendly Target: Standing at 6-foot-2, 205 lb and bolstering a 124.86 QBR when targeted (Rank: 4), Harris is QB’s dream target.
- In his collegiate career, Harris amassed 3,545 receiving yards (Rank: 3) and 29 touchdowns (Rank: 5).
- Among his 3,545 career receiving yards, 2,128 came on air yards, highlighting his ability as a downfield playmaker. To pair with his impressive air yards, Tre Harris averaged 6.44 yac per reception. An incredible feat for a player with such a high ADOT.
- Coverage Dominator: Harris ranks 1st in Man YPRR (4.18) and 8th in Zone YPRR (2.82), illustrating his ability to excel against single coverage and soft coverage alike.
- Elite Yards Per Route Run: Harris’ 3.00 YPRR ranks 1st in the class, highlighting his elite efficiency on per route basis.
High-End Player Comp: Puka Nacua
Weaknesses
- While not a standout weakness, Harris’ 15.45% avoided tackle rate leaves room for improvement.
- Harris’ biggest red flag in his analytical profile (and one of the bigger red flags a prospect can have) is his age, where he’ll turn 23 years old a whole two months before draft day.
- Among 170+ prospects in my draft model, only two receivers found real success in the NFL as 23+ year old rookies: Rashee Rice and Zay Flowers. This isn’t to say Harris can’t find similar success or even surpass them as NFL talents, but it’s a major flag and something to weigh heavily when evaluating Harris as a prospect.
- Harris’ zone production is far from a legitimate concern, but ideally we would like to see a prospect’s success come primarily against zone coverage rather than man coverage. With his zone-man split at around 55%, an ideal ratio would be closer to 75% zone production.
- With all that said, and apart from his age, there is very little you can point to in Harris’ analytical profile as a negative.
Low-End Player Comp: Terrace Marshall Jr.
Emeka Egbuka - OSU
(WR1)
Emeka Egbuka enters the 2025 NFL Draft as the analytically most well-rounded receiver bolsters an analytical profile with little flaws. Egbuka projects as a versatile weapon at the next level, capable of operating both inside and outside.
While he doesn’t necessarily dominate in any one area, his combination of efficiency, YAC-ability, contested catch skills make him a high-floor player with upside if he lands in the right system.
Strengths
- Emeka’s 8.34 Prospect Grade ranks him atop this year’s receiver class and places him 17th overall among prospects in the model dating back to 2019. While he’s not quite at the level of an elite prospect, he’s in a tier of receivers that all have extremely high floors and have found success in the NFL. The tier includes prospects like Garrett Wilson, Ladd McConkey, and Chris Olave.
- Egbuka’s 2.61 YPRR (Rank: 6) and 2.79 YPRR vs Zone demonstrate his strong multi-level route-running ability and efficiency against all coverage types.
- One of Egbuka’s most impressive metrics is his 0.49 Fantasy Points Per Route Run (FPRR) which ranks him 3rd in the class and places him in the 90th percentile of all prospects in the model.
- Egbuka had a productive career at Ohio State, ranking in the Top 10 of the class for all 3 major production metrics. He amassed 2,599 yards, 183 receptions, and 23 touchdowns on 257 career targets
- He also showcases a strong ability to generate extra yards after the catch with a 6.75 YAC/Rec, making him a threat in open space.
- Reliable Hands & Ball Skills: Egbuka’s analytical profile highlights his extremely reliable hands and A+ ball skills with advanced metrics such as his 71.6% catch rate, 53.8% contested catch rate, and an impressive 3.89% drop rate. He’s a very reliable target for QBs and has excellent ability to make plays in traffic.
- Finally, Egbuka has a very well-balanced production profile with 1,357 air yards to pair with his 1,242 yards after the catch, illustrating his ability to be effective at both creating separation and generating extra yardage.
High-End Player Comp: Ladd McConkey
Weaknesses
- When looking at Egbuka’s analytical profile, there aren’t a lot of concerning metrics or any real red flags that stand out. If there are concerns, they are more centered around his potential play style or capped ceiling.
- Limited Elite Deep Threat Ability: 7.38 AY/Rec (Rank: 23) | 1,357 Air Yards (Rank: 18) – Profiles as a limited primary deep threat. Likely fits a role as more of a chain-mover and YAC player.
- Moderate production: While Egbuka had an overall productive career at Ohio State, he never really put up an elite season and was always the WR2 on his team, which could turn people away from viewing him as a legit WR1 in the NFL (despite always playing alongside some of the elite prospects in recent years).
Low-End Player Comp: Jalen Reagor