The million dollar question that everyone asks themselves every year when entering the fantasy football season; “What stats actually matter? What should I be looking for?” First off, I’ll start by saying nobody has fantasy football figured out. In fact, fantasy (and sports in general) are very unpredictable and affected a lot by luck. There is no science or formula that can predict what a player will do or where they will finish for the year.
However, with that being said we can try to give ourselves the best advantage possible after luck has done its thing. It’s about eliminating as much of the guessing as we possibly can. If you just randomly submit waivers, make trades or draft players based off of no information, it’s probably a recipe for disaster. Just get through your head right now that luck is involved, and at any time a player can randomly go off, shit the bed, get injured and/or drastically underperform or outperform their ADP or ‘talent level.’
So what fantasy football stats matter then?
Statistics that show opportunity are the most important in fantasy football. What kind of opportunity a player receives is highly correlated to their yearly and weekly finish. There will always be outliers in an unpredictable sport (obviously) but we found that about 80% of the time, these 5 opportunity focused stats correlate to the player’s finish in PPR/0.5 PPR scoring formats.
These 5 fantasy football stats are listed below and we’ll call them the 5 pillars –
- Snap share
- Targets
- Target Share
- Red zone opportunity (targets/touches)
- Total Touches
The correlation of stats to points in fantasy football
When we built this website, we did take a look at what stats actually mattered and these are stats we have used for years to win our leagues. We didn’t want to fill the website with clutter and random stats that didn’t matter, we wanted a simple website that got right to what you needed.
Of course the highest correlations to fantasy stats are obviously in game stats; rushing and receiving yards, TD’s and receptions. This can be assumed by any reasonable fantasy player because points come from points, its the most fundamental part of fantasy. But these stats are so unpredictable.
Any player can go off for 10 receptions, 100 yards and a TD one week, but how will we know it’ll ever happen again? Better yet how can we best predict that game before it happens? You can’t look at a player’s game log and just say “oh, he had 100 yards and a TD last week, he will definitely do it again this week.” What we can do, we can look at the opportunity they’re getting and try to predict if they could repeat this. The following charts look at the percentage of players who’s final PPR points rank correlated with their rank in each stat.
For RB’s, the correlation of stats to fantasy points went a little like this:
| RB STAT | Correlation to Fantasy Points |
| Snap Share | 93% |
| Touches | 92% |
| Rush Yds | 91% |
| Rec | 88% |
| Rec Yds | 88% |
| Targets | 84% |
| Target Share | 81% |
| Red Zone Touches | 80% |
For WR’s, the correlation of stats to fantasy points looked like this:
| WR STAT | Correlation to Fantasy Points |
| Rec Yds | 96% |
| Targets | 95% |
| Rec | 94% |
| Snap Share | 89% |
| Rec TD | 87% |
| Target Share | 86% |
| Red Zone Targets | 74% |
For TE’s, it looked this way:
| TE STAT | Correlation to Fantasy Points |
| Rec Yds | 99% |
| Rec | 98% |
| Targets | 98% |
| Rec TD | 88% |
| Target Share | 87% |
| Snap Share | 84% |
| Red Zone Targets | 80% |
As you can see, for RB’s the stats like snap share and touches were a little more important than targets and target share, but all 5 statistics still heavily correlated to the points the RB scored. For WR’s, targets and target share were a little more important than snap share and red zone opportunity, and the same for TE’s.
Fantasy football stats that don’t matter
Other popular statistics analysts will look at that actually had little to no correlation were the following:
- Drops 21%
- Drop % -11%
- YPC 46%
- ADOT -2%
- Y/R 26%
Sometimes you’ll see analysts talk about a player that drops the ball or how inefficient a running back is. The fact is, these stats really don’t correlate to being a high factor in the points that these players scored.
For example, Rachaad White in 2023 was looked at in the first half of the year and even all year by some analysts as inefficient and there were even talks of him being replaced by the backup. He finished the year 40th among all qualified runners in yards per carry. He also finished T-18th in TDs scored among RB’s. But… here were his respective ranks among RB’s in the 5 pillar opportunistic stats we spoke about earlier:
- Snap share – 4th
- Targets – 13th
- Target share – 6th
- RZ Touches – 10th
- Touches – 5th
Top 10 in 4/5 stats and just outside of the top 10 in the other. The usage and opportunity that White received led him to a #8 PPR finish and for most managers, where he was drafted, was a potential league winner in PPR formats.
Want another quick example? Puka Nacua and Tyreek Hill led the NFL in drops last year. Here were their rankings among WR’s in the 5 pillars:
| PLAYER | SNAP SHR RK | TGT RK | TGT SHR RK | RZ TGT RK | TOUCHES RK |
| Tyreek Hill | 67 | 2 | 1 | 4 | 3 |
| Puka Nacua | 14 | 9 | 5 | 12 | 6 |
Opportunity is everything.
Tyreek was top 5 in 4/5 categories and the 4 that heavily correlated to WR finishes, which led to a top 2 finish for Hill. Puka Nacua was top 14 in all 5 categories leading to a top 4 finish.
What stats matter for running backs?
We looked at the top 10 finishers for running backs in 2023 and then the top 5 finishers for the last 3 years before that (2022, 2021, 2020).
Top 10 RB Finishers in PPR scoring – 2023
When you take a look at the top 10 finishers in 2023, 8 out of the 11 players (Bijan Robinson and Derrick Henry T-10th) rank in the top 15 of at least 4 out of 5 stats. This just shows that the higher the players rank across these 5 stats, the better the finish was. We have an outlier from 2023, as I said there would always be, which was Raheem Mostert. He tied Christian McCaffrey for 21 TD’s which directly led to his top 5 finish in 2023. As I said before, we cannot predict TD’s and the usage wasn’t top 10 usage — therefore showing how unpredictable this sport can be. Would I bet on Mostert repeating this year? No, I would not.
Top 5 RB Finishers in PPR scoring – 2020-2022
Taking a look at the top 5 finishers from 2020-2022, you can see the average rank for these stats was 10.9. The top 5 finishers from these years averaged in the top 11 for every single one of these statistics. When you remove the target data, they averaged in the top 7 of each. Once again, this confirms our correlation outlook that snap share and touches matter a little bit more than target data for running backs, but all play a part in how a player finishes.
When you look at these charts you can see that where one player lacks (Derrick Henry with Targets/Target Share), they usually make up for in other categories (he is top 5 in red zone touches and total touches, as well as top 10 in snap share).
After analyzing all of the stats, we can come to the conclusion that ‘touches’ data and snap share will heavily influence how a running back finishes and performs. Once again, these are the stats that directly relate to how much opportunity the running back is getting. When a top performing RB lacks in snap share and touches, they will make up for it in targets and target share.
What stats matter for wide receivers and tight ends?
We decided to lump together all outside pass catchers which includes wide receivers and tight ends. All of the stats that heavily favored wide receivers also favored tight ends. The only difference you’ll notice is that since there are less tight ends, there will be higher correlation patterns and higher ranks for the specific stat categories.
Top 10 WR / TE Finishers in PPR Scoring – 2023
As soon as you take a look at these, right away you notice that snap share will not matter as much for wide receivers or tight ends. It almost becomes the opposite of the running backs, where target data will heavily influence the player’s finish while snap share and touches will be a ‘boost’.
Even with that being said, 9 out of the top 10 wide receivers from 2023 ranked inside the top 15 of 4/5 stats, most being outside on snap share. In fact, 5 out of the 10 WR’s ranked within the top 15 for all 5 stats, including snap share. Exactly the way we looked at the correlation chart, this shows that target data heavily correlated to the top 10 pass catchers in 2023.
Let’s take a look at the top 5 finishers from the years 2020-2022.
Top 5 WR / TE Finishers in PPR Scoring – 2020-2022
Taking a look at the top 5 WR/TE finishers from 2020-2022, you can see the average rank for these stats was 10.1. The top 5 finishers from these years averaged in the top 10 for every single one of these statistics. When you remove the snap share data, they averaged in the top 8 of each. Once again, this confirms our correlation outlook that target data will matter a little more than snap share for pass catchers.
How do I use this information to my advantage?
Look, like I wrote about earlier, there is no secret formula to predicting fantasy football. We are just looking to eliminate as much luck as we possibly can, and for the stats that are the easiest to predict.
When you are looking to draft, trade, pickup or start a player look at these statistics to compare and contrast what kind of opportunity they are receiving.
Try to keep emotion out of fantasy football. Keep an eye on the usage and opportunity a player is getting. Early in the year, Michael Pittman Jr. was at least top 20 in all 5 pillar fantasy football stats, yet he was drafted as the WR33 in most leagues. You could have looked at the opportunity Pittman was getting and ignored the quarterback injuries and the worry of him falling off and predicted that he was at least going to finish better than where he was drafted at. The stats showed that he was going to be a top 15 fantasy finisher based on the ranks in the 5 important stats we talked about, and he finished at WR13 in PPR scoring formats. Yes, he had single point games and he had 20 point games, but the opportunity never changed throughout the year.
Conclusion
All in all, there is no special formula to winning your fantasy football league. You have to pay attention and stay up to date with the opportunity that each player is gaining week to week, month to month. That’s why we built this website. You can pull up your game logs every week for every player and see how many receptions or yards they had that week. But, how will we know if they will repeat this? How can we predict this?
In one of the most unpredictable games in the world, I choose to try to eliminate as much guessing as possible when managing my fantasy team. That’s why the 5 pillar stats are available on our website, for you to know the opportunity that a player has and try to eliminate your guessing. At least if you stay up to date and use these statistics to your advantage, you know you did everything possible and gave yourself the highest probability to win.
And listen, sometimes it won’t work out, but at least if you follow a process, and it STILL doesn’t work out, you know by using these important fantasy football stats, you gave yourself every opportunity available to not fall short.
If you made it this far, I appreciate you. If you’d like to, please join our discord at the link below. This is a brand new community that we are looking to build so that fantasy managers have a place to go when they want to discuss anything fantasy related. It is 100% free to join.
