5 NFL Players Who Should Get More Touches in the Second Half of the Season

Gerald Everett, TE, Los Angeles Rams

If there’s a player on the Los Angeles Rams who should see some more volume, it’s probably Sammy Watkins, who is fourth on the team in targets. But for the sake of this, we’ll stick with Gerald Everett. Everett is a rookie tight end out of South Alabama who, per SPARQ, tested as the fifth-most athletic tight end in the 2017 class, which was filled with uber-athletic tight ends.

Currently Everett is behind second-year tight end Tyler Higbee on the depth chart. To this point, Higbee has out-snapped Everett 75.3 percent to 30.2 percent and out-targeted him 27-13. However, Everett has been much better on those passes. Everett has been worth 0.96 Reception NEP per target while Higbee has been worth 0.39. The average for tight ends this year has been 0.56 Reception NEP per target.

Everett was a second-round pick in this past draft, so it’s not as if his talent went unnoticed by those in charge. He’s likely to see an increased role at some point, though it looks like it should be sooner than later based on what Everett has been able to do so far and what Higbee hasn’t. Or it could be as simple as getting Everett the ball more when both players are on the field. The Rams have used 12 personnel (two tight ends) on 25 percent of their plays this season, which is the seventh-highest rate in the league, per Sharp Football Stats.