5 Mid-Round Players to Avoid in Fantasy Football Drafts
Victor Cruz, New York Giants
ADP: 6.09
Again, as with Ellington, Victor Cruz’s recent injury history isn’t breaking news to anyone. I’m sure by now you’re well aware of his ruptured patellar tendon that quickly ended his 2014 season. Now he’s dealing with a calf injury that has kept him in and out of training camp and preseason games for about the past week and a half.
As I said with Ellington, injuries are hard to predict. But Cruz’s harsh knee injury less than a year ago, now coupled with his tweaked calf is leaving me cautiously pessimistic. But of course, I’m not basing my willingness to draft Cruz -- or any player -- on his injury history (although one wouldn’t be totally wrong in doing so). No, I’m basing it off of production.
Before Cruz’s season was unfortunately ended last year, he wasn’t exactly lighting it up. His 0.62 Reception NEP per Target ranked just 56th among 99 eligible wide receivers with at least 40 targets. This wasn’t just an anomaly on a small sample size either. Cruz matched that sub-par Reception NEP per Target total in 2013, a season in which he also missed the final two games due to a knee scope procedure.
While his per-target efficiency was poor, his Success Rate, the percentage of receptions that added to the Giants’ expected scoring outcome, was even worse. In the five-and-some-change games he played in 2014, he amassed a success rate of 73.91 percent. This rate left him ranked 90th among wide receivers. Not good.
Now we’ve gone and thrown Odell Beckham Jr. into the mix. Beckham was pretty much a non-factor in the games Cruz played last year, missing the first four games and seeing only nine combined targets in the two games they played together. Cruz didn’t really have to play second fiddle as he was the Giants’ primary target in the games he played. That’s now changing.
To anybody with a television, Beckham is clearly the most talented receiving threat on the Giants and will undoubtedly take over the primary role. Beckham ended the year with the 16th most targets among all receivers, and that’s with only playing 12 games. Cruz is a scary gamble in the sixth round. He hasn’t performed Cruz-like in performance the past two seasons, and has had multiple injuries sideline him from regular season games during that span.
