We're inching closer and closer to the 2021 NFL season, and while we're still a few days away from kicking back and watching the games on Thursday, Sunday, and Mondays, we have plenty to tide us over.
Whether it's fantasy football drafts (for which we have a customizable draft kit and player projections), best-ball drafts on FanDuel or team futures bets at FanDuel Sportsbook, there's something for everyone.
And did I mention the props?
*Checks notes*
I have not.
NFL odds has a good number of player stats props posted, including the one I'm about to discuss: most regular season receiving touchdowns.
Here are the listed players and their odds to lead the league in receptions, per FanDuel Sportsbook.
| Player | FanDuel Sportsbook Odds | Player | FanDuel Sportsbook Odds |
|---|---|---|---|
| Travis Kelce | +850 | Davante Adams | +850 |
| Tyreek Hill | +950 | Stefon Diggs | +950 |
| D.K Metcalf | +950 | Calvin Ridley | +950 |
| Mike Evans | +1100 | Justin Jefferson | +1100 |
| DeAndre Hopkins | +1100 | Adam Thielen | +1100 |
| Amari Cooper | +1200 | AJ Brown | +1200 |
| Tyler Lockett | +1700 | Darren Waller | +1700 |
| CeeDee Lamb | +1700 | Chris Godwin | +2600 |
| Terry McLaurin | +4400 | Keenan Allen | +4400 |
| Kenny Golladay | +6000 | Julio Jones | +6000 |
| Ja'Marr Chase | +6000 | DJ Moore | +6000 |
| Diontae Johnson | +6000 | Antonio Brown | +7500 |
| Tee Higgins | +9000 | Odell Beckham Jr | +9000 |
| George Kittle | +9000 | Cooper Kupp | +9000 |
| Chase Claypool | +9000 | Will Fuller | +10000 |
| Russell Gage | +10000 | Rondale Moore | +10000 |
| Michael Pittman | +10000 | Marquise Brown | +10000 |
| Kyle Pitts | +10000 | Kadarius Toney | +10000 |
| Jaylen Waddle | +10000 | Devonta Smith | +10000 |
| Deebo Samuel | +10000 | Corey Davis | +10000 |
| Breshad Perriman | +10000 |
Which players make for the best bets?
To find out, I used numberFire's player projections as the baseline along with historical ranges of outcomes to see which players outperformed their odds most frequently across 10,000 season simulations.
Some Historical Precedent
Across 21 seasons from 2000 to 2020, there have been 27 total instances of a player leading the league in receiving touchdowns -- or (obviously) tying for the league lead.
Among those 27 individual player seasons, we have seen target totals span as low as 98 (James Jones in 2012) among eventual touchdown leaders.
Further, 9 of the 27 (so, 33.3%) of the players leading in touchdowns had a target market share below 25.0%. Then again, 23 of the 27 still managed at least 8.0 targets per game.
To clarify, I'm not saying we should be ignoring volume, yet unlike with receiving yards props and especially reception props, projected volume isn't as critical for touchdown leaders.
Notably, since 2012, 10 of the 11 players with at least a share of the season lead in receiving touchdowns ranked inside the top 20 in projected receiving touchdowns, according to numberFire's model. The lone outlier was Doug Baldwin (28th) in 2015.
We can get a little weirder with these props as a result, but we shouldn't get too wild, either.
The Results
Tyreek Hill (+950)
Our projections are really quite high on Tyreek Hill's touchdown expectations. His 13.6 touchdowns are most among any projected player by roughly 1.5 scores.
That's going to be hard to beat.
Hill's +950 odds are tied for third-highest on the board, but he shattered those expectations in the season simulations by a huge margin, due to such a high baseline projection from numberFire's model.
We're dealing with a big-play receiver in Hill who happens to be tied to the quarterback with the highest touchdown projection for the season, so it's hard to argue siding with Hill among the other high-end favorites.
Davante Adams (+850)
Okay, I know I discussed Hill as the best bet among the top, but Davante Adams' touchdown projection (again, around 1.5 shy of Hill's) is still 0.8 scores better than anyone else's, according to numberFire.
That allowed him also to rate out as a positive expected value in the season simulations.
Including the playoffs, Adams had a league-leading (by far) 46.3% red zone target share in games played last season. He averaged 2.3 red zone targets per game, and nobody else averaged even 1.8.
Keenan Allen (+4400)
In looking for longer shots, we should want them to be inside the top 20 in numberFire's projected touchdowns and preferably hold an expected target rate of at least 8.0 per game.
Keenan Allen is slotted for 9.6 targets per game and ranks 10th in projected scores at 8.8.
Allen outperformed his +4400 odds (which imply a 2.2% probability) by leading the league in 2.5% of the 10,000 simulated seasons.
Odell Beckham (+9000)
Odell Beckham has a really interesting case here at such long odds, odds that would suggest he's just 1.1% likely to lead the league in receiving scores.
Beckham topped the league in 1.7% of the 10,000 simulations, and while he misses the 8.0-target-per-game cutoff we're striving for, he's rating out at 7.8.
Plus, 6 of the 27 players to lead the league in our post-2000 cutoff averaged between 7.8 and 8.8 targets. The slightest bump in volume puts him well within that comfort zone.
Beckham also ranks 15th in projected touchdowns entering the season (8.1), and he did see 0.7 end zone targets per game, a borderline top-30 rate last season. His 29.4% end zone target share ranked 21st among players with at least 7 games played, too.