The start of the 2015 NFL offseason has been a whirlwind of activity, and right in the heart of this flurry have been young, elite wide receivers.
Net Expected Points (NEP), normalizing each player's production to their "peak season" in which they produced their highest total Reception NEP.
"The Formula"
Taking the average relative Reception NEP of all 28 wide receiver Pro Bowlers on a per-season basis produced the following trend below.
On average, these elite wide receivers tended to increase their productivity from their rookie season up until their third season, when athletes seemed to hit their peaks. Upon hitting that peak, players hit their "prime seasons," maintaining this elite level of production (defined as total Reception NEP within 80% of their peak production) for an additional six seasons, until they eventually begin a steady decline below these levels.
Taking a closer look at the distribution of when these athletes hit their peaks, we come upon an interesting finding.
Consistent with the trends in the line graph above, we see that many of these receivers do hit their peaks in their third season (n=6). However, we also find that an equally large proportion of receivers hit their peaks in their sixth seasons in the NFL as well. Indeed, 20 out of the 28 receivers (71%) in our study hit their peaks between their third and sixth seasons in the league.
"Age Ain't Nothing But a Number"
So far we see that there is a strong relationship between the productivity of our Pro Bowl wide receivers and the number of seasons they've played in the league, but can the same be said for their age? To answer this question, I again did the analysis described above, but instead aligned players according to their age:
Here we see that, on average, our elite wideouts hit their peak around their 26th birthdays and maintain this level of production up until their 32nd birthday (again, approximately six seasons after hitting their prime), when they begin their steady decline from the top.
The distribution of when these athletes hit their peak seasons displayed an even more concentrated clustering of athletes than what was seen for experience.
We find that there is an even stronger connection between the age in which a player hits their peak than what we observed between years in the NFL and a player's peak. Nearly half of the wide receivers in our study (12 out of 28) hit their peaks between the ages of 26 and 27. Not surprisingly, the list of players falling in this group include some potential future Hall-of-Fame wideouts
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While the career arcs for the two players listed here north of the 30-year-old line (Roddy White and
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Sanders is at the perfect level of experience and age to continue his elite production for the near future: he is entering his sixth season in the league at the ripe age of 27. Of course, playing with
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Dallas, Denver, and Green Bay have made prudent decisions to pony up the money required to retain the services of these young superstars. The Packers re-upped Cobb to the tune of $40M over the next four years, while the Cowboys and Broncos have slapped franchise tags on Dez and Demaryius. The importance of both Dez and Demaryius to their respective franchises is evident in the lengths these teams have made to free up cap space to offer these players large contracts -- the Cowboys are practically allowing aging wideouts on the market such as Andre Johnson, who hit his peak six seasons ago back in 2008 and is set to enter his 13th in the league at the age of 34.
In the NFL, timing is everything. And in today's passing league, if a team wants to compete on offense, it's clear that those throwing money at the wide receiver position must weigh heavily a player's age, experience, and current position and trajectory on their career arc to be sure who to make these investments on.