Exception Report: Michael Thomas, the sequel

Welcome to the Exception Report. This series is designed to examine players and their impressive seasons, games, and/or plays. It looks for the outliers and helps understand how they are doing it and if it can continue.

Perhaps lost amid the breakout season of Adam Thielen, last week’s Exception Report, and the dominance of players like Antonio Brown is a youngster who is showing early signs of reliability. Some fantasy owners would call Michael Thomas a bust this year — that will be covered later — but his consistency has stood out. With 753 receiving yards (seventh in the NFL), Thomas is just 247 yards away from becoming the 10th player in NFL history to manage back-to-back 1,000-yard receiving seasons to open his career. The current list, courtesy of Pro Football Reference:

How did he get here?

While Thomas came out of Ohio State as a ballyhooed NFL prospect, he wasn’t always so heavily coveted. Most top universities passed on Thomas initially, leading him to attend Fork Union Military Academy before eventually becoming a member of the Buckeyes. After two ho-hum seasons, including a redshirt year, Thomas led the team twice in receiving yardage, including 32 percent of the team’s receiving yards in his final year.

Diving deeper into that 2015 season, it was clear that Thomas would be a major asset for his NFL quarterback. He ranked 12th in wide receiver rating, including being just one of 13 receivers who were targeted over 70 times without an interception thrown. He was also ranked 44th in yards per route run out of 319 qualified receivers, impressive considering he had just 13 percent of his targets thrown 20-plus yards that season (he caught five of 10, four for touchdowns). Thomas also proved a playmaker with 11 broken tackles (tied for 49th) on just 49 receptions (tied for 110th).

For the big receiver crowd, Thomas showed off that size (6-foot-3, 212 pounds) at the combine along with giant hands (10.5 inches) and the type of agility (three-cone of 6.8 seconds) expected from a much smaller player. Overall, Thomas was above-average in nine of 12 measurements during the NFL combine (via Mock Draftable) and was ultimately a Saints second-round pick.

What has he done?

As a rookie, Thomas managed 15 games (he missed one) of at least four receptions and 40 receiving yards. That was two more than the previous rookie record of 13, held by Michael Clayton and Terry Glenn (RIP). While many will point to Drew Brees as a key reason, remember that Thomas was competing with two former 1,000-yard receivers in Willie Snead and Brandin Cooks along with a tight end who was among the highest paid in the NFL (Coby Fleener).

Going deeper, Thomas was 10th in wide receiver rating (passer rating when targeted) and actually had six more targets than Cooks. He also was targeted on a higher percentage of his routes (21 percent) than either Cooks (20) or Snead (20) and had the highest yards per route run (2.04) of the three (1.92 for Cooks and 1.84 for Snead). Similar to his time with the Buckeyes, Thomas saw a low percentage of deep targets thrown his way (9 percent), but was able to haul in over half (64 percent, seven of 11), once again showing Thomas’ efficiency in yards per route run despite a lack of designed big plays.

Moving into his second season, Thomas had the benefit of Cooks being traded with no replacement in sight. Then, a suspension to Snead only enhanced Thomas’ potential role within the passing game. He has responded with 2.25 yards per route run, an improvement over 2016 and ranked seventh in the NFL among wide receivers. Thomas also already has more deep targets (13) than last year (11), which makes up nearly 15 percent of his total targets. Some of that can be tied directly to Cooks’ departure, who ranked 18th with 24 deep targets in 2016.

What can he do?

Given the nature of the Saints offense this year — Brees led the NFL in pass attempts last year and ranks seventh this season — it may seem difficult to see any more upside in Thomas’ situation. However, despite his success, Thomas is only 17th in total routes run this year but fourth in receptions and seventh in yardage. That hyper efficiency helps but Thomas could be capable of even more total volume if the team returns to the high-pass-attempt offense that preceded 2017.

Also, Thomas has only managed two touchdown receptions this season. Both of those have occurred in the red zone on six targets. That target figure is actually behind both Alvin Kamara (nine) and Mark Ingram (eight)m a year after he led the team in those opportunities (19). That change in usage is partially a result of the dynamism shown by the two running backs, but could also be attributed to the lack of threats opposite Thomas.

Going back to his campaign to reach 1,000 receiving yards for the second straight season, Thomas has six games left (barring injury), so would need to average just over 40 yards per contest. Considering he has managed at least 40 yards in 24 of 25 career games, this is as close as can be to a certainty given good health.

Confidence level: 99.9%

What does this mean for fantasy?

A strong rookie season gave Thomas a seventh-place 2016 fantasy finish in PPR leagues and ninth place in standard leagues among wide receivers. With the aforementioned touchdown decline this year, Thomas is still performing well in PPR leagues (seventh) but slipped to 15th in standard scoring formats. Considering his average depth of target has increased by over two yards (to 10.3), Thomas is making up for that touchdown drought with increased yards per opportunity. Let other owners be turned off by the lack of end-zone trips and use this time to acquire him in dynasty leagues where trading is still available. This might be the last low point until Brees retires.