Fantasy Football Devy: Drake London vs John Metchie

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Drake London and John Metchie are the next WRs I compare for the 2022 class. How do they stack up to the rest of the WR class?

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The next two 2022 eligible players I took a look at for fantasy football devy are Drake London from USC, and John Metchie from Alabama. Both players come from blueblood programs but obviously, Alabama is on a totally different level right now.

Metchie has not gotten the opportunity with all of the great WR talent Alabama has had in the last couple of years. London has not had the same talent ahead of him, but has performed well behind two NFL drafted WRs. Let’s take a look at how they compare and who has the better NFL profile – which will help your fantasy football team.

Player Profiles

London came into college as a two-sport athlete and many of his offers have had successful programs recently in basketball. London decided to stay in California, choosing USC over other west coast schools like Arizona, Arizona St, California, and UCLA.

Metchie is a Canadian product but played high school in Maryland and New Jersey. He had plenty of interest from big programs but decided on Alabama over Georgia, Michigan, Notre Dame, and Penn St.

Above data is found under Jerrick Backous Patreon  

The Film

As discussed in the previous piece on Burks and Bell and Olave and Wilson, below are the eight traits I have identified to grade receivers on. The traits were tied 4-4, but Metchie had a slight edge on the overall score. But as we will soon see, in analytics, London really had a big advantage.

Analytics

As I am always looking to improve my evaluation process, I have updated how I grade a player’s ‘break-out’ year and dominator rating. Britt Sanders led me to the below tweet using an adjustment based on tiers of competition on their own team. I adjusted some of the tiers but stayed pretty in line with Joel’s.

Talent on teams varies. For some, it’s harder to get on the field over 5⭐️ recruits compared to no stars. (Calvin Ridley, Michael Thomas, etc.)

(Tiers chosen based on recruiting WR, Draft prospect history, etc.) pic.twitter.com/04nEgTIytq

— Joel Smyth (@FF_Smyth) February 21, 2021

London exceeds in rec %, drop %, contested-catch %, and the analytic measures of dominator and breakout year. Metchie does have the edge in yards per reception and average depth of target. Metchie has had much more competition as I mentioned; but last year he was the 2nd guy after the Waddle injury and still did not breakout. This will be a big year to see if he can achieve much higher metrics, now being the supposed main guy at Alabama.

I once again used the same metrics of weighted dominator and reception yards per team pass attempt as before. Since I believe these two receivers are in the 2nd tier for 2022, I used comparable players drafted in the 2nd to 4th rounds.

 

The regression line on both graphs shows the average for the Top-24 WRs in the NFL. You can see in these two graphs from campus2canton.com, both are below the regression line on dominator; but Metchie is above the line in his 2nd year in reception yards per pass attempt. One positive for both players is that Michael Pittman never reached the regression line in either category and still was selected in the 2nd round of the NFL Draft.

Perception

It was a surprisingly large victory for Metchie on Twitter with 37 of the 59 overall votes. This may be because more people know about Metchie from Alabama, but USC is not a small school either; although most of their games are on later at night.

Ok Devy Peeps. Who would u rather have right now?@MyFantasyLeague @FFLeagueWinners @dynasty_lounge @IDPGuys

— Brandon Haye (@hayeb3) June 23, 2021

Here are also some comments from people on Twitter for both prospects.

Drake London

[pickup_prop id=”9010″]

• Demonstrates toughness at the catch point
• As physically gifted as any USC receiver we have seen in a long time
• Great size/speed combo
• Looks like the next Mike Evans on film

John Metchie

[pickup_prop id=”9011″]

• Crafty Route Runner
• Great blocker and a very complete player
• Tough and high points passes
• Reliable vertical threat

Outlook in the NFL

My evaluation of the two prospects has them below Bell, Burks, Olave, and Wilson. While Metchie had the edge in the film, London had such a big edge in analytics that I ranked him higher. I do think because of speed and how Alabama has produced 1st round WRs, Metchie has the higher ceiling in the NFL (and for fantasy football) with a strong Junior year.

Drake London

London has the bigger size but the scheme at USC has him in the slot most of the time. This could be helpful in the NFL – so he can be moved around – but I do wonder if teams will question if he can play outside, and if he can beat man coverage.

London is great against zone coverage and attacks the ball in the air. The main issue I saw was his vision after the catch. He would not take great angles or cuts, and that limited his yards after the catch. I think London could move up to the 2nd round in the NFL Draft with a good Junior year; but a lot of that will depend if Kedon Slovis can return to his freshman season form.

John Metchie

Metchie has waited his turn and will now be the go-to receiver at Alabama. Will he show that he just needed more opportunity, or he is a big step back from the previous WRs drafted in the 1st Round? Of the two, I believe Metchie could sneak into the 1st round because of his speed and explosion.

Metchie had some huge games last year, but with a new offensive coordinator and a lack of another proven WR, showing more consistency week to week is a real question. I think if he improves his route running and becomes stronger against contact, he could move up draft boards and in your fantasy football league in 2022.