Kansas City signed JuJu Smith-Schuster yesterday, and Twitter (yes, still calling it that) had lots of fretting and alarm about what it meant for incumbent wideouts Rashee Rice, Xavier Worthy and Hollywood Brown. My two cents: very little.
A popular theory was that Kansas City got advance word of a lengthy suspension for Rice. If that pushes Rice down a round or two in my drafts this week, sounds great. I don't think Rice is being suspended before next season. With Hollywood (shoulder), he's probably going to miss a game or two. Maybe JuJu fills in for some snaps, maybe Justin Watson does, maybe (most likely) they both play some. I don't think either will be catching more than a couple of passes a game on occasion -- not a significant factor.
I went to the files to look at Smith-Schuster's history with Kansas City. Back in 2022, the last memory of him with that team is playing a huge role in the Super Bowl shootout with Philadelphia. He caught 7 passes for 53 yards that day, a key receiver on a Super Bowl champ. No one can take that away from him.
That team, however, did not have Rice, or Worthy, or Hollywood Brown. The other wide receivers who saw targets in that Super Bowl for Kansas City were Watson, Skyy Moore, Marquez Valdes-Scantling and Kadarius Toney. The guys who will be most affected by the team signing Smith-Schuster are the ones of those players still on the roster, or perhaps Mecole Hardman. One or two of those guys will be cut by the deadline today; they're the ones most affected by this signing.
Aside from that Super Bowl, Smith-Schuster was mostly a non-factor for most of his season in Kansas City. He started out respectably, catching 44 passes for 582 yards and 2 TDs the first half of the season, averaging 14.3 PPR points. The second half of the season he caught 34 passes for 351 yards and 1 TD, averaging 9.4 points. Among all wide receivers to play at least five games in both the first and second halves of that season, there were 14 who saw their production decline by more than 25 percent. One of them was JuJu, who averaged 34 percent fewer points per week in fantasy leagues.
| WRS DECLINING BY 25 PERCENT IN 2ND HALF, 2022 | |||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Player | Stats(1st) | PPR(1st) | Stats(2nd) | PPR(2nd) | %Chg |
| Tyreek Hill, Mia. | 76-1104-3 | 23.0 | 43-606-5 | 16.8 | -27% |
| Ben Skowronek, LAR | 24-231-1 | 6.9 | 15-145-0 | 4.9 | -28% |
| Nelson Agholor, N.E. | 14-225-1 | 8.5 | 16-135-1 | 5.9 | -30% |
| Stefon Diggs, Buff. | 60-857-7 | 23.5 | 48-572-4 | 16.1 | -31% |
| JuJu Smith-Schuster, K.C. | 44-582-2 | 14.3 | 34-351-1 | 9.4 | -34% |
| Jaylen Waddle, Mia. | 47-812-6 | 18.4 | 28-544-2 | 11.9 | -35% |
| Noah Brown, Dall. | 25-339-1 | 9.3 | 18-216-2 | 5.7 | -38% |
| Allen Lazard, G.B. | 30-427-5 | 14.7 | 30-361-1 | 9.0 | -39% |
| Alec Pierce, Ind. | 25-396-1 | 8.8 | 16-197-1 | 5.2 | -41% |
| Corey Davis, NYJ | 19-351-2 | 9.4 | 13-185-0 | 5.3 | -44% |
| Tyler Boyd, Cin. | 37-537-4 | 13.0 | 21-225-1 | 7.1 | -45% |
| Curtis Samuel, Was. | 45-455-3 | 13.4 | 19-201-2 | 7.2 | -46% |
| Devin Duvernay, Balt. | 25-318-5 | 10.3 | 12-89-0 | 4.8 | -54% |
| Marquise Brown, Ari. | 43-485-3 | 18.3 | 24-224-0 | 7.8 | -58% |
More recently, Smith-Schuster averaged 2.6 catches and 24 yards per game, with 1 TD, for New England last year. He's just 27 years old, but he's modest veteran who Kansas City signed as a depth receiver because he knows the offense and can slowly run a route and draw a defender away from one of the guys Mahomes will actually be trying to get the ball to -- Kelce, Rice, Worthy. He will not be a factor.
--Andy Richardson