Chad Johnson is the player in question.

t_rob is FOR Johnson being a valuable fantasy WR this season
Bullies is AGAINST Johnson being a valuable fantasy WR this season

Do your best to convince us your side is the right one.

"He who has begun has half done. Dare to be wise; begin!"
--Horace

This message has been edited. Last edited by: TenTimes,

Okay, I guess I'll start.

Johnson has proven he can be a top threat in this league, but only after the emergence of Jon Kitna in the 2nd half of the 2002 season and during 2003. With Carson Palmer being thrown into the fire this year, Johnson's numbers will suffer. Not only does Palmer have zero experience under his belt, but there will be IMO added pressure on him to succeed because he knows Kitna was getting the job done already. Had Kitna not performed as well as he has of late, the transition would be easier for Palmer.

Also, Rudi Johnson showed flashes of greatness last year while sharing time with Dillon. Rudi will have to prove that he is a full-time back this season, and will have to carry the additional burden of taking pressure off of Palmer all the time. The jury is still out on whether Rudi is ready to face the big-time role.

I think Johnson will get alot of looks as Palmer zeroes in on him, but this will also create regular double-teams, and I think it will frustrate Chad much of the year. I think the biggest effect on Johnson's numbers will be TD catches. I think he'll be hovering right around 5, as they'll have trouble with the red zone passing game.

Chad Johnson is a 6'1" 192lb, 26 year old phenom that is single handedly returning the Bengal ROAR to Cincinatti. He is an electric receiver with excellent hands, burner speed and an absolute game breaking ability. His combination of production, youth and untapped potential should force fantasy owners to look at him very early on draft day.

The question is how early? Bullies, nor anyone else can dispute the fact that Chad Johnson is an elite receiver. I think most are satisfied with his positioning somewhere in the top 6 maybe 7 on the receiver board. So I am going to do my damndest to convice you that Chad Johnson is number three. I will only allow Randy Moss and Torry Holt posiitons ahead of Chad Johnson for I feel he needs one more year of excellent productivity to contend with those two. I will present all kinds of numbers and theories that support my claim. I will take apart a few of the other top receivers in an effort to discredit them as much as credit CJ. Afterall, if he is climbing the board. Who is he knocking down? First and foremost... the numbers:

2001 3 Starts
28 Rec 328 Yds & 11.8 yd/rec with 1TD

2002 14 Starts
69 Rec 1166 Yds & 16.9 yd/rec with 5TD's

2003 14 Starts
90 Rec 1355 Yds & 15.1yd/rec with 10TD's

As you can see CJ beat the usual three year WR curve and performed quite well in year two. However year three was a breakout and an improvement in virtually every statistic.

In 2003 NFL Rankings:
4th - Total Yards Receiving (1355)
4th - Total Receiving TD's (10)
8th - Total Receptions (90)
3rd - Total Yards/Rec's of Players w/ 60+ Rec's

Per Fanball.com Chad Johnson was on the receivng end of 157 balls in 2003. He was able to land 90 of them for a 57.3 Completion percentage rate. Condisering the 15 yards he had per recption and the mediocre QB play that is quite the amazing feat.

I want to close this segment for now with Chad Johnson's contract status. On November 12, 2003, CJ signed a five-year extension worth a reported $25 million that will keep him in Cincy through the 2009 season. The deal included a signing bonus of between $10 and $12.5 million. This marks one of the first times the Bungals actually made a solid personal decision. Heck even they know what Chad Johnson is capable of... IT IS THAT OBVIOUS.

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Originally posted by Bullies:
Johnson has proven he can be a top threat in this league, but only after the emergence of Jon Kitna in the 2nd half of the 2002 season and during 2003.

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This is not a case of a QB making a WR. It is quite the opposite my friend. Jon Kitna didn't start to perform at a high level until the emergence of Johnson. Like a selfless pointguard CJ has elevated the play of everyone around him. A career mediocre QB suddenly puts up probowl like numbers. A virtual unknown 3rd year RB breaks on the scene and nearly produces
1000yds. Career long bust Peter Warrick breaks his single season high mark in every statistical category. And most importantly, the Bengals at 8-8, finsih the year without a losing record.

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The jury is still out on whether Rudi is ready to face the big-time role.

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I agree with this statement but disagree on the effect your insinuating. I don't think it matters one way or the other for Chad Johnson if Rudi is the real deal or not. With the draft acquisition of Chris Perry Cincy basically assured themselves of a solid running game. As a team they mustered 124.2yds a game which ranked 13th in the NFL. And they did this among a full blown RB controversy.

quote:

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I think Johnson will get a lot of looks as Palmer zeroes in on him, but this will also create regular double-teams

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I offer this as proof to dispell this as a negative against CJ:

Chad Johnson: 90 Rec's
Peter Warrick: 79 Rec's
Brandon Bennett: 25 Rec's
Matt Schobel: 24 Rec's

I think it's safe to say Jon Kitna zeroed in on two options all season long. That is tunnel vision. Carson can do no worse.

Here's an angle you can work if you want to continue this Bullies. This is my ranking of the receivers in a performance based scoring league.

1. Randy Moss
2. Torry Holt
3. Chad Johnson
4. Marvin Harrison
5. Hines Ward
6. Laverneus Coles
7. Terrell Owens
8. Derrick Mason
9. Santana Moss
10. Steve Smith
11. Anquan Boldin

So I guess bascially we need not argue CJ is good. But how good is he? I am saying 3. Care to argue that?

You at least have to say that Johnson's emergence coincided with Kitna's. Because they both got hot at the same time. I don't think Johnson was the reason that Kitna all of a sudden became a solid QB. Plus, Kitna had struggled through all of his growing pains and finally had the full season of starting to show signs of improvement. When he started getting comfortable, Johnson's numbers improved and he got noticed. So, I'm still leaning toward Kitna's overall comfort level and improvement as being a catalyst to Johnson's coming out party. Would Akili Smith have benefitted CJ in the same way in 2002 and 2003? No way. Now, I think we all believe that Palmer is better than Smith, but if Palmer was the savior, why didn't he play at all last year? That's highly unusual for the #1 pick in a draft.

Look at Byron Leftwich last year. He was drafted as the Jags' future star. They put a solid veteran on the bench to get him in there. And look what happened to Jimmy Smith's numbers. And all of this with one of the best RB's in the game behind him. Leftwich struggled, and Smith suffered because of it. And I typically don't buy into guys learning by watching, so why no Palmer? And why all of a sudden should we believe he's ready now?

As for Kitna "zoning in" on two guys, how many QB's have more than two solid WR's to throw to. Very few. I don't think you'll find many teams with two guys catching 80 balls. So I don't think you can say that Kitna did that last year. I just think it's more obvious for a rookie QB to always look for the stud WR, who is the safe bet to get open. But, defenses recognize this, and adjust to that WR until the QB proves he can beat them with 2nd or 3rd options consistently.

Since we both know CJ is very talented, I agree that we must now figure out exactly where he falls in among the other WR's in the league. I think third is very generous. Without hesitation, I would have Moss and Harrison as my top two. They are both on pass-happy offenses and have been consistent pro-bowl caliber players. Holt would be next. His bust out last year was huge, despite Bulger's inconsistency. They have a full season together now and I see no reason for Holt to slip.

My next group then will have Owens, CJ, Mason, and Coles. Owens will get his numbers because he will demand them and Philly will look foolish if they don't utilize him. Also, i think McNabb will be excited to finally have a stud to throw to. I will put Mason next because he's improved steadily the last 3-4 years regardless of double-teams and a poor running game. He and McNair are at their peaks. Coles finally has a solid QB and a reliable running game and should post his best numbers as a pro. That leaves CJ at about 7th best. None of the others I've listed have rookie QB's. They're all veterans, and they all have solid RB situations except maybe Tennessee. I think Chad fits in here with Hines Ward and Santana Moss, two guys that have had success on less-than-stellar offenses, mostly because they are that good themselves. just like Chad.

I only have a few minutes right now. So I will be brief for now.

I like Jon Kitna and would hate to bank my argument on how mediocre he is. But I will say this. Carson Palmer is the better QB. Marvin Lewis says he is the better QB. John Kitna himself has agreed to a restructure of his contract to lessen his compensation because he too knows Carson Palmer is the better QB. There is no doubt Palmer will at times struggle but that does not mean CJ's numbers wil tank.

Jimmy Smith is not the same caliber WR CJ is today. Leftwich was thrown into the flames immediatelty and struggled. I agree that snaps teach the most but a year to acclimate ones self with the NFL and learn the playbook certainly can not hurt.

I ofcourse love Marvin Harrison just like the rest of the world. But I think a combination of father time and the emergence of some other receiving options will take away some numbers. Reggie Wayne finally looks capable of producing starter tyoe numbers. Brandon Stokely adds a slot dimension this team never had. They have 3 quality tightends in Marcus Pollard, Ben Hartstock, and Dallas Clark. Plus the Edge gets his share of yearly receptions.

I will find some more numbers to back my claims and add a few other angles to the argument late tonight or some time wednesday.

I was thinking on the lines of Woodstock's mentioning of QB's such as Vick learning the ropes for a year or two before seeing action. So just to name a few QB's that did not play much or any of their rookie years despite being high picks...

Steve McNair (1995 3rd Pick - 6 Starts 1st 2 Years Total)
Daunte Culpepper (1999 11th Pick - Zero Snaps)
Chad Pennington (2000 18th Pick - 12 for 25 thru 2001)
Michael Vick (2001 1st Pick - 2 Starts)

There is absolutely no reason Carson can not get a piece of this action as well.

This is year three for some of todays elite wide receivers.

81Rec 1363Yds 16.8Ave 7TDs - Holt
90Rec 1355Yds 15.1Ave 10TDs - Johnson
77Rec 1437Yds 18.7Ave 15TDs - R. Moss
59Rec 776Yds 13.2Ave 7TDs - Harrison
89Rec 1264Yds 14.2Ave 5TDs - Coles
67Rec 1097Yds 16.4Ave 14TDs - Owens
48Rec 672Yds 14.0Ave 4TDs - Ward
74Rec 1105Yds 14.9Ave 10TDs - S. Moss

As you can see CJ finished:
1st Receptions (90)
3rd Yards (1355)
4th Average (15.1)
3rd Touch Downs (10)

That is good company to be in and CJ didn't give much to anyone of these guys.

Next will look at year 4 for the players and see what we might be able to expect from CJ.

Which of these guys went from a veteran starter at QB, whom they had experience with to a rookie with no snaps in their 4th year? I'll take a look, but I already know it's probably zero. A player's developement can only increase if the rest of his teammates abilities increase or at least stay the same. Especially in the case where the player directly relies upon one teammate (Palmer) for his numbers.

Just as I suspected, I found some very interesting info. Only one of those players had a drop-off in their 4th year. That player was also the only one with a QB who never played a down in the NFL and went on to start almost the whole season. The WR is Owens and the QB is Garcia. Owens' numbers dropped from 1,097 yards and 14 TD's in his third year with Young to 754 yards and 4 TD's with Garcia in year 4. That's HUGE!! Young got hurt in game 3 and Garcia played the rest of the way. The other WR's all improved or stayed about the same because no chemistry was changed.

Jeff Garcia was a 29 year old undrafted rookie in 1999. He started 10 games and finished with 2500 yard 11TDs & 11INTs. Terrell Owens played in 14 games that year and managed the numbers you already mentioned: 60 for 754 & 4TDs. But the great Jerry Rice was still there too and he only got 67 for 830 & 5TDs. I am not going to argue it took Garcia some time to adjust to the NFL level. I will however argue the two players abilities and potential. Garcia was a CFL player because the NFL snubbed him. He gets by on guts and drive while a guy like Palmer simply has the ability.

Garcia turned out fine and is a good NFL QB today. But you can not compare an undrafted 29 year old rook to Carson Palmer.

Also the two players that are really ahead of CJ in the above comparison are Randy Moss and Torry Holt. Randy Moss is the best in the biz and has no equals. While Holt is a good receiver he also benefits from the extreme pass happy offense that is the St. Louis Rams.

CJ has done what he has done in Cincinfrickennatti!

A few examples of chemistry:

Randy Moss
77-1437-15 in 2000 w/ Culpepper
80-1413-11 in 1999 before Daunte
His TD's went up with new QB.

Eric Moulds
100-1287-10 in 2002 w/ Bledsoe
67-904-5 in 2001 before Bledsoe
Career Highs Across the Board with new QB.

Peerless Price
94-1252-9 in 2002 w/ Bledsoe
55-895-7 in 2001 before Bledsoe
+40 Receptions +350 Yards & +2TD's with new QB.

Steve Smith
88-1110-7 in 2003 w/ Delhomme
54-872-3 before Jake got there
Major increase of production with new QB.

Joe Horn
83-1265-9 in 2001 w/ Brooks
94-1340-8 before Brooks
Numbers dipped a little with new QB.

Laveranues Coles
89-1264-5 in 2002 w/ Chad Pennington
59-868-7 in 2001 before Chad took over
30 More Catches, 400 More Yards and a Hell of a lot of Dan Snyder's Doe!

Out of these few only Horn stats slipped, and even his were still pretty damn good. I don't doubt you can find example of just the opposite. But the point is, chemistry is overrated.

Okay I'm almost done with CJ, here is some random offerings:

Lets look at the divsion he plays in and his 2004 schedule, along with some averages.

The Steelers, Browns and Ravens join the Bengals in the AFC's North division.

Wk - Team - 2003 Pass D Rank - Starting CB's
1 at Jets - 11 - Abraham/Barrett
2 Miami - 21 - Surtain/Madsion
3 Baltimore - 7 - McCallister/Baxter
4 at Pittsburgh - 12 - Scott/Townsend
5 bye
6 at Cleveland - 5a - McCutcheon/Henry
7 Denver - 5b - Bailey/Herndon
8 at Tennesse - 30 - Rolle/Dyson
9 Dallas - 1 - Newman/Hunter
10 at Washington - 13 - Smoot/Springs
11 Pittsburgh - 12 - Scott/Townsend
12 Cleveland - 5a - McCutcheon/Henry
13 at Baltimore - 7 - McCallister/Baxter
14 at New England - 17 - Law/Poole
15 Buffalo - 2 - Clement/Vincent
16 Giants - 26 - Allen/Peterson
17 at Philadelphia - 16 - Shepperd/Brown

The Cowboys, Bills and Broncos had the best pass defenses in 2003 and each of them will face the Bengals in Cincinatti. Plus the Bills replaced Winfield with Vincent... a downgrade. The Boys lost Mario Edwards and will use Peter Hunter instead... arguably a downgrade. However Denver added Champ Bailey... so that hurts.

CJ's division only sports Chris McCallister as a true shut down type corner. Otherwise, the Browns and the Steelers have no one that can match CJ's talent.

2003 Ave's
Thrown to 9.8 times per game
Receptions 5.6 per game
84.7 Yards per game
0.6 Touch Downs per game

Within the div CJ averaged:
Steelers - 8.5TT/5Rec - 97Yds & 0.5TD
Browns - 6TT/3.5Rec - 48Yds & 1TD
Ravens - 7TT/3.5Rec - 72.5Yds & 0.5TD
Basically Chad averaged 4 catches for 72.5yds & 0.67TD's in the 6 games within his division.

The Bengals ranked 28th in scoring defense allowing 24 points a game in 2003. Marv did little to upgrade so the Stripes will have to score to be competitive in 2004. Which should mean more scoring op's for Chad Johnson and the gang.

30% of Jon Kitna's pass attempts went to Johnson
31% of Jon Kitna's pass completions went to Johnson
57% of Jon Kitna' passes to Johnson were completed
That means 57% of the times Kitna through the ball in Chad Johnson's direction the Stripes gained an average of 15 yards.

Fantasy playoff weeks 15 and 16 the Bengals play the Bills then the Giants at home. If your league uses week 17 the Bengals travel to Philly and face Sheldon Brown and Litto Shepperd in a game that could mean nothing to the Eagles (assuming they lock up early).

Fast Fact: Chad Johnson's 2003 probowl numbers - 5Rec 156Yds & 1TD marks the first time a Bengal EVER scored an offensive point in a probowl... EVER!

Paul Brown stadium is also supposed to have a better playing surface in natural turf, heated to extend growing season and prevent frozen field.

Chad Johnson is so confident in his scoring ability that he recently said this, “I’m looking for a signature move that doesn’t get me in trouble and I think it would be cool for the fans to send in their ideas,” Johnson said earlier this week. “I need some help from the fans. Put it on the internet big and let’s see what they have." He received over 300 e-mails from fans suggesting TD dances and such. Ickey Woods may finally get some competition!

This message has been edited. Last edited by: t_rob,

Okay, I'll try to be brief, then we can end this thing. As for your QB/WR chemistry stats, I'm not sure what the point is. For Moss, his best season for TD's was his rookie season with Cunningham, so his numbers didn't go up with Culpepper, they went down for three straight years.

I'll give you Moulds-Bledsoe. But Price's numbers went down dramatically when he went to Atlanta. Yes, Vick was out. But he was still the number one WR with an inexperienced QB and his numbers suffered.

Steve Smith? It was his third year. The natural progression had alot to do with that. But, Delhomme did surprise alot of people. Then again, he had five years to study from the sidelines, not one.

Brooks-Horn is a wash. Brooks was Horn's QB for the last 8 games in 2000, so was directly responsible for half of Horn's production that year. So, the next two year's numbers are moot.

Coles' numbers in 2001 were only his 2nd season, regardless of who was QB.

The point being, all those numbers are meaningless. You only showed one side of them.

As for the defenses he'll face this year, last year's numbers are also meaningless. Teams change alot from year to year, so it's hard to say how much the defenses he faces have improved or declined in the off-season.

Kitna only completed 57% of his passes to CJ? That's below what you'd expect from your QB/#1 WR.

I'm not really interested in CJ's pro-bowl numbers or what kind of turf he's playing on this year. If you're good, you perform well on all kinds of turf.

My final poke at this one:

The point of the numbers is to show that a QB change doesn't equal lesser production due to lack of chemistry. I only showed one side of them because I am only arguing for one side of this debate!

Jake Delhomme didn't learn the Panther playbook or practice with the Panther players for 5 years. He did that in New Orleans. So he had to relearn everything and quickly develop chemistry with the Cats the first year he was there.

Last years numbers for defenses is all we have to go on right now. I know that it isn't an exact science but who the player in question goes up against weekly is important. The only way to get a glimpse of that is to look at the previous year. Fact is CJ could have a a fairly difficult schedule if most of the teams fare as well against the pass as they did in 2003.

I have no idea what the league average is on QB to #1 WR completion percentage. I also don't know why 67 balls thrown at Johnson were not completed. Did he drop them? Good coverage, bad pass ..etc.? But more than half the times I drop back and throw the ball his way the team gets 15 yards. With that average the Bengals should never have to punt.

I mentioned the field because I remember wathcing a couple minutes of Bengals games througout the year. I think they had the worst field in the NFL. Corey Dillon got hurt because of the field last year, that is why they began to resurface it to begin with. It also matters. Do you want Holt and Moss or turf or snow covered grass? It matters.

The probowl bit was for fun. But c'mon, the Bengals have been around since the late 60's (I think)... and this is their first offensive TD in Hawaii (Not counting Blake passes).

Bottom Line Time:
Chad Johnson is clearly a top 5 WR in any league format. In a dynasty league I like him at 3. But with the exceptions of Randy Moss, Torry Holt and Marvin Harrison, no one is better or has more potential. He is a 2nd Round Pick (Late second anyway). You Snooze, You Loose!

Okay I'm finnito!