Buffalo Bills WR Keon Coleman’s traits translating to NFL

Despite the pre-draft naysayers, Coleman’s production is promising after only eight games

The most predominant criticisms about Buffalo Bills rookie wide receiver Keon Coleman have rang loud since the team elected to trade down out of the first round and select the former Florida State product with the 33rd overall pick in the 2024 NFL Draft.

“Can he separate from man coverage?”
“Why wasn’t he more productive in college?”
“Isn’t the 40 yard dash time concerning?”

The concerns rang loud even before the pick was made simply due to the fact that the Bills traded down with the Kansas City Chiefs as the first of their two maneuvers — who promptly selected the historically speedy wide receiver Xavier Worthy out of Texas.

One thing that not even the most ardent Keon Coleman detractors could deny was that the 6’4”, 215-pound transfer from Michigan State had skills. They were on display when Coleman put up a dazzling gauntlet drill at the NFL Scouting Combine and they showed up in highlight reels. By that point, he had shown two skills in particular that have translated well on his NFL journey thus far:

Catching technique and yards-after-catch ability.

Even if Coleman never became an alpha “WR1” in the NFL (and very few draft selections do), a player can have a long and productive career off just those two traits. Add to that the fact that Coleman is a willing and physical blocker, and you have a recipe for long-term, gainful employment in the NFL.

Let’s take a quick look at these two Coleman traits:

Catching technique

Keon Coleman has received 23 catchable targets this year per FantasyPros. He’s caught 21 of them and is credited with two drops. That’s a 91.3% catch rate on catchable passes. For league-wide context, here are some other figures, sorted by receivers with between 23 and 30 catchable targets:

• Marvin Harrison Jr. — 86.6% catch rate on catchable passes
• Jerry Jeudy — 86.6%
• Jaylen Waddle — 86.6%
• Brandon Aiyuk — 86.6%
• Tee Higgins — 100%
• Michael Pittman Jr. — 100%
• Michael Wilson — 93.5%
• Darius Slayton — 87.9%
• Ray Ray McCloud (former Bills legend) — 100%
• Mike Evans — 93.3%
• Romeo Doubs — 93.3%
• Christian Kirk — 96.6%
• Jauan Jennings — 93.1%
• Jalen Tolbert — 100%
• Tank Dell — 90%
• Tutu Atwell — 92.9%
• Davante Adams — 96.3%
• Calvin Ridley — 89.3%
• Rashee Rice — 96.2%
• Deebo Samuel Sr. — 100%
• Xavier Legette — 92.3%
• Cooper Kupp — 96%
• Tre Tucker — 100%
• Greg Dortch — 92%

It’s generally assumed that degree of difficulty on catches increases as distance from the line of scrimmage increases over a meaningful sample size. Sure, you’ll have some wide-open targets 30 yards down the field on occasion where your job as a receiver is to Chris Watson the ball and just catch the punt, but catch rate decreases for offenses across the league as average distance of target increases.

Keon Coleman has a 13.3 yard average distance of target in 2024. This is 21st in the league among receivers with 20 or more targets (sample size: 94). Not a single receiver who has a higher catch rate on catchable targets than Keon Coleman, when controlling mildly for volume as done above, has a higher ADoT than Coleman. Conclusion: The average catch difficulty for Coleman is higher than most receivers in his sample of catchable targets, yet his catch rate is around average for that sampling.

What else, apart from distance, makes a pass more difficult to catch? It being contested by a defender. Eleven of Coleman’s 34 targets have been contested this year (32.4%). Of the wide receiver sample listed above, Only Harrison, Doubs, Jennings, Wilson, and Legette have a higher percentage of their targets that are contested.

With an above-average ADoT for receivers in his target grouping and an above-average contested-catch percentage among receivers in his target grouping (therefore, a higher average catch difficulty), Keon Coleman has a perfectly reasonable catchable target catch percentage. His hands and catching technique have been as advertised, and have translated to the NFL thus far.

Yards-after-catch ability

Keon Coleman is number one in the NFL in average yards after catch over expectation.

Coleman is averaging an absolutely absurd 9.0 yards after the catch per reception. That’s second in the NFL behind Detroit Lions speedster Jameson Williams. In fact, Williams is the only player with even close to equivalent average YAC per catch to Coleman, who has an ADoT in the same range (13.8 ADoT for Williams). For some Bills-related context, YAC-celebrated wide receiver Khalil Shakir averages 8.3 yards after the catch per reception and his ADoT is 3.6.

These two things (catching technique and yards after the catch), in combination, have led to Coleman being 22nd in the NFL in yards per route run amongst the 94 receivers with 20 or more targets.

He’s doing it exactly like his supporters thought he would do it, and with the addition of Amari Cooper and the return to health of Khalil Shakir, it’s giving the Bills a top trio of wide receivers that could be better than anticipated in the aftermath of the 2024 NFL Draft.

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…and that’s the way the cookie crumbles. I’m Bruce Nolan with Buffalo Rumblings. You can find me on Twitter and Instagram @BruceExclusive and look for new episodes of “The Bruce Exclusive” every Thursday on the Rumblings Cast Network — see more in my LinkTree!