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Spotlight - WR Joey Galloway, Tampa Bay Buccaneers

Posted on 7/30, exclusive to Footballguys.com

Jeff Pasquino's Thoughts

Joey Galloway enters the 2007 season as the #1 receiver once again for Tampa Bay.  Questions abound for both Galloway and also with the entire Buccaneer offense.  Who will be the starting quarterback?  How well will Cadillac Williams do in his third season?  Is Galloway aging gracefully or just aging?  Inquiring minds want to know.

There are a handful of reasons to really like Galloway this year.  He'll likely be one of the later primary wide receivers to get selected in most fantasy drafts, so that alone represents some value.  His current ADP has him at the 27th WR to go in fantasy drafts, and for a receiver who has been in the Top 15 for each of the last two seasons that is an immense value -- if he repeats those numbers.

Therein lies the question -- can he repeat that performance? Galloway will turn 36 this season, and few WRs over age 35 have had stellar fantasy performances.  For example, there have been just four seasons of 1,000 or more yards receiving by a wideout that was 36 or older -- and three of them were by some guy named Jerry Rice (Charlie Joiner was the fourth).  Now, health, athleticism and modern medicine are lengthening careers for aging stars in all sports, so the history may be amended this season, but the odds are clearly against Joey Galloway to repeat his 2006 numbers.

For every plus I can state about Galloway, there seems to be a minus.  Galloway is the #1 option in Tampa Bay -- good.  His QB situation is an aged veteran that has had questionable arm strength (bad news for a deep threat) -- bad.  Galloway has had 22 touchdowns in the past three years -- good.  His receptions to target ratio (44%) was among the worst of all league leaders -- bad.

Positives

• Galloway is the primary receiver in an offense that needs to throw
• He has put up two consecutive Top 15 fantasy receiver seasons
• Galloway has recorded 22 touchdowns in the past three seasons, the same number as Plaxico Burress
• The options in the Tampa Bay passing game are limited -- who else is going to catch the ball for the Bucs?
• Jeff Garcia is a cagey veteran and he represents an improvement from last year -- a woeful combination of Chris Simms, Bruce Gradkowski and Tim Rattay

Negatives

• Galloway turns 36 this season, a number that rarely represents value for a wideout
• Despite his Top 15 fantasy season (62-1057-7), Galloway had one of the weakest target conversion percentages of the Top 20 WRs at just 44%
• Galloway is a deep threat that averaged over 17 yards per catch in 2006. His new QB, the veteran Jeff Garcia, does not have a reputation for a deep arm
• Other options are likely to manifest for the Tampa Bay receiving corps -- Michael Clayton, TE Alex Smith and even Cadillac Williams are threats to see more targets this coming season
• Defenses will roll coverage over Galloway to limit his targets

Final Thoughts

After deliberating all the good and bad points over Galloway, there is one word that I have to use to describe the outlook for 2007 -- value.  There are few WRs that can be taken after Round 6 of most drafts and still finish amongst the Top 10 WRs for the year, and one of those is Galloway.  Is it a lock?  Absolutely not.  If it was, Galloway wouldn't be available in Round 7, now would he?  That's the point -- Galloway is a nice upside play to make as your third (or fourth) WR for your fantasy team.  When looking at all the other options, there are a handful of wideouts that may have the potential for a Top 10 finish. However, I would wager that Galloway is the only one of the many receivers to be drafted after the Top 25 in most drafts that has ever finished in the Top 10.  For that reason alone, he is worth the pick. Taking all the different factors into consideration -- from QB questions to challengers for catches at WR2 to increased targets for Williams out of the backfield -- I arrived at my best bet for Galloway's stat line.  My prediction for 2007 for Joey Galloway is 130 targets, 70 catches and 1100 yards. That would put him at just under 16 yards per catch, which is below his 17 YPC from 2006 but more aligned with his 2005 and previous best seasons.  Given that Garcia is less of a deep ball thrower, I expect that he may have more 10 yard catches than 30+ yard receptions.  As with many WRs this year, the difference will come down to his touchdown totals. I'm taking the average of the last three years and giving Galloway seven scores for this year's campaign.

So if you add it all up, Galloway would register 152 fantasy points in FBG scoring, and tally another 70 in PPR leagues (a total of 222 points), which would put him in the 14-17 range of 2006 WR performances in both scoring systems -- pointing once again to a nice WR2 option that can be had later than he should be.  That, again, represents a value that we are all seeking in our drafts.  With his unique potential to be a #1 WR, I see little downside in taking Galloway in Round 6 or 7 in most drafts.

Quotations from the Message Board Thread

LHUCKS:
So when he last had a competent QB in this system Galloway puts up nearly 1300 yards and double digit TDs. You give him a completely incompetent QB/O-line for the majority of '06 and he dips by 21 receptions but his Y/R go up amazingly given his age. Subsequently, he is underrated by the "experts" and all the sharks point and laugh at the FF magazine rankings as they swipe him in the middle rounds of the WCOFF. Everybody and their mom is underrating this guy because he's not loud like a T.O. and because he's not young like a Larry Fitzgerald.

SSOG:
I've historically been a very big fan of Joey Galloway. I've owned him and started him more often than not for the past two seasons (Galloway and Glenn both, actually). With that said, I think this is the year that I finally jump off of Galloway's bandwagon.

Why? I'm not concerned about his age, or at least not entirely. I'm not convinced that he's losing a step after he averaged 17 yards per catch last year. What I *AM* concerned with was his dramatic dropoff in production last year- and I'm not talking about his season-ending numbers, which were still very decent (he was WR15 according to FBGs scoring). No, I'm talking about the dramatic dropoff in catch%, yards per target, and points per target- it was really Galloway's insane number of targets that kept him afloat as a fantasy player. Beyond just the stats, watching him play, there were long periods of time where Galloway simply disappeared last year, including two games where he failed to even register a catch. When you're 28 and you see a sudden and precipitous drop in production, then it's much easier for me to chalk it up to a bad year... but when you're about to turn 36 and you see a sudden drop, then it's time for me to start asking whether or not this is a sign of things to come.

Now, I think you could easily argue that perhaps the drop in effectiveness corresponded with a decline in the quality of his situation, and that's a very valid argument, but the question then becomes whether anything is really going to be any better this season. I don't see much reason for hope, that's for sure, since the only big addition is a journeyman backup-type QB who's more known for his WCO than his arm strength.

Another very important point that needs to be made is that only four times in NFL history has a WR gone for 1,000 yards at age 36- and three of those times were Jerry Rice (the other was Jimmy Smith). Likewise, only five times in NFL history has a WR gone for 7+ TDs after age 36- and four of those times were Jerry Rice (the other was Charlie Joiner). Hell, only seven times in NFL history has a WR not named "Jerry Rice" gone for 100 total fantasy points after age 36 (Charlie Joiner x3, Jimmy Smith, Chris Lofton, Tim Brown, Chris Carter).

In other words, this likely going to be the year where I finally stop drafting Joey Galloway.

kensat30:
The biggest risk with Joey Galloway is injury. The guy is a thoroughbred, but one gimpy hamstring or ankle could ruin him. Having a real QB in Garcia will help him, and while I do think we will see him return closer to his 2005 level, he won't quite reach it. Galloway he has never really been a goto WR, and I think a lot of his former owners will agree with me when I say that he can be extremely inconsistent. He will have his amazing weeks and some stinkers to go with it, but that can be said for a lot of WRs. Still, I tend to him down along with guys like Santana Moss into a lower category due to his liability during weeks when he doesn't blow up. I'd be extremely happy with him as a WR#3 though.

Joey Galloway Projections