2025 Bad Values: Xavier Worthy's Speed Is Creating A Crazy ADP

It’s very early in the Draft season to be looking at average draft position (ADP), because players will move up and down as news hits, injuries occur, and signings change depth charts. However, seeing wildly overvalued and undervalued players is worth noting, because even sizable shifts are influenced by where they currently sit. Someone whose ADP seems dramatically high now is likely to still be overinflated come Draft Day, so knowing the outliers can aid preparation. Today, we’ll talk about Chiefs WR Xavier Worthy, a gifted speedster whose spike games in 2024 have fantasy managers drafting a lit bomb on their rosters.

Worthy entered the NFL with a legendary 40-yard dash time, and joined a team with one of the greatest offensive minds in NFL history ready to deploy this unique weapon. He opened the 2024 season with a two-touchdown effort and put that speed on full display. He finished the season with 59 receptions, 638 yards and nine total touchdowns while seeing his production and consistency elevate toward the end of the year. That development is likely what’s fueling his current ADP, which, according to FantasyPros, is at No. 43 overall in half-PPR scoring. That would make him the WR22 off the board, and while Worthy has otherworldly pure speed that is a prohibitive price.

Worthy was second on the Chiefs last season in targets with 98, drawing a 17% target share. That’s decent stuff when your QB is Patrick Mahomes, a guy who is building a resume that could wind up being the greatest of all time. That heavy target share is a bit misleading though, because Rashee Rice was injured in the fourth game of the season, and prior to his injury he was averaging 7.25 targets per game, and pacing for 123 targets on the season. Rice is healthy this offseason and will be a full go in Week 1 barring any new injuries over the summer, and he operates out of the slot where he was absolutely dominating before he got hurt.

Rice occupying the slot is bad news for Worthy, because while Worthy was moved all over the formation as a rookie to maximize his speed, the slot is where his skillset is best suited. Per Reception Perception, Worthy was effective vs. zone posting an 80.1% success rate (64th percentile). He was downright terrible vs. man though, posting just a 20th percentile rate of 60.2%. Worthy was also not really deployed as a “real” receiver. This isn’t me saying he can’t develop as a player and be more of a full field threat, but the way he was used does not show that the Chiefs trusted him to be a focal point. The Chiefs were smart about manufacturing ways for him to use that speed, but it led to very limited usage. 40% of his routes were slants, flats and screens. 17.2% of his total routes were slants, and he only posted a 66.7% success rate on them. For context, when Rice played a whopping 36.7% of his routes were slants, and he was winning at a 78.8% clip. Those routes aren’t going to Worthy when Rice is good to go.

Much of Worthy’s success was also reliant on finding the end zone, typically an unstable source of fantasy production year to year. He led Kansas City in touchdowns, but the Chiefs offense hasn’t been the powerhouse of old in quite some time. KC threw just 26 touchdown passes last year, 11th-most in the NFL, and 28 the previous season which was 9th. There’s always the possibility of a Mahomes explosion – we have seen him hit 50 TD passes before – but Worthy will be battling with Travis Kelce, Hollywood Brown, and the ascendant Rice for a slice of that receiving TD pie. With Kelce coming off a three-touchdown season when he drew 133 targets and had 97 catches, that’s a positive regression candidate. Should Worthy’s touchdown luck regress, I’m not seeing much of a case for him to replace those points through volume.

In all, Worthy’s got talent, he will have spike games, and the Chiefs would be silly to not design plays specifically to get him in space. Worthy’s electric once he has the rock; five of his nine scores were from 10+ yards out, and four of them were longer than 20 yards. But he needs to turn those into touchdowns, because he’s deficient vs. man and press, limiting how much his role can be expanded, and his best place is in the slot where Rashee Rice looks like he might be one of the best in the NFL. At Worthy’s current ADP, you’re taking him ahead of players like DK Metcalf, DeVonta Smith, Jameson Williams and Zay Flowers. These are players who require a lot less effort designed to get them the ball in space, and who can get separation down the field efficiently. Worthy is a worthwhile mid-lateish round pick with potential to pop, but if this is the price you must pay to get him then the juice is more than likely not worth the squeeze.