The veteran wide receiver carousel continued to turn on Tuesday when the Kansas City Chiefs agreed to send a conditional fifth-round pick to the Tennessee Titans for wide receiver DeAndre Hopkins. The move was the team's latest attempt to make up for the loss of Rashee Rice and Hollywood Brown for the season. Their need became even more urgent when recent addition JuJu Smith-Schuster injured his hamstring. He's already been ruled out for Week 8.
The question now is what Hopkins still has left. So far this year, he's been a part-time player, only playing more than half of the offensive snaps twice in six games. But those two weeks were the last two weeks, which should give us some hope that the knee injury Hopkins entered the season with isn't as bad as it was at the start of the year.
Hopkins ranks fifth on the Titans with 107 routes run, but his 19.6% target per route run rate is nearly the same as Calvin Ridley's, and his 1.62 yards per route run leads all Titans receivers. Neither of those numbers look anything like prime Hopkins, but the Chiefs don't need prime Hopkins to help their passing game. Remember, JuJu Smith-Schuster averaged less than 25 yards per game in New England, but the first time he had a snap share over 60% with the Chiefs, he scored 20 PPR Fantasy points. Also, remember, Hopkins accounted for 34% of the Titans receiving yards and 50% of their receiving touchdowns in 2023. Those are elite ratios.
Hopkins should be the best wide receiver in the receiving room, even at 32 years old. If he plays Week 8, view him as a borderline number three wide receiver who probably needs to score a touchdown to be worth starting. He has the potential to become a must-start option as a number three receiver in this offense, so the most important course of action is to make sure Hopkins is rostered in your league, even if there are only 10 teams. The Chiefs have struggled mightily in the red zone, and that's a place Hopkins could really help Patrick Mahomes and this offense. Don't be surprised if he leads them in receiving touchdowns for the rest of the season.
Speaking of Mahomes, this gives you some hope if you've just been holding him and starting him. It also gives you a reason to add him if yours is one of the few leagues where he's been dropped. He's still the best quarterback in football, and it's unlikely he'll continue to struggle in the Fantasy department as he has.
I wouldn't expect this addition to impact Travis Kelce much; he's still a mid-range TE1. Xavier Worthy remains a boom/bust WR3, though I do think he had a better chance of hitting those big plays if the defense has someone else to pay attention to. I would like to hold JuJu Smith-Schuster but understand if you can't.
On the Titans' side of things, this doesn't have a huge impact because Hopkins wasn't doing much. Maybe we see a small target bump for Calvin Ridley and Tyler Boyd. I'm only rostering Boyd in deeper leagues; Ridley should be rostered in most 12-team leagues.
With Hopkins off the market, we're looking at Cooper Kupp and Diontae Johnson as two more veteran wide receivers who could get moved. They have one less positive landing spot available to them now.
