Production, the old wisdom holds, happens at the intersection between a player’s skill and his situation. Adrian Peterson’s skill is so favorable that it has resulted in production in inferior offenses like Minnesota’s. Peyton Manning’s offense is so favorable that it has resulted in production with inferior talents like Knowshon Moreno. Between those two extremes, however, fall most fantasy players, their value a combination of their offensive role and their innate ability. Or, to put it into its more common formulation, “talent + opportunity = production”. I find this paradigm to be particularly instructive when evaluating the fantasy prospects of Percy Harvin.
Talent
Percy Harvin is rarely mentioned among the league’s elite receivers, but when his resume is taken as a whole, his talent level is undeniable. Coming out of high school, Percy Harvin was rated as the #1 recruit in the entire nation at any position despite a history of disciplinary issues (after repeated suspensions, the Virginia High School League eventually suspended Harvin from all athletic competition midway through his senior year). In college, Percy Harvin delivered on his promise immediately, starting as a true freshman, earning SEC Freshman of the Year honors, and serving as a key piece on Florida’s national championship team. In Harvin’s sophomore and junior years, he put up eye-popping numbers as good as anyone else to play the game. Over his final two seasons in college, Harvin averaged 127 yards and 1.2 touchdowns per game. Over that two year span, Michael Crabtree twice earned the Biletnikoff Award, given annually to the nation’s top receiver. Crabtree averaged 120 yards and 1.6 touchdowns per game during that stretch.
After dominating the sport at an extremely young age, Harvin declared for the NFL draft. Once again, he was rated very highly despite several character marks against him; Harvin failed a drug test at the NFL combine, but still went in the first round, 22nd overall, to the Minnesota Vikings. Once again, his success was immediate and startling. Harvin compiled 925 yards and 6 touchdowns as a rookie, scoring the second-most fantasy points by any 21-year-old receiver in history, behind Randy Moss and ahead of Larry Fitzgerald. In addition, despite never returning a kick in his college career, Harvin handled kickoffs for the Vikings, returning two for touchdowns and being named to the NFC’s pro bowl squad as a returner. For his efforts, Percy Harvin was named the NFL’s offensive rookie of the year, one of the youngest recipients of the award in league history.
From there, Percy Harvin’s career trended inexorably upwards. After averaging 61.7 yards per game as a rookie, he averaged 69.6 as a sophomore. After averaging 69.6 as a sophomore, he averaged 82.0 per game in his third year. After averaging 82.0 in his third year, Harvin averaged 85.9 in his fourth year. Through the first eight weeks of 2012, Percy Harvin trailed only Wes Welker in receptions, trailed only Reggie Wayne among receivers in yards from scrimmage, and trailed no one in the league in all-purpose yardage. Percy Harvin was a top-24 fantasy receiver in each of his first three seasons, becoming the first receiver to accomplish that feat since Randy Moss pulled it off in 1998-2000, (he has since been joined by A.J. Green from 2011-2013). In PPR leagues, Percy Harvin’s pace through eight games in 2012 would project out to be the second-best fantasy season by a 24-year-old receiver in NFL history, behind only Jerry Rice. At midseason, Harvin was being listed by major publications such as Pro Football Focus, ESPN, and Sports Illustrated as a serious MVP candidate.
Harvin continued to improve as a kickoff returner, too, scoring a touchdown in every season and running his per-return average up to a league-leading 32.5 yards in 2011, and a league-leading (and utterly ridiculous) 35.9 yards in 2012. For some perspective on that final number, 35.9 yards per return is the third-highest average among qualifying returners in the history of the league, and the highest figure since 1967. Percy Harvin’s career average of 28.2 yards per return is the fifth-highest in history, and ranks 2nd among players with at least 100 returns. Percy Harvin, who did not return a single kick in college, has returned a kickoff for a touchdown in all five seasons of his career, including last year where he only attempted two returns all season. His six career kickoff return TDs, including playoffs, trail only Leon Washington (8), Josh Cribbs (8), and Dante Hall (7).
Despite all of that, Harvin feuded with his coaches and wore out his welcome in Minnesota. Despite the many red flags on his resume, Seattle was so enamored with his talent that they traded a 1st, 3rd, and 7th round draft pick to Minnesota for his rights, then immediately made him one of the five highest-paid receivers in the league with a new 5-year, $64.5 million dollar contract extension.
In total, everything about Percy Harvin positively screams that he is an elite talent. From high school to college to the pros, Percy Harvin has put up elite, record-setting production and had team after team spend enormous amounts of capital to acquire his services despite a long string of character-related red flags. And yet, despite all of this, Percy Harvin is rarely- if ever- mentioned among the elite at his position. Why is this? I believe the reason directly relates, not to his production, but to how he gets it. You see, Percy Harvin is quite unlike any other receiver in the NFL. In the University of Florida media guide, Percy Harvin was listed as a running back. In each of his last two seasons, he accounted for more rushing yards than anyone on the team except for Heisman-winning quarterback Tim Tebow. Over his entire college career, Harvin produced 1929/13 receiving… and 1852/19 rushing. He had more carries than receptions, and even an eye-popping 9.5 yard per carry average couldn’t dispel suspicions that that part of his game was a gimmick that would not translate to the faster, more sophisticated NFL.
Those fears would prove to be unfounded. For his NFL career, Harvin has 683 rushing yards at 6.4 yards per carry in the regular season. The former represents the most rushing yards by a wide receiver in NFL history- a career record Harvin set at the tender young age of 24. When last we saw Harvin, he was busy becoming the first wide receiver in Super Bowl history to lead all players- on either team- in rushing yards. Minnesota would occasionally use Percy Harvin as a goal-line vulture for the great Adrian Peterson, lining Harvin in the backfield and giving him a handoff between the tackles. Since Harvin entered the league in 2009, he has accounted for as many carries within the 5 yard line as all other wide receivers in the league combined. It is safe, at this point, to suggest that rushing is a massive part of Harvin’s game, and any analysis that ignores this simple fact is necessarily an incomplete and flawed analysis. When Harvin is the topic of conversation, it is often mentioned derisively that he has never had 1,000 receiving yards in a single season. In fact, he has only once even been on pace for 1,000 receiving yards; in 2012, Harvin was on pace for 1203 receiving yards at the time of his injury. But in most fantasy leagues, rushing yardage counts every bit as much as receiving yardage, and for his career Harvin has produced 925 yards (in 15 games), 975 yards (in 14 games), 1312 yards, and 773 yards (in 9 games). Claims that he hasn’t been productive are spurious and unsubstantiated; remember, only A.J. Green and Randy Moss have opened their career with as many consecutive top-24 fantasy seasons. In Harvin’s final 16 games in Minnesota, he produced 112 receptions, 1492 offensive yards, and 11 offensive touchdowns, (plus one more touchdown on a kickoff return). Those numbers work out to 327.2 fantasy points in PPR leagues, or more points than Josh Gordon has scored in his last 16 games (324.0 points). And he did that with quarterback play that was every bit as bad as Josh Gordon’s.
And all of this actually understates Harvin’s ability as a receiver, anyway. While his rushing yardage has buoyed his fantasy value through the years, Percy Harvin has produced elite numbers purely as a receiver, too. Josh Gordon may have had over 1600 receiving yards last year, but Gordon’s team led the league in passing attempts and ranked 11th in passing yardage with over 4,000. Percy Harvin hasn’t played with a passing offense that potent since his rookie season in 2009. From 2010 to 2012, Minnesota averaged an anemic 2935 yards passing, ranking on average as the 28th best offense in the league in that regard. Pro Football Focus has created a statistic called “Yards per Route Run”, (or YPRR), meant to account for the wildly disparate opportunities that receivers sometimes have. The statistic is quite plain- it’s the amount of receiving yards a player earns divided by the total number of pass routes he runs. It’s the wide receiver equivalent of the quarterback’s Yards per Attempt stat. In YPRR, in his four seasons in Minnesota Harvin ranked 7th, 4th, 5th, and 4th in the league. The only other receiver in the league to also finish in the top 10 in each of those four seasons was Andre Johnson. Brandon Marshall was the only other receiver with even three such finishes. Pro Football Focus has statistics dating back to the 2007 season. Over that span, Hakeem Nicks is the only other player to rank in the top 10 in YPRR in his rookie season. Harvin’s impact on his team’s passing offense was plainest to see in 2012. Over the first half of the season, with Harvin on the field, Christian Ponder averaged 218 passing yards per game at 6.7 yards per attempt. Over the second half of the season, those numbers plummeted to 149 yards per game and 5.4 yards per attempt. Percy Harvin, often denigrated for his skills as a receiver, has consistently been one of the league’s most deadly and efficient receivers since the day he first stepped onto a football field.
Percy Harvin has not only been productive as both a rusher and a receiver, he has been historically productive. If production = talent + situation, then Harvin’s production in an unfavorable situation, catching balls from Christian Ponder in one of the league’s worst passing attacks, speaks volumes about Harvin’s own talent level. Volumes that are corroborated by Harvin’s success at every other stop and the high prices teams keep paying to acquire his services.
Perhaps nothing sums up Harvin’s talent, though, better than the reaction of teammate Adrian Peterson upon learning of Harvin’s trade. Peterson immediately took to twitter and tweeted the following: The best all around player I ever seen or you'll ever see! Goes to Seattle! I feel like I just got kicked in the stomach. Several times!!!
Situation
If Percy Harvin’s talent is undeniable, his situation is an enigma. Harvin is playing for a brand new team, and our only idea of how they will use him is based on a bare handful of snaps played last season between injuries. Will Seattle use Harvin on screens as often as Minnesota did? Will Seattle design running plays for Harvin as often as Minnesota did? Will he return kickoffs?
Fortunately for us, we do have a few leads to go on. Seattle’s current offensive coordinator, Darrell Bevell, was the offensive coordinator for Harvin’s first two years in the NFL. Seattle’s head coach, Pete Carroll, heavily recruited Percy Harvin coming out of high school to play for him at USC. Carroll coached a strikingly similar player in college in Reggie Bush. These indicators are all positive signs for Harvin’s usage. Given how much Harvin thrived under Bevell in Minnesota, it is easy to see him thriving once again. Given how eager Carroll has been to acquire Harvin not once, but twice, it is likely that he has a specific plan in place for how Harvin will be used. Quotes from both parties over the last two seasons suggest that Harvin will retain his status as a swiss-army knife, lining up all over the formation and even returning kicks. Harvin’s usage in limited action last year supports this notion, with five receptions, three rushes, and two kickoff returns. This offseason, the Seahawks are even working Harvin out on punt returns, something he hasn’t done since high school. These signs do not point to a team that wants to limit a player’s contributions to keep him fresh. These signs point to a team that has a shiny new toy and cannot wait to deploy him at every possible opportunity.
But how many opportunities will there possibly be? The Seahawks ranked 31st in passing attempts last season, and 26th in passing yards. In 2012, they ranked 32nd and 27th, respectively. In 2013, Seattle ranked 2nd in rushing attempts and 4th in rushing yards. In 2012, they ranked 1st and 3rd, respectively. In 2013, Seattle ranked 1st in the league in points and yards allowed. In 2012, they ranked 1st in points allowed and 4th in yards allowed. It seems quite clear that the team’s very identity revolves around running the ball and playing great defense. Is it possible for Percy Harvin to thrive in a bottom-5 passing offense?
The answer, of course, is that it obviously is; Minnesota was a bottom-5 passing offense in 2010, 2011, and 2012, and in PPR scoring Percy Harvin ranked 22nd (in 14 games), 8th, and was on pace to finish 3rd. In non-PPR scoring, those finishes were 20th, 7th, and 6th. Playing in a bottom-5 passing offense is nothing new to Harvin, and this once again is where his rushing prowess comes in handy. A team can easily switch to a run-heavy game-plan without taking the ball out of Harvin’s hands. And besides, this ignores the fact that Seattle is hardly destined to remain a bottom-5 passing offense in perpetuity. The Pittsburgh Steelers ranked last in the NFL in passing attempts in each of Ben Roethlisberger’s first two seasons, as they preferred to run the ball and play excellent defense. In Roethlisberger’s third season, they gave him more responsibility and finished 14th in passing attempts and 9th in passing yards. The 2001 New England Patriots ranked 24th in passing attempts as they attempted to keep the burden off the shoulders of a young Tom Brady, but then ranked 4th and 6th over the next two seasons as they took the chains off of their franchise quarterback. Similarly, if Russell Wilson really is a star quarterback in this league- and everything about his young career points to the fact that he is- then eventually Seattle will open up the offense and put the outcome of games on his arm. That may not be this year… but then again, it may be this year.
The biggest difference between Minnesota and Seattle, and the biggest cause of concern for Percy Harvin’s sake, is one of necessity. Outside of his rookie year, Percy Harvin was heavily featured by the Vikings out of pure necessity- other than Adrian Peterson, they had no advantages to press. Their defense was mediocre at its best and awful at its worst. Their quarterback play was atrocious, and no other receivers managed to distinguish themselves. Minnesota basically had no option but to give the ball to Peterson and Harvin over and over, and in the games where Peterson was injured or still recovering from injury, Minnesota featured Harvin even more. That will no longer be true in Seattle. Seattle’s defense is much better, meaning they can play at a slower pace. They will be milking more leads late in the game. Marshawn Lynch and Christine Michael are no Adrian Peterson, but they are very talented backs in their own right. Russell Wilson is a skilled runner who has finished 190 plays with his legs over the past two years.
Perhaps most importantly, Seattle’s secondary and tertiary targets are substantially better than were Minnesota’s. Percy Harvin, like Andre Johnson and Brandon Marshall, frequently finished in the top 10 in yards per route run partly because he got such a high percentage of his team’s targets- after all, yards per route run essentially breaks down to target percentage times yards per target. As with Andre Johnson and Brandon Marshall, Harvin’s huge target percentage was partly an indicator of his own talent, and partly an indictment of the players around him. In 2010, Minnesota’s second-leading receiver was TE Visanthe Shiancoe, and their second-best WR was Bernard Berrian with 28 receptions and 252 yards. In 2011, the second-leading receiver was Michael Jenkins with 38 receptions and 466 yards. In 2012, tight end Kyle Rudolph ranked second on the team in receiving, this time finishing with 53 receptions and just 493 receiving yards, despite Harvin himself missing half of the season. By contrast, Seattle’s secondary options of Doug Baldwin, Jermaine Kearse, Zach Miller, and Luke Willson are not All Pros, but they are quality role players who provide a solid depth of options. In addition, Seattle spent a 2nd round pick in the 2014 draft on receiver Paul Richardson. Rookies typically come along slowly, and Richardson profiles largely as a deep threat, but the fact remains that there are more mouths to feed in Seattle, and a quarterback who is quite capable of progressing through his reads rather than locking on to a primary option.
Even this, though, seems an overrated concern. Just last season, Golden Tate managed to secure 64 receptions for 898 yards. As we said, production = talent + situation. Golden Tate, it should be noted, is not the talent that Percy Harvin is. Instead of Harvin’s 5-year, $64 million contract, when he hit the open market Tate only commanded 5 years and $31 million. According to Tate, Seattle’s offer to him was substantially less than that, even- Tate himself characterized the offer as “laughable” and said it represented a “40% discount” from what he got in Detroit. If true, that would mean Seattle’s offer to Tate was more in the $3.5-million-a-year range, a far cry from the $12m-a-year they recently committed to Harvin. Even if Harvin only manages to match Tate’s receiving numbers, if he meets his career averages in rushing production he will add another 200 yards and 1 TD on the ground. That alone would move Harvin into the top 20 at his position, and would justify his ADP, which currently sees him as the 18th receiver off the board. And that’s if Harvin merely slides into Golden Tate’s role without improvement.
Injuries
Finally, no discussion of Percy Harvin would be complete without an honest look at his injury history. Production only equals talent plus opportunity, after all, as long as the player is actually on the field. It is quite true that Percy has a long injury history, having appeared in just 1 of his past 23 regular season games. This is an indisputable fact. Over that timeline, Harvin suffered an ankle injury that lingered and eventually landed him on IR (reportedly helped along by a feud with head coach Leslie Frazier). Doctors found he had a slight labral tear in his hip, prompting surgery that shut him down for most of the 2013 season. Harvin returned, but suffered inflammation, so the Seahawks shut him down until the playoffs. In the playoffs, Harvin suffered a blow to his head, giving him a concussion and forcing him out of the NFC Championship game. In addition, over his first two seasons, Harvin dealt with persistent migraine issues that kept him out of three more games.
Fortunately, Harvin’s migraine issues are a thing of the past. In 2011, Harvin was diagnosed with sleep apnea and given a CPAP machine. Since his diagnosis, Harvin has been migraine-free. And while concussions have become something of a boogeyman in recent years, the January concussion was the first known one in Harvin’s career. He was able to return from it at full strength in the Super Bowl, which leaves little in the way of lingering concerns.
That leaves us with an injury history consisting of an ankle sprain and a labral tear, both of which he was obviously recovered enough from to dazzle the world in the Super Bowl. With a full offseason, both injuries should be a thing of the past. Does the presence of two injuries like that in such close succession constitute a trend, revealing a hidden pattern and giving us evidence that Percy Harvin isn’t built to handle an NFL workload? I would question that belief, especially since Percy Harvin appeared in 56 consecutive games before an injury ever forced him to miss time, (although, as mentioned, he did miss three games to migraine issues that have since been resolved during that span). Playing 56 games without suffering an injury severe enough to sideline him is quite a feat of durability. It’s a longer consecutive-game streak than Calvin Johnson has ever managed, for instance. A truly injury-prone player would have a hard time accomplishing that. For instance, notoriously injury-prone Colts safety Bob Sanders never played more than 17 consecutive games, including playoffs. Darren McFadden has thus far topped out at 12 consecutive games. Danario Alexander, whose ligaments are apparently made out of Laffy Taffy, has never played more than 10 consecutive games before suffering an injury that forced him to miss time. Does Percy Harvin belong with those names in the class of players with a true propensity towards injury? Or is he perhaps more similar to Fred Taylor, who missed 24 of his first 64 games, earned the nickname “Fragile Fred”, and then suddenly became the picture of durability as he topped 1,000 touches, 5,000 yards, and 46 consecutive games before missing time again?
This isn’t to say that we can completely dismiss the risks surrounding Harvin. The truth is that we must be at least slightly more concerned about him than we would be about a WR who had played in every game over the last two years. Harvin’s 5’11”, 184 lb. size is a cause for concern for some, as is his aggressive style of play. Seattle’s coaches are already giving him every third practice off this offseason, which is practically unheard of for a young, healthy 26-year-old. And even the threat of injury might be enough for Seattle to scale back Harvin’s workload; they’re certainly good enough to win without him during the regular season. Injury concerns, while likely overblown, simply cannot be dismissed out of hand. If we amend our initial formula to “Production = Talent + Opportunity + Health”, the health factor might be the only thing capable of stopping Percy Harvin in 2014. I certainly don’t believe NFL defenses will be able to.
Positives
- Harvin is an elite talent who has dominated at every level, every age, and every stop.
- Harvin was historically efficient as a receiver in a horrible passing offense.
- Harvin is playing for a head coach who dreams about him, for an offensive coordinator he has thrived under, and with perhaps the best quarterback of his career.
- Harvin is already the most prolific rushing WR in NFL history and can supplement lackluster receiving numbers with extra rushing production.
Negatives
- Seattle will likely be protecting a lot of leads and slowing games down, which will depress their passing statistics.
- Despite our best speculation, we really have no idea how Seattle will use Harvin.
- Injury, or even the threat of injury, could easily cause Seattle to take things easy on their offensive weapon.
Final Thoughts
Harvin is a sensational talent who rarely gets his due, and who is falling through the cracks in early drafts as everyone focuses on his risks. In addition to those risks, however, Percy Harvin offers the potential for substantial rewards. In his last two seasons, Percy Harvin put up a top 10 season and was working on a top 5 follow-up campaign. If Seattle decides to let Russell Wilson loose in his third season, Percy Harvin could very easily make good on that top-5 upside in 2014.
Percy Harvin's Projections
| Rec | ReYD | ReTD | Rush | RuYD | RuTD | |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| David Dodds | 68 | 782 | 6 | 40 | 240 | 1 |
| Bob Henry | 68 | 830 | 6 | 10 | 70 | 1 |
| Jason Wood | 72 | 1075 | 7 | 10 | 120 | 1 |
| Maurile Tremblay | 69 | 874 | 6 | 18 | 103 | 0 |
| Adam Harstad | 80 | 960 | 7 | 32 | 192 | 2 |
Other Viewpoints
C.D. Carter presents the counterarguement, suggesting that Percy Harvin is very unlikely to live up to his draft position:
Harvin, as you can see, has precisely six scenarios above in which he’ll meet or exceed his average draft position of WR14. He would need to a career high in FP/Attempt or Attempts, or be close to career levels in both. Assuming a symmetrical distribution of the probabilities above (we can't really assume this, but what the heck), Harvin has about a 30 percent chance of being worthy of his current WR14 ADP. If he rises in drafts this summer, the likelihood of Percy being worth his price will drop significantly.
Adrian Peterson expresses his disappointment at Harvin's loss:
The best all around player I ever seen or you'll ever see! Goes to Seattle! I feel like I just got kicked in the stomach. Several times!!!
Pete Carroll discusses Harvin's ideal usage:
He's not just a slot player. I want him to be an every down player, there's no reason he shouldnt be.
Richard Sherman mentions the impact Harvin will have on Seattle's offense:
Percy Harvin faced all the criticism in the world while fighting back from injury, and arrived at the perfect moment, joining the offense that was built around him. At the beginning of the season, we hoped to use him on a variety of motion-sweep plays just like those he ran in Minnesota. Take the defense one way, run Marshawn at them the other way, like he’s our Adrian Peterson. Without Harvin, we were just biding time. With him, our offense is one of the NFL’s best.