Why WR/CB Matchups Don’t Matter for Fantasy Football
Tags: Fantasy Football, NFL, Sports Analytics, Sports Betting, Fantasy Sports

You see them everywhere. Anybody who has spent time researching what’s impactful for fantasy football has stumbled upon a matchup chart or two. Intrinsically, it makes sense that a Wide Receiver’s fantasy output would be impacted by the man covering him, Football is a game of inches after all.

However, in this article, I am proposing something radical. I am proposing we throw 99% of fantasy football coverage matchup advice out the window. While that may sound harsh, I will do my best to explain this stance with as much evidence as possible. I’ll go over coverage types, how coverage types interact with WR routes, the volatility of coverage, how that applies to fantasy football, why matchup charts/advice are so popular in the fantasy football community, and where actionable coverage/matchup advice can be found.

The Types of Coverage

Most casual football fans have heard the terms ‘man’ and ‘zone’ coverage, but very few understand how complex coverage is at the NFL level. Let’s start with some basics.

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Cover 0, Cover 1, and Cover 2-Man are the base versions of what, for the purposes of this article, we will call ‘Man coverage’. The number in each coverage indicates how many players will be playing a deep-safety role, with 2 deep safeties in Cover-2 and no deep defenders in Cover-0. Man coverages require most of their coverage defenders to cover their assigned receiver step for step, mano-a-mano.

Cover 1 example from BleacherReport.

Zone coverages are made up of Cover 2, Cover 3, Cover 4 (aka ‘quarters’), and Cover 6. Just like man coverage, the number at the end of the coverage reveals how many deep players there are. The key exception being Cover 6, which is one-half Cover 2 and one-half Cover 4. Zone coverages require their players to first get to a spot on the field, known as a zone, and then cover whatever receiver runs into that zone. Sounding a lot like Madden, right? How complicated can it really be?

Cover 4 example courtesy of Breakdownsports.blogspot.com

NFL offensive coordinators are actually pretty smart guys, and they developed counters to every major coverage I just mentioned. Defensive coaches were then forced to develop counters to those counters, leading to a Darwinian progression of coverage techniques and variations.

At the professional level what we are left with is, quite literally, thousands of versions of what Nick Saban coined: ‘Match Coverage’. Match coverage relies on defensive players to read offensive route combinations and react to cover receivers man-to-man based on the rules of the called match coverage. This essentially combines the head-to-head coverage element of man defenses with the eyes on the QB, read and react nature of zone coverage.

For example, the base version of Cover 4 offers four deep defenders, who split the deep parts of the field into ‘quarters’ and three underneath players, who focus on routes run within the first ten or so yards of the line of scrimmage. With so many players focused on defending deep, offenses attack underneath with quick slants, various screens, and other short route combinations.

To stop the offense from putting up video game numbers on underneath throws, the defense develops rules based on the underneath concepts the offense runs. One rule could be that the outside corner will cover the outside receiver man-to-man unless the #2 receiver on that side runs an out route in the first five yards, in which case that corner passes off the outside WR and plays #2 man-to-man. Another rule could be that the outside corner is man-to-man with the outside WR, unless the WR runs a shallow, inside breaking route, in which case the corner gives an ‘under’ call, passes off that WR and plays his deep 1/4. Now imagine thousands of combinations of those rules intertwined with the base coverages already mentioned, constituting dozens or hundreds of play calls, all completely dependent on what the offense runs.

How Does This Relate to Fantasy Football?

I give that overarching rundown on coverage to assist you, the reader, in understanding that breaking down WR and DB play at the NFL level requires tremendous nuance and is never as simple as “this bad CB is projected to line up across from that WR so that WR has an amazing matchup.”

Calvin Ridley makes a catch over Chris Harris Jr. Courtesy Ashley Landis/AP

Great strides in fantasy football data science could be made if advanced coverage data were publically available, but unless you work for the right people, you won’t have access to that gold mine. That’s something to keep in mind when you hear fantasy football analysts discuss coverage matchups, as very few have access to data that would help them make any meaningful conclusions.

What about the teams that play man coverage?

While college, and especially high school football offer teams that run just a few schemes and keep things quite simple, the NFL is a copy-cat league. The latest trend: mixing up your coverage.

This article from SportsInfoSolutions (one of the few companies that collect advanced coverage data) and this one from PFF showcase that the most man-heavy teams in the NFL play man coverage on just over 50% of their snaps. That leaves a lot of room for variation, in both one-on-one matchups and play calls.

So organizations that analysts tout as being ‘man teams’ play zone on nearly half their snaps. See the problem?

Even if we were to give this argument the benefit of the doubt and assume an NFL team would actually play man coverage on every snap, offenses know how to beat it. Here is an excellent breakdown from 9-year NFL veteran CB Darius Butler on how NFL teams attack man coverage with bunch formations and what defenses can do to counter. It’s a 25-minute video about a single way offenses attack man coverage. When factoring in motion, stack releases, and picks/rubs you can clearly see that NFL offenses have a litany of tools to beat man coverage.

Regardless of what your favorite matchup chart says, the WR you are targeting isn’t going to line up across from the Packers’ worst corner all game, or even the majority of snaps.

What about ‘Shadow’ matchups?

Based on my tone so far, this is probably the part you expect me to say something like ‘shadow matchups aren’t real’ and move on. Don’t worry, they are real. They just don’t happen as often as most fantasy players likely believe.

David Moore makes a catch against the Jets. Courtesy Alika Jenner/NFL.

Looking at PFF’s quite useful Shadow Coverage Matrix, we see that about 15–30% of teams will utilize a shadow corner in a given week. However, while most would believe a ‘shadow’ matchup requires that a corner covers a WR on 100% of his routes, the PFF Shadow Matrix data suggests otherwise.

In fact, in the first 12 weeks of 2020, there have been just under 200 games played and just 26 instances of a corner lining up across from a WR on more than 80% of the WRs’ routes.

The chart description itself states, “ A corner is considered to be shadowing them if they lined up across from that receiver on over 50% of their routes from both the left and right. Percentage of routes includes the slot. All receiving stats are on plays the corner lined up against the receiver, regardless of who ended up being the person covering the receiver at the time of the pass.”

Even football’s most reputable stat provider doesn’t offer primary coverage defender data, just alignment data, as a fantasy football tool. This demonstrates how difficult it is to truly discern what is and is not a ‘shadow matchup’.

The Volatility of Coverage

Remember when A.J. Bouye was an All-Pro corner? If you are unaware, he still plays professional football for the Denver Broncos, so why hasn’t Bouye’s name been thrown around much in 2020 as a top corner? No, it’s not because he was recently suspended for PEDs. It’s because game-to-game, and especially year-to-year, coverage is tremendously volatile.

While not directly related to fantasy football, Estimated Points Added (EPA) has been long-used in analytic circles as a strong measure of player performance on both the offensive and defensive sides of the ball.

Jarvis Landry scores a TD against the Dolphins. Courtesy Ron Schwane/AP.

Right alongside PFF coverage grades, EPA is one of the best measures of how much value a coverage defender adds on a per-game basis. According to this 2018 article from PFF on the value of coverage and receiving, “it’s important to note that this comes with the results we’ve written today — that coverage from various positions (at least how we’ve measured them — through PFF grades and EPA) are not as stable season-to-season as other traits (receiving stability) we’ve explored.”

Looking at PFF coverage grades from 2018 to 2019, we see a mere 0.29 correlation coefficient for CBs, demonstrating the past successful coverage performances cannot be relied on to predict future coverage success. Coverage stats like passer rating allowed don’t help much either, with a 0.08 correlation coefficient from 2018 to 2019 for NFL corners.

Don’t get me wrong, EPA, PFF Coverage Grades, and passer rating allowed are great stats to determine how well a coverage player has played, but these statistics are not predictive of future performance, despite many fantasy analysts suggesting they are.

The Popularity of Matchup Charts and Analysis

I’m a sucker for nuanced football analysis, and I would suppose most of the people reading this are as well. While there are certainly people who know what they are talking about when it comes to coverage, I’ll mention them later. The real reason you’re here is that you saw a tweet (Buster Skrine vs. Davante Adams *fire emoji* fire emoji* *fire emoji*), read a post, or saw a matchup chart that screamed at you to put a certain player into your lineup because he was facing a bad corner and he failed.

Hopefully, with a more in-depth understanding of how complicated coverage is, you can see why that matchup chart didn’t win you that semi-final game in your friends and family league.

Why do analysts tout matchups all the time?

It sells. As a low-tier tout myself, I’m well aware of how difficult it can be to develop reasons for why you like certain players every week. CB/WR matchups inherently make sense to most fans and seem like they should significantly impact fantasy scoring.

With virtually every fantasy football content website providing subscription-based services, large amounts of content need to be published weekly to keep people coming back. Matchup charts and analysis make for the perfect weekly article.

Example matchup chart from rotoballer.com

Fantasy Football players, myself included, love conditional formatting. It makes every chart look better visually and when it’s combined with a concept that naturally makes sense to most football fans, it’s easy to see how this content became popular.

I don’t blame touts for promoting this kind of analysis. Their job is to provide consistent, weekly content. However, I do think they are taking advantage of a knowledge gap in their consumer base, and many touts do not have a high enough understanding of coverage concepts to fill this gap. This brings us to our final discussion:

Where can I find Coverage and Matchup data that will help me with Fantasy Football?

Now that we are acutely aware of the downfalls of traditional WR/CB matchup analysis, we can finally focus on what matters — winning fantasy football games.

With teams rarely shadowing and many coverage concepts requiring that defenders pass off or ‘switch’ the offensive player they are covering, we can largely throw most individual WR/CB matchup analysis out the window. However, coverage analysis at the team level can still be worthwhile.

Stats like FootballOutsiders DVOA, PFF Coverage Grades, and defensive EPA allowed on passing plays are an excellent way for fantasy players to quickly determine the overall strength of a pass defense. It’s important to remember that WRs aren’t just playing against the CB lined up across from them, they are facing an entire coverage unit that has to work together and communicate to slow down the offense.

By attacking the weakest overall pass defenses and avoiding the strongest overall pass defenses, fantasy players can realize an albeit small, but meaningful edge when it comes to pass game matchups.

What touts actually know what they are talking about when it comes to coverage?

I’ve read most of the coverage/matchup articles that are regularly published, and one in particular sticks out every week: Wes Huber’s NFL Advanced Matchups column. I’ve linked his most recent piece from Week 15 here.

Wes Huber is a former PFF coverage analyst who now works for fantasypoints.com, one of the best DFS tout sites out there. As someone who’s been through PFF’s process of learning the complexity of coverage and how to chart it, I can vouch that Wes knows his stuff when it comes to coverage. He even goes through every play of every game, every week to make sure he has the most accurate possible coverage data, something that’s extremely time-consuming but assures the quality of his work.

Fantasy players determined to exploit edges in coverage matchups should view Wes as their savior, as the length and depth of his weekly NFL Advanced Matchups column are unmatched anywhere else in the industry. He’s great at what he does and deserves more credit in the community.

Those looking to broaden their overall understanding of coverage concepts should start with The Pass Coverage Glossary by Cameron Soran. While this may not directly relate to fantasy football, it is an excellent guide as to the many variations of coverage, what certain schemes are designed to stop, and it includes helpful diagrams for the more visual learners out there. Essentially a coverage encyclopedia, you won’t find a more detailed 30,000-foot view of coverage concepts anywhere else out there.

Last but certainly not least, former NFL CB Darius Butler runs an excellent Youtube channel called Everything DB, where he breaks down advanced coverage concepts and techniques at the NFL and college levels. I know, it’s not fantasy football related, but watching just a couple of his videos demonstrates what I’ve tried to put into writing in this piece: NFL coverage is extremely complicated and is almost never a pure 1 v 1 matchup.