0:00Rome Odunze Burden just had the most
0:01efficient rookie season of anyone in the
0:03NFL since Justin Jefferson. He was a
0:05second round pick last year, waited
0:07until later in the year to produce, and
0:08is now going in the fourth round of
0:10fantasy football drafts. By the end of
0:11this video, you are going to be
0:13absolutely convinced that you have to
0:15have Rome Odunze Burden on your fantasy
0:16football team or your money back from
0:18this
0:18>> Yeah, I'm buying Rome Odunze Burden
0:19stock right now.
0:20>> Let's begin with that rookie season. 2.7
0:23yards per route run, which is tied for
0:25the best ever rookie mark in the next
0:27gen stats era. The only names that are
0:29close to him AJ Brown and Justin
0:31Jefferson. He was also third in the
0:33entire NFL in 2025 behind only Puka and
0:36JSN. Now, obviously, there's a little
0:38bit of difference there. Some people are
0:40counting routes where he was effectively
0:42a blocker. So, you're going to get
0:44different numbers if you're using
0:45fantasy points data or nfl.com or next
0:47gen stats. But, the point is he was
0:49absolutely elite in terms of yards per
0:51route run. He generated 4.6 yards of
0:54average separation on his catches. His
0:5626.1 targets per route run was the
0:58highest on the Chicago Bears. He also
1:00generated 7.4 yards after catch per
1:03reception, which was fourth amongst all
1:05wide receivers with 25 or more catches.
1:08Also led the Chicago Bears in catch
1:10rate. Now, let's address the elephant in
1:11the room. Rome Odunze was injured last
1:14year. Cole Kmet also saw his playing
1:16time scale up over the course of the
1:18season as he won his job from Cole Kmet.
1:21Burden was playing behind DJ Moore and
1:23for part of the season he was also
1:24playing behind Equanimeous St. Brown.
1:26So, a lot of these numbers are based on
1:26a quote-unquote
1:29smaller sample. Though, he was basically
1:31a starting player in the back half of
1:33the season for the Chicago Bears. DJ
1:35Moore is now gone. He is a member of the
1:37Buffalo Bills. We also have Equanimeous
1:39St. Brown out of the team. He is playing
1:40for the Atlanta Falcons. The guys behind
1:44Rome Odunze Burden are Dante Pettis,
1:46Equanimeous St. Brown, and a bunch of
1:48other guys you've never heard of
1:49including Kalif Raymond. A popular
1:51opposition to Rome Odunze Burden is this
1:53guy is Kadarius Toney. This guy is a
1:55gadget player. We fallen for these
1:57gadget players before, these guys who
1:58get a ton of screens, they get designed
2:00touches. So, of course Luther Burden is
2:02going to have a high targets per route
2:04run. Of course Luther Burden is going to
2:05high have a high yards after catch per
2:08reception because he's basically Dexter
2:09McCluster. So, I went through and looked
2:11at some analysis that my friend Dwayne
2:13McFarland did.
2:15He had a 2.35 yards per route run if you
2:17remove all screens. His average depth of
2:20target when you remove those screens,
2:22basically at that elite wide receiver
2:23level, 11.8
2:25for his A dot and a 21% targets per
2:28route run if you remove screens. Now,
2:30also, screens are very important for
2:32fantasy football. I think that we should
2:34not overlook this. Being the design
2:36screen guy in a Ben Johnson offense,
2:38that is inherently very valuable. And if
2:40you look at the pass catchers that they
2:42have right now, Rome Odunze, Colston
2:44Loveland, and Luther Burden, who is most
2:47likely to get those designed touches
2:49this upcoming season in 2026, it is
2:51going to be Luther Burden. So, not only
2:53has he proven in my mind that he can win
2:55down the field, but he's also proven
2:57that he can be the guy that Ben Johnson
2:59says, "You know what? I want to run this
3:01play to get these nine guaranteed yards
3:03right now?" Well, Luther Burden is going
3:05to be able to get you those nine
3:06guaranteed yards. He also played 51% of
3:08his snaps out wide. He can play the X,
3:10the Y, or the slot flanker, in my
3:12opinion. And I also think that is going
3:14to be reflected in the opinion of Ben
3:16Johnson. He had above average success
3:18rates versus man and zone with our
3:20friend Matt Harmon's charting over on
3:22Reception Perception. And if you look
3:24back at his collegiate profile, which I
3:26do think is very important for these
3:28second and even sometimes these
3:29third-year players when we have them in
3:31a limited sample, I do like to look back
3:33at what they did in college. He was the
3:35first ever wide receiver in PFF charting
3:37history to have 30-plus missed tackles
3:40forced on 80 or fewer targets in a
3:42season.
3:43My friend Pat Carino over at Legendary
3:45Upside has actually done some great work
3:47on this and found the predictive ability
3:49for collegiate wide receivers in terms
3:51of missed tackles forced to fantasy
3:53points in year one, year two, and year
3:55three, which guess what? Makes total
3:57sense because if you are going to be
3:58generating a ton of your receptions in a
4:01shallow area, on screens or on crossers,
4:03you are going to be able to either need
4:05to break tackles or force missed
4:07tackles, which Luther Burden has already
4:09proven that he could do. Now, we do need
4:11to address the fact that he was a
4:13part-time player for the beginning of
4:14the 2026 season. 34 of his 47 catches
4:18came in the final eight games. He was a
4:20top 16 wide receiver in the fantasy post
4:22season, obviously including the
4:24monumental performance in week 17 in
4:26your championship week, helped our
4:28friend Sam Sherman win $2 million. That
4:31week three game, I mean, hey, we're
4:33going to present all sides of this
4:34argument. That week three game with 101
4:36yards, it looks really good, right?
4:38Well, it's only kind of good when you
4:40realize that 75 of those yards came on a
4:42trick play, a 75-yard flea flicker
4:45touchdown where Luther Burden didn't
4:46basically do anything. I think you can
4:48credit all of that to Ben Johnson and to
4:51Caleb Williams. Caleb Williams, by the
4:52way, a huge part of this argument, but I
4:55think what we saw from Luther Burden in
4:57the back half of the season is this is
4:59not a Kadarius Tony. This to me is not
5:01even a Gabe Davis situation. Luther
5:03Burden was a third He was the 36th
5:06overall pick. There was a ton of draft
5:07capital there. He probably would have
5:09been a first-round pick if the entire
5:11Missouri football program his final
5:13season did not just absolutely go in the
5:15bin, but to me he has proven that he can
5:17be a starter. Perhaps most important of
5:20this whole thing is the vacated volume
5:22and the options that the Chicago Bears
5:24have because a lot of times we get in
5:26these situations, you know, I'm thinking
5:27of historical examples. Gabe Davis is a
5:29great one. Kadarius Tony for the 2023
5:32Kansas City Chiefs is a big one.
5:35When you look at the guys who remain on
5:37the offense, what would be the option
5:39for Luther Burden to not earn the volume
5:42necessary to pay off his wide receiver
5:4321 tag in the the round? 15 end zone
5:46targets were vacated with DJ Moore and
5:48Equanimeous St. Brown out. Burden did
5:50have zero targets inside the 10 in 2025.
5:53This is an argument that Rich Rebar has
5:55processed for Luther Burden. Like if you
5:58look stylistically at the guys remaining
6:00in that offense, you could realistically
6:02say, well, Loveland is probably going to
6:04lead the team in end-zone targets, and
6:06then Rome Odunze is the more
6:07prototypical and classic touchdown
6:09scorer. However, one thing that I would
6:11like to clearly point out there though,
6:13is that Amon-Ra St. Brown for the Lions
6:15and in the Ben Johnson offense,
6:17obviously he kind of left the
6:18architecture of an offense that the
6:20Lions also used in 2025.
6:23Amon-Ra St. Brown is not the physical
6:25prototype of a dominant red-zone
6:28touchdown-scoring wide receiver, yet he
6:30was able to score touchdowns above
6:32expectation every year that he played
6:34with Ben Johnson. With the targets left,
6:378.6%
6:38or 8.6 expected touchdowns are off the
6:40table. Now, it's possible that I'm
6:42completely wrong and Cole Kmet Loveland
6:44scores 12 touchdowns and Rome Odunze is
6:46a dominant red-zone wide receiver.
6:48However, I don't really think that
6:50Odunze has been all that impressive in
6:52the National Football League. His yards
6:54per route run is less than half of
6:55Luther Burden after his rookie season.
6:58He's dealing with a foot injury that he
6:59did not have surgery on, and he noted
7:02that he's probably never going to feel
7:04the same running again as a result of
7:06that broken foot.
7:08And I think probably the most
7:10interesting thing about Luther Burden
7:12and the Chicago Bears is that the
7:14fantasy football industry refuses to
7:16pick a winner here. I've got their
7:17aggregated projections from Fantasy
7:19Pros, Rotowire, my own stuff, and Mike
7:22Clay's. We've got 980 aggregated yards
7:25for Rome Odunze, 957 for Burden, and 916
7:29for Cole Kmet Loveland. Is that how
7:31often teams really play their offenses?
7:33Like if you think about the great
7:35offenses, if you think about teams that
7:37are going to win their division, if you
7:38think about teams that have Super Bowl
7:40aspirations, which I think the Bears can
7:42reasonably have, right? They still have
7:44their rookie They still have their
7:45quarterback on a rookie contract. They
7:47made some splashy personnel moves in the
7:49offseason. Ben Johnson got his guys in
7:51Burden in the 2025 NFL Draft. Generally
7:55speaking, there is going to be a winner.
7:57I am picking Luther Burden as the
7:58winner, and I do think Kholston Loveland
8:00is also a phenomenal fantasy football
8:02pick. But, if I look at the guy here who
8:04is most likely to dominate target
8:07volume, if we want to pattern match to
8:09the Detroit Lions offense that Ben
8:11Johnson ran, Burden is the St. Brown.
8:14Adunze would be the Jameson Williams
8:16type, and Loveland can very easily be an
8:18upgraded version of Laporta. The key
8:20difference being in this offense, there
8:22is no Jahmyr Gibbs. There is not a
8:23running back who is going to demand 20
8:26touches per game. There's not a running
8:27back who is going to accumulate 80
8:29targets in a given season. So, there's a
8:31little bit of meat left on the bone for
8:34Luther Burden to be the dominant target
8:36winning wide receiver. I mean, even if
8:38we extend the target earning profiles
8:40back to college, Burden had a better
8:42targets per route run and had a better
8:44target earning profile than Adunze did
8:46when they were both in college.
8:49The Burden A dot gives us some great
8:51pattern matching for Amon-Ra St. Brown.
8:54Burden's cumulative A dot as a rookie,
8:567.67.
8:58Amon-Ra St. Brown's A dot in his final
9:00season, 7.67.
9:02Now, obviously, I think that it is a
9:04little absurd to say that we know that
9:07Luther Burden is as good as Amon-Ra St.
9:08Brown. He's got a lot of work left to
9:10do. Though again, there is some pattern
9:12matching there where St. Brown started
9:14very slowly as a rookie and then ended
9:16up being a league winner down the
9:17stretch. Burden didn't reach the overall
9:20highs that St. Brown did, and he was
9:22actually highly drafted, which
9:24should cause us to evaluate their
9:26playing time in a different way. But, as
9:28Ben Johnson himself said, "I am buying
9:31Luther Burden stock right now." He said
9:33that after the organized team activities
9:36in May 2026, and I choose to believe Ben
9:39Johnson. I think that it is a little bit
9:41silly to not pick a winner for the
9:43Chicago Bears and I think a a large part
9:45of the silliness is due to people's
9:47reticence to think that Caleb Williams
9:48can improve. But Caleb Williams is going
9:50to be a huge improver in my mind in
9:532026. He actually was legitimately below
9:56average in 2024, had one of the worst
9:59sack rates we have ever seen for a
10:00rookie quarterback. He also had one of
10:02the largest of all time sack
10:05improvements from year one to year two.
10:07I would I don't actually think it's
10:08absurd to say that Caleb Williams from
10:10year one to year two improved about as
10:12much as Josh Allen did from year one to
10:15year two. Do I think that Caleb Williams
10:17can be as good as Josh Allen? I mean,
10:19maybe if you got me like alone at the
10:20end of the night and and I was feeling
10:22really loose and I was doing a little
10:23bit of truth serum. But I think
10:25realistically, we can say that one of
10:27Caleb Williams' biggest problems in year
10:29two was he missed a ton of layups. He
10:31was one of the worst quarterbacks again
10:33in the most recent five years in terms
10:35of overall completion percentage. And
10:37what the Bears offense did was they did
10:38the NBA equivalent of saying three is
10:40greater than two. Caleb Williams missed
10:42a lot of layups, but of I mean, look, we
10:44all watched the playoff game and we all
10:46watched them at the end of the season.
10:47He made a ton of the difficult throws
10:49and a ton of the insane plays that you
10:51can't really teach at the end of games.
10:54I think that Caleb Williams and Luther
10:56Burden are going to have perfect synergy
10:58this upcoming season. My final verdict
11:01here is that Luther Burden is one of the
11:03biggest smashes on the board in round
11:05four. He has a potential best pick on
11:08the board resume in the fourth round. We
11:11are definitely paying a very high price
11:14for a guy who has not accomplished
11:15anything. But if I'm looking forward to
11:172027 and I'm looking at the Bears
11:19offense and I'm saying, "Who do I think
11:21can be a one-two turn pick this upcoming
11:23year?" I think Rome Odunze would have to
11:25show something that we basically have no
11:27evidence for, which is that he can be
11:29both a huge target earner and a
11:31touchdown scorer. The way that the NFL
11:33is trending with the average depth of
11:35target going down, and the most
11:37important thing being success rate and
11:39sustaining these long drives, I think
11:41that Luther Burden is the best fit
11:42there. I think that he is going to
11:44benefit greatly from Sam LaPorta and
11:46Cole Kmet playing more. Like if we look
11:48at the way that the Bears offense is
11:50structured, they're going to play a ton
11:51of 12 personnel. That's why they took
11:53Sam LaPorta, and that's why they've not
11:55invested anything at their wide receiver
11:57three position. It's why they let DJ
11:58Moore go. It's why they let Olamide
12:00Zaccheaus go. They feel very comfortable
12:02with their base 11 personnel being
12:04Burden, Equanimeous St. Brown, and Cole
12:06Kmet, and then a rotation between Sam
12:07LaPorta, Cole Kmet, and then a rotation
12:08between Khalil Shakir and DeAndre Swift
12:09and Khalil Shakir. If this team ends up
12:10with 600 dropbacks, it's not even
12:11impossible to me that Burden could be a
12:12smash, Kmet could be a smash, and
12:12Equanimeous St. Brown could still kind
12:13of pay off a round six tag. Burden is
12:14the prototypical year two leap
12:14candidate. There's a ton of
12:29vacated targets on this offense. Ben
12:32Johnson is certainly one of, in my
12:33opinion, one of the two or three best
12:35play callers in the entirety of the NFL.
12:38And then another hidden point there is
12:39that there is some real offense and
12:41continuity for Caleb Williams. Even
12:42going back to college, Caleb Williams
12:44has had a ton of change. He transferred
12:47schools, Lincoln Riley kind of lost his
12:49mojo at the end. Although Caleb Williams
12:51was a Heisman Trophy winner. Then the
12:54Bears coaching staff was one of the
12:55worst in the entire NFL his rookie
12:57season. And then he got so much better
13:00in year two. I am expecting the entire
13:02Bears offense to trend up, and I think
13:04that our guy Luther Burden can be the
13:07new answer to Amon-Ra St. Brown inside
13:09of this offense. If you want more
13:11analysis, my rankings, or the season
13:12pass over on Flock Fantasy, you can get
13:14that for only $34 if you use promo code
13:17Davis. Link to that is in the
13:18description and in the comments. Make
13:20sure you like the video, and then like
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