- Early career production - Dynamic threat downfield & after the catch - Elite speed & start-stop ability - Fluid mover w/ good route running chops - Ball tracking is A+
Not entirely sure why the vibe isn't higher when talking about him in the WR class. pic.twitter.com/dv3JjdyZgh
I'll write something fresh about Worthy tomorrow morning now that he's a Chief to lay out how he's more than speed, but for now here's an excerpt from article linked in the below tweet... https://t.co/EcW7QtUrFFpic.twitter.com/811ahCEfMS
Originally Posted by BossChief:
Exactly. Each miss has been really close. Once they get dialed in for timing, the combo will be lethal. It’s not like they are miles apart.
It’s wild that people are calling his a bad pick when he has 5tds in his first 8 games and defenses are forced to know where he is every snap.
He's tied with MHJ and BTJ with 5 touchdowns as rookies. No other rookie has more than 3.
He isn't a volume receiver yet, and may never be in this offense, but I do think we are just seeing the surface right now, and by the end of the year we should see more of what is ceiling could be. [Reply]
Originally Posted by Kiimo:
I'm not going to join in bashing a rookie wide receiver's footwork in the pouring rain that made him lose a wide open touchdown by less than an inch.
If anything that should show promise.
This is how I feel, at least he caught the ball [Reply]
Maybe idk... get him in rhythm more and involve him more on regular plays and get him and Mahomes more chemistry and he won't have mental problems on the deep plays.
Right now all of his touches and target are either a deep ball or some gadget play. He should be great on drags/slants and doing the intermediate crossers but we haven't done that for some reason. If we start that and start actually involving him on regular plays instead of just manufactured touches and decoy plays and occasional deep balls, this offense will be back to scoring 30+ regularly.
I don't think Reid has adjusted to the fact that rookie WRs are capable of doing more these days coming out of college. He still thinks that you have to drip feed them concepts and slowly bring them into the offense when really, most good rookies are ready from day 1 these days. Everything still moves too fast for them and concepts still confuse them at times but looking around the league, rookie WRs and young WRs are far more capable of different things than than Chiefs ask of their young receivers.
Even Rice is far more capable of things than they asked of him this season. When they let Worthy off the leash, this offense will be great. [Reply]
Patrick Mahomes on Xavier Worthy's Sideline Miscue and Expectations Going Forward
Rookie wide receiver Xavier Worthy has had an up-and-down start to his first season of NFL action. While Worthy has accounted for five total touchdowns for the Kansas City Chiefs, tied with Kareem Hunt for the most on the team, his role in KC's passing game still hasn't fully come into focus.
On Monday night, Worthy was open deep downfield on the first drive of the game and hauled in a pass from quarterback Patrick Mahomes as he stepped out of bounds, turning a would-be touchdown into a long incompletion.
During his Wednesday press conference, Mahomes was asked about what kind of progress he's seen from Worthy throughout his rookie year and his view of the missed connection in the first drive. Mahomes started by crediting Worthy for reading the defense and getting open before stepping on the sideline.
"He does a lot of great things," Mahomes said. "On that play, he had more of an in-cut type route, they went to a coverage that they hadn't played a lot with kind of a 2-invert with the safety kind of playing in the middle there, and so I looked down the middle of the field because that's kind of my guy I look to, and out of the corner of my eye I saw Xavier down the sideline making that adjustment. I tried to get him the ball as quickly as possible. Obviously, you're half an inch from scoring a touchdown or whatever it is, maybe even less than that. He'll learn from that, but I thought he did a great job on that play in general of recognizing the coverage and getting to the right spot. And regardless of stats and whatever it is, the threat of him over the top is getting a lot of other guys open. That gets lost in the swing of things, that you don't see the big catches downfield, but I promise you the defenses are respecting his speed, and that's helping getting guys like DeAndre [Hopkins] and Trav [Travis Kelce] open in that medium range."
Could Worthy be in line for a similar mid-season uptick as Rashee Rice enjoyed in his rookie campaign? Last season, Rice caught eight passes for 107 yards in his 11th game as a Chief, setting season-highs in both categories. From that point forward, Rice was clearly KC's No. 1 wide receiver.
"Rashee's season was special last year, and we needed him to step up and have that role in the offense," Mahomes said. "Obviously, we've gotten guys in here that I think take off that pressure of having one guy make all those big plays, but I think you'll continue to see big games from him. You've seen it in certain moments throughout the season, the big plays, you've seen certain plays where he's caught the ball and scored touchdowns, and so I think his role will get bigger and bigger within the offense, but I think we're probably more well-rounded as an offense in general, so maybe not as big of the numbers and stats that Rashee had last year." [Reply]
The chemistry and timing is even more important for X than some other WRs because you need to get that ball on him right out of his breaks. You can't allow DBs to recover and turn it into a contested catch, he isn't gonna win many of those even though I have been impressed with a couple of high-point snags he has nearly made the past two weeks.
That timing is hard to develop but there's hope that it comes with reps. [Reply]