- WR Zay Flowers, Baltimore Ravens: Flowers produced multiple career-best per-play efficiency metrics in an up-and-down season.
- WR Troy Franklin, Denver Broncos: Franklin produced at least one weekly finish in the WR1-WR8 range this season.
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Estimated Reading Time: 15 minutes
Talented NFL wide receivers sometimes produce inconsistent results. While weekly stability is often reassuring for fantasy managers, explosive players can deliver positively volatile, week-winning performances that should not be overlooked despite occasionally being bookended by aggravatingly low weekly point sums.
The article below breaks down four of the 2025 NFL season’s most volatile wide receivers.
WR Zay Flowers, Baltimore Ravens
Flowers made good on his 2025 WR1 prospects, detailed in January 2025, in Weeks 1-18 scoring formats, finishing as the half-points per reception (half-PPR) overall WR7. He did so by delivering agonizingly erratic weekly fantasy finishes while enduring unreliable, injury-impacted quarterback play. Flowers’ 79.9 PFF offense grade ranks second among his three NFL seasons.
Flowers finished as the overall WR1 in Weeks 1 and 18, banking just four top-12 finishes all season. In Weeks 2-13, he finished as a WR2 or better just once, notching an overall WR21 finish in Week 11. He finished in the WR1-WR24 range in Weeks 14-18, banking three top-12 positional finishes.
Flowers’ weekly positional fantasy football finishes among Weeks 1-18:
| Zay Flowers | Weekly Half-PPR Finishes |
| WR1 | 4 |
| WR2 | 3 |
| WR3 | 8 |
| WR4 | N/A |
| WR5 | N/A |
| WR6 | N/A |
| WR7 | N/A |
| WR8 | 2 |
Ironically, Flowers’ 2.53 yards per route run (YPRR), 24.4% target rate and 10.7% slot-target rate are the best per-route averages among his three NFL seasons.
Absent context, Flowers’ per-play metrics appear to show consistent play. However, his 52.4 combined points scored in Weeks 1 and 18 starkly contrast with his failure to score even 12.0 points for 13 weeks. He produced single-digit results seven times, highlighted by a negative point showing (-0.4) in Week 13.
Flowers, 25 years old, successfully broke into the WR1 tier, though his weekly results are among the most volatile of 2025. He must now learn a new offensive scheme, implemented by the Ravens’ new offensive coordinator, Declan Doyle, who spent six of the last seven seasons studying under Denver Broncos head coach Sean Payton and Chicago Bears head coach Ben Johnson. Doyle should provide Flowers with increased opportunities as a post-catch producer, lining up in the slot, potentially stabilizing Flowers’ weekly results, if he can absorb the playbook this spring and summer.
WR A.J. Brown, Philadelphia Eagles
Brown finished as the Weeks 1-17 half-PPR WR10 in his age-28 season this year, delivering a positive conclusion to a season in which he opened as the WR91 in Weeks 1-2. Brown’s 82.2 PFF offense grade ties for a career-low, first earned in his 2019 rookie season.
Among Brown’s first eight 2025 games in Weeks 1-9, he finished as the WR100, WR70 twice, WR97 and WR91, plus two top-four positional finishes and one WR21 finish.
Among Weeks 1-17, Brown scored fewer than 2.5 points three times and produced single-digit weekly results seven times.
Brown finished as a WR3 or better each week among Weeks 11-17, logging four finishes as the WR17 or better, which is highlighted by an overall WR1 finish in Week 13.
Among the full NFL season, Brown produced career lows in YPRR (1.96), yards after the catch per reception (3.3) and yards per reception (12.7). His 24.2% target rate is the third-lowest among his seven NFL seasons.
Brown’s declining per-route productivity could yield even more erratic, and likely overall worse, results in his age-29 season next year.
WR Troy Franklin, Denver Broncos
Franklin delivered consistently volatile results this season, only mildly improving his per-route efficiency along the way. Franklin’s 62.3 PFF offense grade is an improvement on the 54.9 PFF offense grade he earned in 2024, albeit in an underwhelming manner. He finished as the Weeks 1-17 WR29.
Franklin finished as the WR62 and WR68 in Weeks 5 and 6, respectively, the WR23 and WR20 in Weeks 10 and 11 and the WR76 and WR70 in Weeks 13 and 14. In all remaining consecutive game sequences, Franklin’s week-to-week fantasy scoring finishes fluctuated by 24-plus spots, positionally.
Franklin’s weekly positional fantasy football finishes among Weeks 1-17:
| Troy Franklin | Weekly Half-PPR Finishes |
| WR1 | 3 |
| WR2 | 2 |
| WR3 | 2 |
| WR4 | 1 |
| WR5 | 2 |
| WR6 | 4 |
| WR7 | 1 |
| WR8 | 1 |
Franklin appeared to be earning a featured offensive role mid-season, finishing as the WR30 and overall WR1 in Weeks 7 and 8, respectively, before plummeting to the WR59 spot in Week 9.
He increased his target rate by just 1.9% (20.5%) and his YPRR average by just 0.28 (1.42). His 2025 results bode poorly for his stability in 2026.
WR Jameson Williams, Detroit Lions
Williams enjoyed a Week 1-17, half-PPR WR1 breakout season, detailed here, yet still produced the same volatile weekly results that plagued him during his first three professional seasons. His 75.6 PFF offense grade earned in 2025 is the best among his four NFL seasons.
Williams benefited from Lions head coach Dan Campbell assuming play-calling duties in Week 10, immediately banking overall WR1 results after “notching three weekly places in the overall WR10-WR15 range and five in the overall WR53-WR104 window” with “former Lions offensive coordinator John Morton calling plays in Weeks 1-9.”
Despite Campbell’s altered role, Williams still turned in unusable weeks down the stretch, albeit infrequently. He failed to catch a single pass in Weeks 7 and 12, sandwiching both games with outings totaling at least four receptions, 66 receiving yards and one receiving touchdown.
The Lions’ field-stretching wide receiver totaled 88-plus receiving yards six times and finished with less than half that sum seven times.
His week-winning ability keeps Williams as a WR1 candidate in 2026, though his volatile productivity is likely to continue.
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