After a strong rookie showing, Baltimore Ravens wide receiver Zay Flowers was poised to take a step forward in his sophomore season. While far from disappointing, he mostly stayed the same. As the clear WR1 for the Ravens, should fantasy football managers bank on an old-school year three breakout?
Zay Flowers Fantasy Outlook
Flowers immediately burst onto the scene as a rookie, hauling in nine passes for 78 yards in his first career game. Unfortunately, that hot start cooled off quickly, and he’s yet to show the ability to produce at a high level consistently.
Flowers averaged 12.9 fantasy points per game as a rookie. With 858 receiving yards, he found himself in a class of rookie receivers that typically end up being very successful long-term, albeit not quite elite.
Zay Flowers pic.twitter.com/LNOKfx1Jvs
— Ian Hartitz (@Ihartitz) March 19, 2025
Flowers was widely expected to improve in his second season. And while I would not consider 12.3 PPG a step back, it certainly wasn’t progression. He remained essentially the same guy.
Flowers did increase his efficiency, catching three fewer passes than he did as a rookie, but amassing 201 more receiving yards. His target share remained about the same (24.4% to 25.7%). Where he saw improvement was in his ability to command targets when running routes, earning one 25.6% of the time compared to 21.1% as a rookie. He averaged 1.67 yards per route run in 2023. That bumped up to 2.34 in 2024.
Overall, Flowers is a talented receiver with the upside to be a WR2 in fantasy. I’m just not sure what we should expect to change this year.
The Ravens’ Offense Is Largely the Same
There’s a lot of turnover in the NFL. Teams change quickly. An offense can completely overhaul in just a couple of years. That’s not the case with the Ravens, though.
The addition of Derrick Henry last year helped relieve a lot of pressure on Lamar Jackson, but this team’s overall identity didn’t change.
The Ravens ran the ball 47% of the time in neutral game script in 2023. That was 50% last year. They’re always near the top of the league in run rate. As a result, the opportunities for a guy like Flowers on a 25% target share are not the same as they would be on an offense that throws more.
Flowers and Rashod Bateman are back as the top two receivers. Mark Andrews and Isaiah Likely will share the TE role. The only main addition was DeAndre Hopkins, who is nothing more than a role player at this point in his career.
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Flowers’ WR25 ADP is baking in a significant leap forward that I just don’t think we can project.
I will always endorse drafting young players whose best seasons are in front of them, but nothing in fantasy is purely black and white. There needs to be a reasonable path to significant improvement. Flowers is a safe selection who won’t fail you, but I don’t see a difference-maker here.
Dan Fornek’s Zay Flowers Projection
Zay Flowers has had a strong start to his career, but so far, he’s been a better real-life wide receiver than a fantasy wide receiver. Flowers caught 74 of 116 targets for 1,059 yards and four touchdowns in his second year, but didn’t dramatically improve his fantasy production (12.3 PPR points per game). It was the second consecutive season Flowers has finished as a low-end WR3 in fantasy.
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Flowers has led the Ravens in targets for two straight seasons, but it is generally an offense that spreads the ball to numerous pieces. The greater issue is his lack of role in the red zone. The former first-round pick had just eight red-zone targets in 2024, 59th among wide receivers. Flowers is arguably fifth on the pecking order in that field area, behind Derrick Henry and Lamar Jackson as runners and Rashod Bateman, Mark Andrews and Isaiah Likely in the passing attack.
Flowers is immensely talented, but the Ravens offense has had too many options for him to consistently make an impact in fantasy football. He has yet to finish inside the top 20 target earners at wide receiver despite having more than a 24% target share in two straight seasons. Unless he sees his role in the red zone grow, it is hard to imagine him finishing higher than a WR3 in fantasy again in 2025.
