Chris Olave joined rare company in his huge rookie season with the New Orleans Saints, matching the pace of several superstar wide receivers. One of the better stats you’ll find at Pro Football Focus is yards per route run — which directly reflects how many plays receivers were making in relation to how often they were on the field.
And Olave produced one of the best rookie seasons we’ve seen in this metric over the last decade. Fantasy Life’s Ian Hartitz observed that Olave ranked up there with the likes of Odell Beckham Jr. and Justin Jefferson, having posted the fifth-highest yards per routes run metric among qualifying players (first-year pros who were targeted 50 or more times).
Here’s how they stack up:
1
Odell Beckham Jr. (2014)
2.75 yards per route run
2
A.J. Brown (2019)
2.67 yards per route run
3
Justin Jefferson (2020)
2.66 yards per route run
4
Ja'Marr Chase (2021)
2.51 yards per route run
5
Chris Olave (2022)
2.42 yards per route run
