Xavier Legette Fantasy Overview

2024 Summary

Production & Fantasy Finishes

Legette finished his 2024 rookie season with 49 catches for 497 yards and four TDs across 16 games. He exited Week 15 and missed Week 16 with a hip injury.

Legette ranked 61st among WRs in total PPR points and 74th in points per game. He cracked the top-36 WRs in only four weeks all season, with just one finish better than WR28.

Usage & Role

Legette opened last season in a part-time role, failing to reach a 60% route rate in four of his first five games. His playing time climbed starting in Week 6, and Legette averaged an 87% route rate over the next eight games. He was limited again late in the season, presumably because he was battling hip and wrist injuries.

Legette finished the season with 84 targets — 5.3 per game on a 16.1% target share. If we look at those eight mid-season games with full playing time, Legette climbs to 5.8 targets per game on a 17.7% share. He ranked 46th among WRs in expected PPR points per game over that stretch; 58th in actual points per game.

Efficiency Metrics

Legette caught just 58.3% of his targets and averaged 10.1 yards per catch. His 5.9 yards per target ranked 82nd among 89 WRs with 50+ targets.

Legette fared only slightly better in terms of yards per route, finishing 72nd. He ranked 84th in Pro Football Focus receiving grade.

Among 16 qualifying rookie WRs, Legette ranked 11th in yards per route and 16th in PFF grade.

He was particularly disappointing after the catch, where he averaged just 2.3 yards per reception. That ranked 82nd among those 89 qualifying WRs. Legette’s +0.1 yards after catch over expected, per NFL Next Gen Stats, ranked 64th.

Offensive Context

Legette played in a bad Panthers offense that ranked:

• 31st in plays
• 23rd in points
• 29th in total yards
• 30th in passing yards
• 30th in yards per pass attempt
• 16th in passing TDs

QB Bryce Young played better over the second half of the season, but Carolina still averaged only 198 passing yards per game over their final 10. That would have ranked 25th over the entire season.

Historical Production & Trends

Legette was the 32nd overall pick of the 2024 NFL Draft after a strange college career.

He did next to nothing over his first four seasons at South Carolina, totaling just 42 catches for 423 yards. That stretch included a 2020 hamstring injury and a 2021 motorcycle accident – all after Legette spent his senior year of high school playing QB.

Then he came out of nowhere for a huge 2023 campaign: 71 catches for 1,255 yards and seven TDs. Legette ranked top-16 among 286 qualifying WRs in both yards per route and Pro Football Focus receiving grade.

Then he smashed the Combine, recording a 4.39-second 40 time and 40-inch vertical at 6’1, 221 pounds to earn a 9.90 Relative Athletic Score.

Injury History

Legette dealt with shoulder, toe, hip, and wrist injuries last year — and then underwent foot surgery this offseason, reportedly to address persistent discomfort he experienced throughout his rookie season.

He also had the aforementioned hamstring injury in college that cost him four games in 2020.

2025 Expectations

Projected Role & Competition

Legette’s role and target projection are up in the air after the Panthers used the eighth overall pick of this spring’s draft on WR Tet McMillan. He’s likely to be a full-time player right away, leaving Legette to battle for playing time with WRs Adam Thielen, Jalen Coker, and Hunter Renfrow.

Thielen turns 35 in August but led the Panthers with 61.5 receiving yards per game last year. That included 72.3 yards per game over his final seven outings. (Legette averaged 35.5 yards per game during that stretch.)

Coker went undrafted last year but wound up beating Legette in receiving yards per game, yards per target, yards per route, and Pro Football Focus receiving grade.

The 29-year-old Renfrow returns after missing the 2024 season due to a bout with ulcerative colitis. He topped 1,000 yards back in 2021 but totaled only 585 yards across 2022 and 2023.

One thing working in Legette’s favor is that Renfrow and Thielen are primary slot receivers, and Coker ran 61% of his routes from the slot last year. Legette ran 69% of his routes from the outside.

Supporting Cast

The biggest question in Carolina this year is which version of Bryce Young we’ll get.

The No. 1 overall pick of the 2023 draft had a historically inefficient rookie season, averaging 5.5 yards per attempt with a 2.1% TD rate. Last year didn’t start out any better, and Young was benched after Week 2.

But he returned in Week 8 and played much better the rest of the way.

Over his final 10 games, Young averaged:

• 210.4 passing yards
• 1.5 passing TDs
• 0.6 INTs

He still ranked just 26th in completion rate and 27th in yards per attempt over those final 10 games. But he ranked sixth among 35 qualifiers in Pro Football Focus passing grade.

Coaching & Offensive Scheme

HC Dave Canales and OC Brad Idzik return for their second season with the Panthers. Year one was underwhelming, but they had a lot working against them.

Canales is just a year removed from helping revive QB Baker Mayfield’s career in Tampa Bay. He also served as Seahawks QBs coach for Geno Smith’s breakout 2022 season. Canales still looks like a positive for Young’s development — and, therefore, Legette’s fantasy outlook.

It’s worth noting that Canales’ 2023 Bucs team produced a pair of top-30 PPR WRs, with Mike Evans finishing WR7 and Chris Godwin WR29.

Production & Efficiency Trends

Legette was an older rookie and will play the 2025 season at 24 years old.

According to our aging-curve research, we should expect somewhere between 87-94% of peak production from a 24-year-old WR.