Wide Receiver · Seattle Seahawks · Age 24 · Ohio State · WR3 Half-PPR (Season 2026)
Jaxon Smith-Njigba is ranked WR3 (overall #5) for the Season of the 2026 NFL season in Half-PPR fantasy football by Hayden of The Underdog Football Show. ADP 5.3 — close to consensus.
JSN can regress some and still be a top-5 fantasy WR
JSN arrived in a huge way without DK Metcalf and Tyler Lockett in his way. He was the WR2 on WR7 usage, averaging 99.6 receiving yards per game including the postseason. His 35% target share dwarfed the next closest, Amon-Ra St. Brown (32%). And he didn't do it as a screen merchant either. Only 8% of his targets were screens. Smith-Njigba's explosion was entirely tied to being a better downfield threat. His average depth of target as a rookie was 6.1 yards downfield, then 8.6 as a sophomore, and then finally last year jumped to 11.1. He had 20 yards per game more than he did in 2023-24 on his targets 15+ yards downfield. Some credit belongs to Sam Darnold for being 2nd in completion percentage over expected (+10.0%) on these deep targets, but Darnold is back with the same OL. Other credit belongs to OC Klint Kubiak, who called an offense 10th in play action rate and played at the 3rd-fastest pace in neutral situations. All this data is from Underdog Rankings' advanced stats page, by the way. The hard part with JSN's 2026 projection is baking in the new playcaller after Kubiak took the Raiders head coaching gig. Enter new OC Brian Fleury. He might be the least talked about new playcaller this year because he hasn't been a playcaller before. Nobody knows. Fleury comes from the Shanahan tree, and he's coached with Kyle Shanahan himself with the Browns in 2014 and then for the past 7 seasons with the 49ers. He didn't directly know coach Mike MacDonald to my knowledge, yet got the job. Former QB Brock Huard, who has connections to the team, said this about Fleury: "I know he crushed the whiteboard. I can say that confidently ... I know in the interview process it was pretty overwhelming to everybody in the room that his years under Kyle, and his understanding of situational ball, and the level and the depth and the detail was pretty overwhelming, because there were strong in-house candidates, a number of them." That makes me feel a lot better about the Seahawks offense in 2026, even if JSN's yards per target (10.5) and completion percentage over expected (+10.2) are bound to regress. Smith-Njigba still projects as a top-5 fantasy WR with regression baked in.
Based on 1 community vote:
See where all Wide Receivers are ranked for the 2026 fantasy football season. Jaxon Smith-Njigba is currently WR3 among Wide Receivers.
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Hayden is a fantasy football analyst for The Underdog Football Show, covering 2026 fantasy football with PPR and Half-PPR rankings, ADP comparisons, and weekly start/sit analysis. Rankings are updated regularly throughout the season. Hayden's "Best Bet" designations highlight players ranked higher than their ADP consensus, while "Fade" designations flag players the ranker believes are overvalued by the market.
By Hayden · The Underdog Football Show · Updated 2026-07-06