When it comes to fantasy football, the first step to scoring fantasy points is being on the field. That said, not all snaps are created equal. Being asked to stay in and block on a passing play is not going to help your fantasy players earn targets and score points.

That’s where route participation comes into play. Route participation can tell you exactly how often a given player is involved in a pass play, which is very important for players who rely on catching passes to produce fantasy points.

Let’s dive into everything you need to know about route participation.

What is Route Participation?

Route participation is pretty self explanatory. Essentially, this metric measures the percentage of passing plays for which a player ran a route in any given game. It excludes plays where the player either was on the sidelines or stayed in to block, so it also tells you how frequently each player was an option to receive a target.

Here's an example. Let’s say that the Chiefs ran 40 passing plays in a given week. If Travis Kelce were to run a route on all 40 of those plays, then his route participation would be 100%. If he were to run 30 routes and is asked to block on the other 10 of those 40 passing plays, Kelce would record a 75% route participation rate.

Feb 12, 2023; Glendale, Arizona, US; Kansas City Chiefs tight end Travis Kelce (87) is tackled by Philadelphia Eagles linebacker T.J. Edwards (57) during Super Bowl LVII at State Farm Stadium. Mandatory Credit: Mark J. Rebilas-USA TODAY Sports

Even though Kelce's snap count would be the same in both of the above scenarios, the former is obviously much more desirable for fantasy purposes. A player can't catch passes if he's not involved as a potential receiver on any given play, so you want your fantasy players running routes as much as possible.

The top pass-catchers for most NFL offenses will typically have a route participation close to 100%. This includes most teams' top WRs as well as some of the top pass-catching TEs like Kelce and Mark Andrews. It's easy to see that these elite WRs and TEs will record high route participation rates, but this stat can be very helpful when analyzing other less-utilized pass-catchers.

For example, a team’s WR3 may only be on the field for 60% of the snaps in a given week, which might make you feel uncomfortable starting him in fantasy. However, if the majority of those snaps are passing plays, and that player's route participation is above 80%, his role might actually be a lot safer and productive for fantasy than his snap share might suggest.

Route Percentage vs. Blocking Percentage

The disparity between a pass-catcher's route percentage and blocking percentage is particularly important when looking at RBs and TEs. WRs are generally going to run routes on a high percentage of passing plays even when they're good blockers.

That’s not necessarily the case for RBs and TEs. Some teams will prefer to keep those players in as blockers on passing plays to protect their QB and give their WRs extra time to get open downfield.

As a result, route participation can be an extremely useful metric in determining which RBs and TEs are being more heavily utilized as receivers.

RBs and TEs who are viable options in the passing attack—in other words, players with solid route participation—are going to be more reliable fantasy producers than those who are asked to stay in and block. Even if those players aren’t playing quite as many snaps, the snaps they are playing should be more valuable the higher their route participation.

Route participation can be a great way to break ties among players in committee situations. For example, if one RB in a committee is often used to pass protect compared to another who releases to run routes, the latter is clearly the preferred target for fantasy purposes.

Using Route Participation in Fantasy and Sports Betting

Each week, Fantasy Life’s data guru Dwain McFarland tracks a ton of different metrics for each player in his Utilization Report. That includes route participation, target share, air yards share, targets per route run, and end-zone targets. All of that data can be used to paint a complete picture of each player’s workload.

That information has plenty of different uses for fantasy players and sports bettors alike. If a player’s role in the offense is growing, you can consider targeting them in your fantasy leagues or by taking overs on their receiving props in the betting space.

Dec 4, 2022; Minneapolis, Minnesota, USA; Minnesota Vikings safety Harrison Smith (22) breaks up a pass intended for New York Jets wide receiver Garrett Wilson (17) during the second quarter at U.S. Bank Stadium. Mandatory Credit: Matt Krohn-USA TODAY Sports

For example, let’s say a player’s route participation has hovered around 50% for most of the year but then jumps to 80% in his most recent game. That could suggest that the player's role is growing, whether it's a rookie developing or a veteran returning to full strength post-injury.

On the other hand, let’s say a player is coming off a massive 100-yard performance with multiple TDs, but he only ran a route on 15% of his team’s passing plays. That type of player could be a sell-high, which could mean trading that player to a less-informed league mate or taking the under on that player in the prop market, unless we have reason to believe that his role will increase following that big performance.

To help provide a baseline of what to expect from a route participation standpoint, the below table highlights the average route participation based on positional fantasy finishes over the past five seasons.

Based on fantasy finishes over 5 seasons (2017-2022) (using points per game fantasy rank—minimum 8 games played)

Combining Route Participation and Other Stats

As mentioned previously, getting on the field is the first step for a player to score fantasy points. When it comes to pass-catchers, running a route is the second step. After that, a player needs to earn targets, catch targets, and then generate yards on said targets.

With all that in mind, combining route participation with some other target metrics makes sense.

Target share is a rate stat that measures the number of targets that each player earns relative to his team’s total target volume. For example, Justin Jefferson led the league with 184 targets in 2022, but the Vikings had 641 targets overall. That works out to a 27.4% target share.

It goes without saying that a player can’t have a great target share without running a lot of routes. A player can see high target volume in a given week without a lot of routes run, but a high target share over the course of a full season generally requires a lot of snaps played and routes run.

Targets per route run (TPRR) is another interesting metric to combine with route participation. Essentially, TPRR measures efficiency by calculating how many targets a player is seeing or “earning” on each route run.

Route participation is more of a measure of volume. If a player can combine a strong route participation with good target-earning ability, that’s a good formula for success in fantasy football.

You can start using route participation to your advantage on Underdog Fantasy, where you can get a 100% deposit match of up to $250 by using the promo code LIFE!

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