Jauan Jennings Fantasy Overview

2024 Summary

Production & Fantasy Finishes

It’s OK to admit that you weren’t really aware of Jennings before Week 3 of last season.

That’s when he forced everyone to take notice by catching 11 of 12 targets for 175 yards and 3 TDs against the Rams.

Jennings clearly benefited from Deebo Samuel missing that game. He had totaled just 9 targets across the first two weeks. Jennings reverted to games of 6, 4, and 5 targets the next three weeks (with Samuel back) but would later benefit from Brandon Aiyuk’s season-ending knee injury.

That occurred in Week 7. Jennings missed that game and Week 8 with a hip injury. From Week 10 (after the bye) on, though, here’s how Jennings ranked among all WRs:

• 12th in target share (25.1%)
• 22nd in targets per route
• 23rd in receiving yards per game (63.4)
• 30th in team yards share (24.6%)
• 39th in yards per route
• 93rd in yards per target
• 29th in PPR points per game
• 24th in expected PPR points per game

Here are his ranks over the full regular season:

• 27th in target share
• 16th in targets per route
• 22nd in yards per game
• 34th in yards share
• 15th in yards per route
• 42nd in yards per target
• 29th in PPR points per game
• 35th in expected points per game

Efficiency Metrics

Jennings also checked in just 93rd in yards after catch per reception over that span, despite ranking just 88th in average depth of target.

Typically, a shorter-range target should be set up for more run-after-catch production. Jennings, though, ranked just 13th among 49ers in after-catch rate – sixth among the team’s WRs in that category. Four of the five players ahead of him sported deeper aDOTs.

Last season marked a low for Jennings in YAC per reception, but he stands at just 3.9 for his career in that category, with a 10.0-yard career aDOT. He fared better after the catch in college, especially with marks of 7.7 and 8.0 his final two years at Tennessee.

Usage & Role

The Niners clearly opened 2024 with a plan to play Jennings in a limited No. 3 WR role. He played a season-low 48.6% of offensive snaps in Week 1, despite Aiyuk coming off minimal summer practice thanks to a contract holdout.

The aforementioned breakout against the Rams marked the only time before Week 10 that Jennings reached 60% playing time. From Week 10 on, though, he played 82.9% of the snaps and easily led the team in target share.

Despite trailing Jennings by 8.4 percentage points in that category, though, TE George Kittle beat Jennings in yardage share (27.9% to 24.6%).

For the season, Jennings spent 41.6% of his pass snaps in the slot vs. 58.4% out wide. That marked a decrease in slot share vs. his previous three seasons – 62.3%, 54.2%, and 57.7% – but lined up near-identically with the way rookie teammate Ricky Pearsall was deployed.

Historical Production & Trends

Jennings’ 2024 looked much different than his previous four seasons, after he arrived as a seventh-round pick in 2020.

The wideout saw no action as a rookie and then averaged just 1.7 receptions and 21.4 yards per game over the next three years.

College went similarly, as Jennings didn’t lead his team in any receiving category until his final (fifth) season. His previous three healthy campaigns found him ranking seventh, tied for second, and second among Volunteers in receptions.

Those No. 2 finishes found him trailing Josh Malone and Marquez Callaway, respectively. Both Malone and Callaway made it to the NFL, but they have combined for 94 career catches to date (83 of those from Callaway; 46 of those for the 2021 Saints).

Jennings did pass Callaway and beat junior-year Josh Palmer in that final Tennessee season. But there’s worthwhile context in the types of WRs he competed with – and often trailed – in receiving.

Injury History

Jennings doesn’t have much in terms of serious injuries behind him. But he has missed at least one game in each of his NFL seasons.

Last year included the two-game hip injury. He dealt with a concussion and a shin injury in 2023. There was a hamstring injury in 2022. And Jennings’ rookie season went empty at least in large part because he carried a heel injury into the year and then sustained a season-ending hamstring issue in October. (It’s not clear why he missed a game in 2021.)

2025 Expectations

Projected Role & Competition

Jennings appears to enter 2025 as the best bet to lead the 49ers in targets after doing so last season.

Samuel’s gone. Aiyuk’s still around but working back from an ACL tear that’s expected to delay his start to 2025. (We’ll see by how much.)

Kittle returns. McCaffrey’s back and should reacquire some of the target share that leaked out of the backfield in 2024. The 49ers tied for just 23rd in RB receptions last season after ranking seventh in that category in 2023.

Besides Aiyuk, Jennings’ primary competition for WR targets will be second-year man Ricky Pearsall. The former first-round pick had his 2024 start delayed by an Aug. 31 shooting, but Pearsall became a prominent member of the offense as soon as he was ready (67.5% playing time in his first game; 66.6% the rest of the way).

The 49ers did show surprising (at the time) commitment to keeping Jennings around by extending him for two years ahead of last season at $11.89 million, with $8.4 million of that guaranteed and a max contract value of $15.39 million.

He’s set to become a free agent after this season.

Supporting Cast

The 49ers showed their belief in QB Brock Purdy for the foreseeable future by re-signing him this offseason to a five-year extension that averages $51 million in annual salary.

Purdy’s well-suited to operate a Kyle Shanahan offensive system that has historically supported strong yardage efficiency.

Even though Purdy fell off 1.1 yards from his league-leading yards per attempt in 2023, he still ranked third in the league at 8.5 YPA last season.

Production & Efficiency Trends

Jennings left some TDs on the field last year by catching just three of his team-leading 10 end-zone targets, according to PFF. He beat Kittle by 2 targets but trailed him by 4 TDs on such plays.

Jennings also trailed Kittle in red-zone targets, but only by two. And his 25 red-zone looks put Jennings clearly ahead of the rest of his teammates.