Week 4 AMA: Saints/Falcons Postgame (Ask Me Anything)

Rexman100 said

My only issue with shaheed is that he’s not a contested catch receiver. He’s money if he’s open. But if he has to act like a normal WR, then he’s not the guy, and doesn’t look like he ever will be. Kinda like Darren Sproles. Throw Sproles a jump ball in the endzone, it’s not happening. Even Lance Moore, diminutive in size, still had some elite hands vs contested balls and deflections etc. But neither Sproles or Moore could take the top off the defense, so there’s that.

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I don't agree with this, to be honest. The sample size needs to be larger, but he made some contested catches last year and the year before. In the Eagles game, yes, a dawg 50/50 ball guy gets that first underthrown ball to the end zone, but that was by no means an easy grab.

He had an fantastic one-handed catch in the end zone this week, just the ball was too high to get his feet down.

Whether or not that particular aspect becomes part of Shaheed's game is somewhat irrelevant--he brings more than enough in terms of deep ball and run after the catch ability to carve out an important role. But everyone writing off his ability to compete for the ball I think is operating off of recency bias.