What Should Redskins Expect From Leonard Hankerson? The NFL Draft Holds A Clue.

It was inevitable really. WR Leonard Hankerson, the Washington Redskins’ third-round Draft pick, came in as the answer to the ‘Skins need for a big red zone target. Now he is a rookie
with questionable hands. All in the space of a couple of weeks, from training camp to the Steelers exhibition game last Friday.

But Hankerson is just a rookie trying to make the team. Concern for drops is legitimate, but some folks already seem to think he is not what we cracked him up to be. Slow down, cowboy. Lets have a little perspective here.

The NFL gave its consensus assessment of Hankerson in the 2011 Draft: Third-round prospect and ninth-best college receiver of his class. Third-rounders can be productive players, though not necessarily the quarterback’s primary target. The 2010 Draft had a mother lode of eight receivers selected in the third round, nearly all contributors. As a group, they averaged 24 receptions, 302 yards, one touchdown over 15 games. (See the table that accompanies this story.)

Hankerson was the ninth wide-out picked in the 2011 Draft. May he do as well as Cincinnati’s Jordan Shipley, the ninth receiver picked in 2010. Shipley overachieved his third round classmates with 52 receptions, 600 yards and three touchdowns. That is close to Anthony Armstrong’s 2010 performance.

Armstrong delighted Redskins fans by his performance, even though it was no better than Antwaan Randle El’s stats in each of the previous two seasons. Armstrong was effectively in his rookie season. We need to see more from him this year. The benchmark for Hankerson is the average of the 2010 third-round receivers. A performance like Shipley’s would be a bonus.

If Hank delivers 40 receptions and two TDs, Hog Heaven will declare him a Draft success. That won’t make him the long-term answer at wide receiver we’ve been looking for since Gary Clark.

Performance of Receivers Selected in the Third Round 2010 NFL Draft

**For this analysis, we disregarded the receiving stats of Armanti Edwards, a college quarterback brought in for the Wildcat offense.

Point after: Sunday night. Lightning strike. Utility pole fire. Bundled ISP services lost. Call to Verizon to report outage. “We will send someone out Friday.” FRIDAY? But it’s MONDAY! Sorry, labor strike, you know. No, I didn’t know. I got readers. Both of them want to see posts, or I lose them to Hogs Haven. Can’t wait until Friday. The NEW ISP can switch me, like yesterday. Good-bye, Verizon. You suck!