Things had been trending this way over the past week, but now it’s official: Keenan Allen is a Charger again. Allen, now 33 years old, will team up with Ladd McConkey, Quentin Johnston, and Tre Harris to form an intriguing blend of new school and old school in Justin Herbert‘s WR corps. Let’s break this signing down from a fantasy standpoint.
KEENAN ALLEN
- This is an interesting fit from a player deployment perspective since Allen took 52.8% of his snaps from the slot last season, while McConkey took 65.3% of his snaps there. McConkey was obviously electric as a rookie and looks like the long-term answer at WR1 for Los Angeles, but do the Chargers dare move him out of a primary slot role in Year 2? As mentioned, Allen is 33 years old and averaged just 10.5 yards per reception last season, his second-lowest mark of the past decade. It’s unclear whether he can win consistently on the outside, and it’s not super sensical for LAC to force McConkey outside all the time after he was so productive in the slot as a rookie.
- What was clear last year is that Allen can still command targets. He led Chicago with a 25.7% target share last year (ahead of D.J. Moore‘s 24.9% mark), though those targets weren’t particularly useful given his 6.1 yards-per-target average (for reference, Moore was at 6.9 YPT; Rome Odunze 7.3). Allen is a franchise legend and figures to have the WR2 role early in the season, making him viable in full-PPR formats given the lack of target competition beyond McConkey, but he has a second-round pick in Tre Harris behind him and another WR in Quentin Johnston who, while still not great, at least took a clear step forward in 2024. If he’s not efficient, can he maintain a full-time role with two young wideouts behind him?
- This is a good spot for Allen, and his ADP is going to soar. Our early projections have him in the Round 10-11 range — far ahead of the Round 17+ ADP he’s been drafted at all summer. If you’ve been drafting him, you’re very happy with this. But at his new price, there are real questions about his ability to sustain a heavy workload all season.
LADD MCCONKEY
- We slightly dinged McConkey’s target share with Allen joining the squad. It’s not a death knell by any means after McConkey was so awesome in 2024, but Allen was incredibly effective at earning targets last year and poses a significantly larger threat than someone like Johnston or Harris (given what we know currently about Harris). The questions about how Allen and McConkey fit together and whether they can consistently play together in 2-WR sets are also fair. Still, McConkey is a long-term answer at WR for the Chargers, and we expect them to prioritize using him and developing him when possible.
OTHER CHARGERS RECEIVERS
- This is pretty killer for Tre Harris‘ prospects of playing early. There was already KeAndre Lambert-Smith buzz making things hard on Harris, and now he’s relegated to WR4 to start the year presumably with McConkey and Allen as huge target earners and Johnston in a big-bodied, big-play, red-zone sort of role. It’s bad news for Harris’ September production, but the good news is that the season extends far beyond September. Allen is 33 years old and averaged an awful 6.1 yards per target last season, plus Johnston was still plagued by drops in 2024 despite catching eight touchdowns. Harris has multiple outs to seeing the field and can win more targets once he’s on the field, but the path to early production is murkier now.
- For Johnston, he just gets pushed further down the target totem pole. He did have eight touchdowns last year and flashed some promise as a vertical threat, but he has to be more consistent to keep his job all season. Given his veteran status and the positive buzz about him all offseason, we expect him to begin the year as the WR3.
- Lambert-Smith, Tyler Conklin, Will Dissly, etc. also fall a little bit with increased target competition.
