What You Need to Know:

-The Bengals selected Higgins in Round 2 of the 2020 draft.

-He made an instant impact with a team-high 908 yards and 6 scores. He ranked behind Tyler Boyd with 108 targets and 67 catches.

-Higgins’ WR28 finish ranked 4th best among a loaded rookie WR class.

-From Week 1-Week 11 — alongside Burrow only — Higgins ranked a decent 27th among 53 WRs with 50+ targets in yards per route run (1.81).

-Higgins suffered a hamstring injury in Week 17 and didn’t return. He was listed with a hamstring on the Week 14 injury report and missed several days of training camp with the same issue.

-Joe Burrow went down with a season-ending ACL/MCL tear in Week 11. However, he’s fully expected to be under center for Week 1 this fall.

-In 10 games with Burrow, Higgins was on a full-season pace of 113-69-1,006-6. That would have made him the WR22 — 6 spots above his true finish.

-This offseason, the Bengals replaced A.J. Green (and his 104 vacated targets) with top pick and potential superstar Ja’Marr Chase. His dynamic talent and the chemistry he showed in 2019 alongside Burrow could have him leading this group right away.

-Higgins will remain on the field a ton after playing on 94.1% of Cincy’s passing snaps last season. Overall, the team ran 3-WR sets at a league-high rate (76%).

-Tyler Boyd returns for his 6th season. He’s missed only 1 game (due to a concussion) over the past 2 seasons. Historically, he’s at least a low-volume TD scorer (5.9% career TD rate) — good news for the 6’4 Higgins.

Draft Sharks Bottom Line

In 2018 and 2019, Higgins produced big-time totals at Clemson alongside Trevor Lawrence. He parlayed that into immediate success as a big-bodied outside target for Joe Burrow.

Ja’Marr Chase brings serious target competition, but the Bengals should continue to lean pass after registering a nearly 59% pass rate in 2020. The key here is the health of Burrow, who’ll be less than 10 months removed from tearing up his knee come Week 1.

Barring a Burrow setback, though, Higgins will profile as a WR2/3.