CeeDee Lamb 2024 Player Profile

The Cowboys star receiver had a strange 2024 season after a contract holdout that caused him to get off to a mild slow start before his quarterback got hurt midseason. However, what Reception Perception can show is that CeeDee Lamb remained as good as ever in isolation last year and once again confirmed his place among the elite tier of wide receivers. You can’t make a credible top-five list and not include Lamb. The details in this profile will get you even more excited for his 2025 output now that George Pickens is also in the mix. We could be on the verge of witnessing Lamb’s most productive NFL season. 

Success Rate by Route

Route Percentage

Success Rate vs. Coverage

For the first time since 2021, Lamb took fewer than 50% of his sampled snaps from the slot. At 47.2%, he was close but he also took 5.2% of his snaps from the backfield. His 47.7% outside alignment was his highest rate in the past three seasons, and he was nearly a clean 60/40 split between snaps on and off the line of scrimmage.

Lamb is a fun receiver to study because he possesses all the skills and traits necessary to line up at X-receiver on a near-exclusive basis and dominate. However, he becomes fully maximized when moved around the formation and as a slot-heavy option.

With Pickens in place as a true X-receiver on the perimeter, we should see even more of that movement in 2025. Pickens has averaged an 80.8% outside alignment rate over his three NFL seasons and took more than 81% of his sampled snaps on the line of scrimmage the past two years. Given that his 2024 Reception Perception data revealed significant improvements in his ability to get open against man and press coverage at all three levels, he’s someone the Cowboys can have full faith in as a near-every-down X-receiver. I expect the Cowboys to do some creative stacking with these two receivers, where Lamb and Pickens are aligned right next to each other in condensed sets. We can see plays where Lamb comes onto the field as the outside receiver and then short motions into the slot, and vice versa. That’s going to be a nightmare for defenses to defend; both because Pickens is a more than viable threat in his own right, but also because this is going to give Lamb more easy releases to get into his routes. Considering he’s already one of the best separators in football, that’s terrifying. 

Some of Lamb’s early-season games charted were slightly below his usual success rates but that’s understandable considering he was coming off little prep time with his training camp holdout. However, by the end of the season, Lamb had put up several career-best marks in Reception Perception. 

Lamb’s 78.6% success rate vs. man coverage was a 96th percentile finish and narrowly bested his 77.9% from 2024. Lamb has cleared a 72% success rate vs. man coverage in all of his NFL seasons but has undoubtedly cracked into the elite tier the past two seasons. He’s a fluid mover who is a chore to cover on breaking routes and can drop his weight with ease to create separation on routes that work back to the quarterback. 

Lamb has also been a quality zone-beater throughout the course of his NFL career but made another pretty sizable leap from 83.1% in 2023 (85th percentile) to 85.4% in 2024 (91st percentile). A player like Lamb, who, in ideal circumstances, will move around the formation and take a ton of reps from the slot, must be able to win against zone coverage. The reason he is one of the most hyper-targeted players at his position is because he’s become one of the premier zone-beaters in the game. 

What really sells Lamb’s case as a Tier 1 wideout, in my view, is his work against press coverage. Again, he doesn’t move into the slot because he needs to be put into these situations to minimize weaknesses in his game; it’s done to accentuate his strengths and make it easier for Dak Prescott to hit him on layup passes quickly into plays. Lamb’s 80.8% success rate vs. press coverage should slam the door on any questions about his ability to handle big-boy coverage outside. He’s gone over 80% in back-to-back seasons. There are plenty of plays on tape through those two years where he is a boundary on-ball receiver and stacks corners to separate on downfield patterns. 

Lamb is a three-level separator who wins at an average or above-average rate on all routes of the tree. He did see an increase in his deep in-breaking routes in 2024 compared to 2023 but didn’t always have the quarterback play to get him the football. He still posted excellent success rates on digs and posts. With Dak Prescott back and Pickens stressing defenses down the field, those plays should be much more efficient for Lamb in 2025.

Even when he doesn’t get open, which is unusual, Lamb has some of the best hands in the NFL. He dropped just 2.1% of his sampled targets and checked in with a 75% contested catch rate. He’s been at 75% or better in every year since his sophomore season. Lamb is more than willing to extend and/or leave his feat to catch high-leverage targets. He’s also willing to take a big hit to secure a catch. I think he’s a little under credited for how tough he is as a wideout. 

Another area where the presence of Pickens and the return of Prescott should help Lamb, especially as he’s likely moved around more, is getting him into favorable YAC situations. He was “in space” on 29 receptions in 2024, which was a decline from 42 in 2023 and 35 in 2023. He’s more of a downfield route runner now but still, that is more a reflection of how tightly team’s defended him without another viable threat. I expect to see him get more layups in 2025 which should juice those opportunities up. 

CeeDee Lamb turned in one of his best NFL seasons in Reception Perception despite operating in suboptimal circumstances. There was chaos around him and the lack of another threat in the passing game saw teams going way more out of their way than usual to double cover and bracket an interior receiver. Still, Lamb was excellent. 

He has a mastery of all three wide receiver positions and that’s just extremely rare in today’s game. Only the best wideouts can lay claim to that honor. Reception Perception shows he absolutely belongs near the top of that cohort. If Prescott stays healthy and Pickens hits, Lamb could be looking at an Offensive Player of the Year type output with how many times Dallas will likely need to throw in 2025.