How did Corey Davis perform against top cornerbacks in 2020?

What type of numbers did New York Jets wide receiver Corey Davis put up against elite cornerbacks in his breakout 2020 season? After a disappointing first three years of his career in which he averaged only 44.5 receiving yards per game, Corey Davis enjoyed a breakout season of spectacular proportions in 2020. He ranked 19th in the NFL and 16th among wide receivers with 70.3 receiving yards per game - but it was his per-play efficiency that shined the brightest. Davis ranked seventh among wide receivers in yards per target (10.7), fifth in yards per route run (2.58), and first in conversion rate as he picked up a first down or a touchdown on 53.3% of his targets. Did Davis rack up those numbers by beating up on lousy defenders or did he maintain his dominance even against some of the league's best cornerbacks? Shown below is a chart that includes Davis's production versus every defender he saw at least one target against. Five numbers are listed for each defender: The defender's career average for yards per target allowed Davis's number of targets and receiving yards against the defender The expected number of receiving yards Davis should have earned against that defender (defender's yards-per-target average multiplied by the number of targets Davis saw against him) The net difference between Davis's actual receiving yardage total against the defender and his expected receiving yardage total The data reveals some very interesting takeaways regarding the legitimacy of Davis's 2020 production: Even when adjusting for his level of competition, Davis was phenomenal. Based on the career production levels of all of his opponents, Davis should have been expected to post about 734 yards over his 91 regular season and playoff targets (a total that excludes three targets that were throwaways by the QB), but he posted 984 yards, a plus-250 differential. On a per-target basis, Davis averaged 10.8 yards per target against a crop of defenders that typically allows 8.1 yards per target. That's a plus-2.7 differential, which is nearly the same as the margin between the season-long yards-per-target averages of Braxton Berrios (7.2) and Chris Godwin (10.0) last season. Davis thrived against every position. He averaged 9.7 yards per target against cornerbacks, 19.4 yards per target against safeties, and 13.2 yards per target against linebackers. Against elite competition, Davis was mostly solid. He was targeted against nine different cornerbacks who ranked top-30 out of 97 qualifiers in PFF's coverage grade: Jaire Alexander (#1), Bryce Callahan (#3), Marlon Humphrey (#12), Jimmy Smith (#16), Cameron Sutton (#20), William Jackson (#23), Kyle Fuller (#25), Joe Haden (#29), and Marcus Peters (#30). Over 24 targets against those nine players, Davis posted 230 yards against an expectation of 165.6 yards, a tremendous differential of plus-64.4 against some of the best cornerbacks in the league. Davis averaged 9.6 yards per target whereas he should have been expected to average only 6.9 yards per target - none of those nine cornerbacks have allowed more than 7.5 yards per target in their careers, well below the 2020 positional average of 8.0. Five of the nine top-notch cornerbacks held Davis in check. Alexander, Smith, Sutton, Fuller, and Haden combined to allow 28 yards on 11 targets against Davis, a microscopic 2.5 yards per target. Davis had zero-yard games against Alexander's Packers and Fuller's Bears, while he posted only 35 yards over 10 targets against Sutton and Haden's Steelers. On the contrary, Davis was outstanding against Callahan, Humphrey, Jackson, and Peters. When matched up across from those four players, Davis collected 202 yards over 13 targets, a blistering 15.3 yards per target versus his expected average of 6.6 yards per target against that four-player crop. Davis had 100-yard games against Callahan's Broncos, Jackson's Bengals, and Humphrey's/Peters' Ravens (although Baltimore held Davis to zero catches in their Wild Card win over Tennessee). Relative to expectation, Davis actually fared better against elite opponents than lackluster ones. As previously mentioned, Davis averaged 9.6 yards per target versus an expectation of 6.9 yards per target against the nine top-30 cornerbacks that he faced, a plus-2.7 differential. Against all other cornerbacks, Davis averaged 9.8 yards per target versus an expectation of 8.7 yards per target, a much smaller differential of plus-1.1. Essentially, this tells us that Davis's production was hardly affected by the quality of his competition. You could generally expect him to bring the same quality of performance regardless of who matched up against him. Elite cornerbacks did not drag him down (on an overall level - obviously, this varied from game to game), and while he was generally fantastic against weaker cornerbacks, he was quieted by them just as frequently as he was by elite corners. Altogether, this is a promising collection of data for Davis. It's not as if he feasted on one particular type of matchup to achieve greatness. His top-notch efficiency extended across every matchup. Good corners, bad corners, safeties, linebackers - he was beating everybody, validating his breakout season.