Donte Moncrief is a big touchdown threat for the Colts

The 2017 season will be a big one for Donte Moncrief, as it will be a contract year and he’ll be looking to earn a big contract the following offseason.

There are areas in which Moncrief could stand to improve, but one area that he’s been very good at already in his first three seasons is in the red zone as a touchdown threat. In fact, according to Pro Football Focus, Moncrief led the league last year in percentage of targets that went for a score.

Moncrief was hampered by injuries in 2016, playing in just nine games and starting seven, but he caught 30 passes for 307 yards and seven touchdowns. He was targeted 56 times, meaning that he caught seven touchdowns on 56 targets, which as PFF says was best in the NFL last year for players who were targeted at least 50 times. While 12.9% of his targets went for touchdowns, nearly one-fourth of his receptions did (23.3%). Moncrief caught a scoring pass in seven of his nine games played, including a streak of five games in a row with a touchdown reception.

He has proved to be a tremendous touchdown threat for the Colts, as he has caught 16 touchdown passes in his three years in the league. He caught seven in 2016 and the year before caught six despite playing over half the year without Andrew Luck. This year, his ability to find the end zone could prove especially valuable since he’ll likely be one of their top red zone targets.

The Colts know that Moncrief can find the end zone and that he’s capable of scoring, but thus far Moncrief hasn’t developed quite as much as hoped in some other areas, though part of that can be attributed to his injury-plagued 2016 campaign. As he enters a contract year, however, it is important for him to step up and show his true potential. There’s reason to think he can do so, but either way, we should expect him to once again be a very capable red zone threat.