Giants-Redskins matchup features two budding receiving stars

Sunday’s matchup against the New York Giants and Washington Redskins featured two budding stars at wide receiver.

The 2019 NFL Draft has provided quite a few new stars for the league as expected and contained it’s share of quality wide receivers. Tennessee’s A.J. Brown leads all rookie wideouts with 893 receiving yards. D.K. Metcalf has the most receptions among rookies with 52 and Darius Slayton leads the freshman class in touchdown receptions with eight.

Other top performers in the class are Washington’s Terry McLaurin, Deebo Samuel of San Francisco, Mecole Hardman of Kansas City, Pittsburgh’s Diontae Johnson Marquise Brown of Baltimore and Denver’s Noah Fans, a tight end.

Two of those youngsters will be under the spotlight this Sunday when the New York Giants face the Washington Redskins down in the Nation’s capital.

Slayton, after the missing the first two games of the season with a hamstring issue, has come on like gangbusters to have a breakout season with 44 receptions for 690 yards and eight scores. He was a fifth-round pick (171st overall) out of Auburn in this year’s draft.

McLaurin, the former Ohio State star, was selected in the third round (76h overall) and has 51 catches for 833 yards and seven touchdowns.

Here are some things to watch for from both players on Sunday.

Slayton aims for:

  • 3rd consecutive game with at least one touchdown reception. Slayton leads all rookie wide receivers with 8 touch- down receptions.
  • 2nd consecutive 100-yard receiving game vs. an NFC opponent.
  • 3rd consecutive game with a reception of 25+ yards. Slayton in 4th among rookie wide receivers 11 receptions of at least 20 yards.
  • 13th consecutive game with a reception.

Watch for McLaurin:

  • Posting 94 yards to become the Redskins all-time leader in receiving yards by a rookie, passing Anthony Armstrong [871, 2010] and Gary Clark [926, 1985].
  • Recording one touchdown, tying a franchise record for most touchdown receptions by a rookie [Charlie Brown, eight, 1982].
  • Posting his fourth 100-yard game, setting a new franchise record by a rookie.
  • Recording three receptions, passing No. 4 Charley Taylor [53, 1964] in franchise history for receptions by a rookie.
  • Joining Gary Clark [1985] as the only Redskins rookie in franchise history with at least 50 catches, 850 receiving yards and five touchdown receptions.

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