The NFL isn't like basketball, where prospects land on depth charts before a wide role gets eventually thinned out, nor is it similar to other team sports like baseball or hockey with their substantially longer seasons of potential opportunities. Development in a game with minimal room to overtake starters and even less leeway to change positional archetypes places an exceptional amount of weight on preexisting infrastructure, with a potentially poor response to a specific environment often getting misconstrued as analysts attempt to understand the players before them.

As we now know, Treylon Burks is one of those players who needed more of a push in a specific direction than he got. The Tennessee Titans hoped he'd become the franchise's playmaker for years to come when they drafted him with the first-round pick acquired in the A.J. Brown trade with the Philadelphia Eagles, but the Washington Commanders have been happy to get consistent production out of him since signing him to their practice squad a little over a year ago.

It's becoming increasingly clear that his ascendance as a go-ball artist has far more to do with his partnership with Jayden Daniels than it does with the X-spot opened up by the down-for-the-count Terry McLaurin. Despite his long path here and his still-incomplete game, he's as worthy of a full-time starting gig as he ever has been, a necessary bright spot during a team-building period that's badly searching for wins.

Burks' Long-Awaited Search for Comfortability

To be clear, he didn't shift from a disappointing former first-round pick into a relied-upon wideout overnight. It took him most of last year to finally impress Washington and its frustrated fan base.

He didn't have much time to build chemistry with Daniels, as the quarterback appeared in only two of the Commanders' 10 final matchups. Burks did, however, enjoy a moment in the sun when he made one of the team's top plays of the season: a fading one-handed touchdown grab against one of last season's top defenses, the Denver Broncos.

Though little from that late-season stretch offered any long-term guarantees, he still seemed worth monitoring whenever the Commanders next meant business.

A few months later, when it was time for the squad to whittle its training camp participants down to an inner circle of rotational playmakers, he had 130 yards over eight games to lean on, not much, but enough to convince management that his 13 yards per reception offered some upside as a deep-ball threat, something they lacked outside of the aging and battered McLaurin. Burks himself hadn't exactly been Mr. Perfect Attendance, having yet to make a dozen appearances in a season, with a mere five outings logged during his final year in Tennessee, but his talent made a flier seem worth it.

Washington's play-callers have leaned all the way in on Burks and the long ball, spiking his yards per target to a career-high 10.6 on 22 targets over a half-dozen-game sample size. 19.4 yards per reception also rings in as a high-water mark thanks to the work he's doing after his tough catches, and his average nightly yardage count of 38.8 is within two ticks of the 40.4 mark he'd once peaked at as the Titans' hyped rookie.

He's drawing some of the deepest targets at his position, proving a unique enough threat to keep on earning trust from Washington's staff. Following his first target attempt in Week 8 against the Eagles, a bobbled pass he dropped from point-blank range, the Commanders went back to him four more times for 81 yards on three receptions in a successful gamble.

McLaurin's absence after a torn patellar tendon suffered last month has opened a starting spot to complement slot options like Stefon Diggs and Antonio Williams. Daniels has his groove back thanks to a more versatile receiving corps, and his stabilizing presence as a dual-threat creative is proving that Burks may have even more to unlock beyond his role-player status, let alone as a must-deploy ahead of pure reserve options like Luke McCaffrey and Dyami Brown.

Look no further than the Commanders' most recent outing, a Burks-less 20-13 loss to the Los Angeles Rams, for evidence regarding how much it hurts to lack that extra help. After being left alone with a thin corps of Diggs, Williams, Chig Okonkwo, and surprise hero Van Jefferson, Burks' combination of physical force and finesse will be appreciated if he returns from his foot injury for Thursday's Giants rematch in New York.

With D.C. serving as a "second draft" for the former washout, he's looking almost as deserving of attention as a true rookie like Williams, thanks to his unique skill set. Washington should keep that downfield role for him even when the receiving corps gets healthier. It only took some time to unlock, and the Commanders may have plenty more of that coming as they navigate another messy season.

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