One town has altered the landscape of America over the last few years, producing an American Idol, a humble and amazing blogger, and the NFL’s leading receiver in 2010.  Brandon Lloyd has been in the league now since 2003, and his career best season was 48 catches and 733 yards for a bad San Francisco team in 2005.  At age 29, he has almost reached that total (589 receiving yards) after five games.  After three seasons of wandering the league in which he had 36 total catches, he has found a home in Denver playing in Josh McDaniels’ system, and catching passes from Kyle Orton.

How rare is it for a wide receiver to have a breakout season at age 29 or older, like Lloyd?  Well, not as rare as I would have thought.  Here is the list of wide receivers who had their first 1,000 yard receiving season at 29 or older, since 1960.  I also list the number of additional 1,000 yard seasons for these older breakouts.

yearfirstlastagerec yds1000 yd seasons
1995BrettPerriman3014881
1995TonyMartin3012243
1964JohnnyMorris2912000
2001TroyBrown3011990
1985DrewHill2911694
1979AhmadRashad3011561
2007BobbyEngram3411470
1964ElbertDubenion3111390
2007KevinCurtis2911100
1999QadryIsmail2911051
1995QuinnEarly3010870
2006MikeFurrey3010860
2004EddieKennison3110861
1979FrankLewis3210821
2006TJHoushmandzadeh2910811
1989MervynFernandez3010690
1976CharlieJoiner2910563
1998EdMcCaffrey3010532
1998OJMcDuffie2910500
2001WillieJackson3010460
1993ReggieLanghorne3010380
1998RocketIsmail2910241
1981FreddieScott2910220
1990StephonePaige2910210
1986JTSmith3110141
1991IrvingFryar2910104

We have some great names from the past on that list, including some guys who turned out to be one-hit wonders, like Mervyn Fernandez and Mike Furrey.  We”ve also got one guy who was (dubiously in my opinion) selected to the Hall of Fame in Joiner, and others who experienced a career revival as they entered their 30′s.  Half of the late breakouts would go on to have at least one more 1,000 yard season.  Given the quality of his roots, I think you have to like Lloyd’s chances.