@cfielder09 I agree that the WR vs. DB duells are quite unrealistic in total. as far as I know, one has to release the catch button early enough (not holding the button during a contested catch) in order to trigger a successful catch before the DB is able to intercept it. but frankly, I'm very bad in doing successful 1-on-1 catches since I do not play a lot H2H and therefore do not really try it to find the correct timing (and it is easy to beat the AI defense as soon as you know how to read the defense pre-snap...).
maybe it is worth to invest some time in practice mode to find out the best timing to win 1-on-1 catches?
hope that helps. good luck!