The NFL Draft is still fresh in our minds for just a few weeks now, and with that, I thought it was a good time to dive in. Professional football reference and see how certain positions perform as rookies in the fantasy era. The series starts with tight ends and will continue with the other key positions in the coming weeks.
Sam LaPorta broke the rookie tight end rules last season. We were all witnesses. He had 86 receptions, 889 yards, 10 touchdowns and even a pair of two-point conversions. This earned him the TE1 title and second-team All-Pro honors.
It was the best TE rookie season ever and easily the best tight end debut of the fantasy era. And it’s crazy to pursue that going forward. Unicorn seasons will rarely be repeated.
I decided to research the performance of top tight end picks in the Fantasy Era, loosely defining that era as the year 2000 to today. Obviously the game is constantly evolving, and I would understand if someone preferred a shorter sample of data.
Let’s see what the preliminary trends show for newcomers to this tricky position.
— Five tight ends were selected with the top 10 picks this period. Kyle Pitts had a peculiar rookie year, with 1,026 yards but just one touchdown. He qualified as TE10 in the standard; he has been the TE33 and TE13 since then. No one will miss Arthur Smith in Atlanta.
— Kellen Winslow II was the sixth pick in 2004 and was injured. He only played two games.
– Vernon Davis was decorated as Maryland’s sixth pick in 2006. He missed six games as a rookie and didn’t do much while healthy (20-265-3). Davis turned out to be a good player, scoring four times at TE8 or better (and he was the #1 TE in 2009). He also inspired a classic speech by Mike Singletary.
– TJ Hockenson (eighth pick, 2019) is part of Iowa’s tight end legacy. His freshman year was dismal: 32-367-2. He missed four games.
— Eric Ebron (10th pick, 2014) never met a pass he didn’t want to miss. He gave the Lions 13 mediocre games his first year (25-248-1).
No wonder the spirit of fantasy became “ignore the limits of the novice” during this period.
There are some occasional hits if we look at other first-round tight ends (there were 27 picks in total). Evan Engram’s 2017 debut was the best among first-round rookies in our target area: a 64-722-6 finish in 15 games. He surpasses Pitts in standard scoring; Pitts is slightly ahead in PPR. Engram was TE5 that year; he was TE6 in the last two seasons, reinventing himself with the Jaguars.
Touchdown Deodorant (six scores each) earned a TE11 season from Heath Miller and a TE17 season from OJ Howard. Jeremy Shockey and Dalton Kincaid surpassed 70 receptions. Noah Fant and Dustin Keller were the only other first-round tight ends to surpass 500 receiving yards.
The second round poll opens us up to some exciting seasons. LaPorta, of course, was the 34th pick in the 2023 draft. Rob Gronkowski threw 10 touchdowns as a rookie; Pat Freiermuth had seven. John Carlson checked in with a solid 50-627-5 season.
The later rounds include many players who became stars, although most of their rookie seasons were uneventful. Aaron Hernandez threw six touchdowns as a rookie. Mark Andrews, Chris Cooley, Jimmy Graham, George Kittle and Jordan Reed showed future potential.
I suppose we should also mention Captain Asterisk, Marques Colston. The Saints took him in the seventh round of the 2006 draft, the 252nd overall pick. His 70-1,038-8 season was a monster, and it was especially fun in Yahoo formats where he was eligible at tight end. If you drafted Colston as a wideout, you enjoyed his WR14 season. If you could slide Colston to tight end, you would have the highest-rated player at the position. Not bad for someone who went undrafted in fantasy leagues.
Too long, I didn’t read it
The 2024 rookie class is ready to disappoint us.
Brock Bowers comes into the league with shiny cutouts from Georgia, but he landed on a Las Vegas team that has little in the way of a quarterback, a touchdown-gobbling interior player (Davante Adams) and a solid tight end already on the roster (Michael Mayer). Bowers is a modest TE16 in early Yahoo ADP, which seems fair to me. Talent is great, but fit is not.
The other rookie tight ends look like slow-developing prospects. Maybe Ben Sinnott (Pick 53) ends up gaining some traction in Washington. Ja’Tavion Sanders (Pick 101) heads to a Carolina roster desperate for pass catchers.
I was prepared to proactively pick Bowers if he landed almost anywhere other than Las Vegas. Now, he’s essentially not on my board. Rookie life is often tough on first-year tight ends — it’s a complicated position that often requires gradual integration — and the Raiders have receiving options that take precedence. And no one sees Gardner Minshew or Aidan O’Connell as kingmakers.
“All gone” is not a satisfactory conclusion, I understand. But as we continue this beginner research series, we will find more optimism in some other positions.
