Fantasy Football Tight End Tiers, 2023

One remaining obstacle we face in the fantasy community as content providers and consumers is understanding that rankings, projections, tiers, and average draft positions are all different and serve different purposes.

I wrote a primer highlighting the use of player projections combined with rankings and ADP, but there is so much more on the table.

My season-long rankings and projections focus on the probable outcomes for a player based on top-down production on a per-play basis and projected game script.

Player production is based on that team volume. We can tweak volume and efficiency for a range of outcomes per player, but that is the simplest explanation of how the projection sauce is made.

While those projections give us a range of season-long production and have implications for listing players in a linear format (rankings), even when those full-season numbers are accurate, they fail to capture the weekly impact and the pockets of production that are relevant to our weekly game of fantasy football.

Projecting Joe Mixon for 1,255 yards and nine touchdowns on 270 touches (his 2021 totals) paints a nice picture of his season-long outlook, but any gamer who rostered Mixon will also tell you that in no way did he fulfill those season-long numbers in creating a balanced weekly impact. This happens to all but a handful of players during every NFL season.

That is an anecdotal example to make a larger point, but there is a litany of examples that fits the point I am making.

There are very few players at each position that just smash weekly over the course of the fantasy season, and we are hopeful to be in on the remainder of the players when they strike the hottest.

That is where player tiers come in.

A lot of player tiers are just rankings chopped up into sections.

While the rankings are more focused on a probable tally of season-long output for a week-to-week game, I prefer to structure my tiers based on how similarly players accrue their fantasy points and by the archetypes of players.

By doing this, it allows me to notice actionable gaps in player pricing per tier which in turn allows for arbitrage in fantasy drafts.

It also highlights some longer-odds players who have more potential than originally perceived.

Arbitrage in fantasy football is driven strongest by how production is accrued, and the order of those players (rankings) is driven by the opportunities (on a player and team level) that each player receives.

Our projections are inherently going to be wrong on those projected opportunities often. Team situations are influenced by a plethora of things. The game script, injuries to the player himself, injuries to surrounding teammates, ineffective play, player breakouts, and so on. That is just the game.

Understanding how a player is used allows us to find prospects who could benefit from that variance. If we are wrong on the opportunity projection, then a lower-tiered player could be an arbitrage opportunity.

While there is not a direct overlap to the individual player rankings, the order of these tiers is how I prioritize drafting the positions from an archetypical stance.

While that can be confusing for a player ranked highly on a linear list versus a specific tier he is in, I will do my best to incorporate detailed thoughts regarding draft capital in those events throughout the player breakdowns.

One final bit of housekeeping, I will be updating and adding analysis to these tiers all summer long.

Tier 1 Fantasy Football TEs:

Travis Kelce

Travis Kelce is still in a tier by himself at the tight end position.

Kelce is on a tear of positional dominance that we have not seen in fantasy football since Jerry Rice.

Kelce has outright led all tight ends in scoring in six of the past seven seasons. The one time that he did not (2021), he was second.

Kelce will turn 34 in October, but Father Time has not come calling yet.

Last season, Kelce set career highs in targets (152), catches (110), and touchdowns (12).

His 1,338 yards were the second most in a season, which also was his seventh-consecutive season going over 1,000 yards receiving.

No other tight end in league history has had more than four 1,000-yard seasons over their entire career, let alone seven in a row.

While Kelce is the clear-cut TE1 and there is a gap until the TE2 comes off draft boards, we should anticipate the field will be closer to Kelce this season than last year.

It will be hard to replicate the positional leverage he provided in 2022.

T.J. Hockenson was the TE2 in overall PPR scoring, but it was the fewest number of points scored by the TE2 in a season since 2016 and the second-fewest points scored by the TE2 overall over the past 12 seasons.

As a byproduct, last season’s TE2 only produced 68.1% of the fantasy points that Kelce did.

That was the lowest rate of production for the TE2 compared to the top scorer over the past 30 years.

On average, the TE2 overall has produced 85.7% of the TE1 points over that span.

Even in previous seasons when Kelce has led the position in scoring, the rest of the position has not been as bad as they were in 2022.

In Kelce’s other seasons pacing the position, the TE2 was able to match 93.7%, 97.4%, 95.2%, 87.5%, and 89.1% of his output.

Tier 2 Fantasy Football TEs:

Mark Andrews

Mark Andrews led the team in targets (113), catches (73), yards (847), and touchdowns (five) in 2022, but even he was beaten up along the way and saw an impact on his output.

Over the opening six weeks of the season, Andrews caught 39-of-57 targets for 455 yards and all five of his touchdowns.

He was once again neck-and-neck with Travis Kelce as the league’s most productive tight end over that span.

Andrews was even leading the position in yards per route run (2.32) and target rate per route (29.1%) over that span.

Then Andrews picked up shoulder and knee injuries and was never quite the same the rest of the season.

Over the remaining 10 games he played, Andrews caught 39-of-66 targets for 465 yards and zero touchdowns.

Baltimore has added target competition, but Andrews (turning 28 in September) is still at the heart of his prime. He could shave off a few targets but is still a good bet to hold the most touchdown equity in the Baltimore passing game.

Tier 3 Fantasy Football TEs:

T.J. Hockenson
Darren Waller
Kyle Pitts
Dallas Goedert
George Kittle

Travis Kelce and Mark Andrews will be the first two tight ends to be drafted in the majority of drafts this summer, but after them, the snow globe will get shaken up quite a bit.

Minnesota traded for T.J. Hockenson at the deadline last season, and he immediately became their second receiving option in the passing game.

From Week 9 through the end of the regular season, Hockenson was second among all tight ends in targets (86), catches (60), and receiving yards (519) behind only Kelce. His 21.8% share of the Minnesota targets over that span was third at the position.

There is some fragility here if the Minnesota offense has a decline in passing volume or Jordan Addison makes a significant push to earn targets as a rookie because we still do not have a sample of Hockenson being efficient on his own. He has needed volume to anchor his output.

Hockenson did take advantage of the Minnesota offensive climate over that stretch. He ran the most pass routes in the league (36.1 per game) over that span while his 1.44 yards per route run was 15th. Hockenson’s 8.7 yards per catch and 6.0 yards per target with the Vikings were the lowest rates of his career.

Hockenson will look to find a marriage of efficiency and volume this season while playing on the fifth-year option.

Dealing with hamstring issues for nearly the entirety of the 2022 season, Darren Waller was limited to just nine games, catching 28-of-43 targets for 388 yards and three touchdowns.

Waller will turn 31 this September and has now missed 14 games over the past two seasons.

While active last season, Waller was stuck in a field-stretching role. His 13.4 air yards per target were a career-high while 38.6% of his routes were go routes, the highest rate at the position.

Waller played just 27.4% of his snaps at tight end after rates of 59.6% and 65.3% the previous two seasons.

As Waller has been forced into a field-stretching role, his efficiency and receptions per game have dipped per TruMedia.

Year	aDOT	Short Target %	Deep Target %	Go Route %	Catch %	Catches/Game
2022	13.4	46.5%	32.6%	38.6%	65.1%	3.1
2021	9.9	61.3%	15.1%	20.2%	59.1%	5.0
2020	7.8	62.0%	11.0%	19.3%	73.8%	6.7
2019	7.3	66.7%	9.4%	14.5%	76.9%	5.6

It is hard for us to gauge what the Giants view Waller as.

If they view him as a needed downfield element since Daniel Jones was second to last in air yards per throw last season, then Waller could once again struggle with counting stats and efficiency.

But if the Giants view Waller as the leader of this passing game and plan to deploy him at all levels of the field, then Waller could have a bounce back to when he broke out at the position.

I do tend to side with the latter scenario being the most probable given how the Giants coached up Jones a year ago.

After a 1,000-yard season as a rookie, Kyle Pitts took a step back in his second season in the league.

After he averaged 4.0 receptions for 60.4 yards per game as a rookie, Pitts only averaged 2.8 receptions for 35.6 yards per game last season. He also only appeared in 10 games due to injury to further compound matters, leaving him with 28 receptions for 356 yards and two touchdowns on the year.

Part of Pitts’ struggles last season came from the offensive system.

Pitts was still sixth among all tight ends last season in yards per route run (1.72 yards) and was targeted on 28.5% of his routes, which led all tight ends that ran 100 or more routes last season.

But he also only ran 20.7 routes per game, which was 28th at the position. Atlanta threw the ball -13.0% below expectation on all downs (31st in the league) with a rate of -18.0% on 1st and 10 situations (32nd).

The main strength of Pitts also has become part of what hurts his counting stats, especially when paired with the low-volume passing attack in Atlanta and his quarterback play to this point.

Because Pitts is such an athletic marvel and can be used in ways other ways tight ends cannot, it has impacted his production in this offense. His greatest gifts helped create his 2022 demise. Atlanta built his entire package last season around his downfield ability and not much else.

Pitts averaged 13.8 air yards per target last season, which was the highest of all tight ends.

28.8% of his targets were on throws 20 yards or further downfield (second) while only 39.0% of his targets were shorter than 10 yards downfield, which was 68th out of 71 qualifying tight ends.

Pitts simply does not get enough easy targets to exploit his athleticism. He was forced to live on targets that come with a lower success rate. As a byproduct, 28.8% of his targets were deemed inaccurate due to the quarterback, which led the position.

Compare Pitts to someone like Andrews. Andrews is in a low-volume offense and has a high depth of target for a tight end, but he is given a smattering of shallow targets as well. Since Pitts entered the league, he has had 83 targets shorter than 10 yards downfield. Andrews has 150.

While Pitts was a disappointment in raw stats over his sophomore season, his efficiency was still strong despite being used inefficiently. Atlanta simply needs to do a better job getting him more layups instead of making him live as a three-point shooter.

Dallas Goedert was fourth among all tight ends in yards per route run (1.83). Goedert averaged 7.6 yards per catch after the reception (fourth) and was third among all tight ends in yards after the catch (420) despite missing five games.

The rub is that he is still forced to live on limited opportunities compared to his peers. Goedert ranked 24th in target rate per route run (18.0%) while his 5.8 targets per game were 10th. That limited him to just two top-six scoring weeks.

As mentioned with Jalen Hurts in the quarterback tiers, Goedert could find a pathway to more volume should the Eagles be pressed more on the scoreboard in 2023.

Goedert had just 26 second-half targets all of 2022, which was 121st in the league.

The George Kittle experience is one we have come to live with at this point.

His highs are among the best at the position. He was fifth among all tight ends in yards per route run (1.73 yards) while the only tight ends to average more yards after the catch per reception with as many catches as Kittle had were Goedert and Evan Engram.

Kittle had six games as a top-six scorer and four of those were good enough to finish that week first or second in points scored.

But we also take on the low weeks with Kittle in this low-volume passing game. Kittle had another six weeks as the TE20 or lower. His 5.7 targets per game were 11th at the position.

Kittle was targeted on 16.6% of his routes when both Deebo Samuel and Brandon Aiyuk were on the field (17.2% of the team targets) compared to a 25.0% target rate per route with Samuel off the field and a 38.5% rate with Aiyuk off the field.

When all three were on the field with Brock Purdy also in the game, Kittle had just 13.6% of the team targets and was targeted on 12.3% of his routes.

Tier 4 Fantasy Football TEs:

Pat Freiermuth
David Njoku
Chigoziem Okonkwo
Greg Dulcich
Cole Kmet
Juwan Johnson

This is arguably the tier of tight ends that could make fantasy drafts all come together this season.

You can make a case for any of these tight ends finishing close to the tier above with an apex outcome. This tier is littered with youth and upside but also a limited sample of front-end production that takes some projection.

After a solid rookie season in which he caught 60 passes for 497 yards and seven touchdowns, Pat Freiermuth caught 63-of-98 targets for 732 yards and two scores in his second season.

Despite the lack of receiving scores (a common theme for the Steelers in 2022), Freiermuth jumped up from 8.3 yards per catch and 6.3 yards per target as a rookie up to 11.6 yards per catch and 7.5 yards per target this past season.

Freiermuth established himself as a target earner in his second season. He was targeted on 22.6% of his routes (seventh among tight ends) while averaging 1.69 yards per route run (seventh).

David Njoku averaged a career-high 44.9 yards per game (eighth among tight ends) while catching a career-high 72.5% of his targets. Njoku was 13th among tight ends in target rate per route run (20.0%) and 12th in yards per route run (1.57).

It was a small sample playing with the worst football version of Deshaun Watson to this point, but Njoku and Watson only connected on 60.7% of their targets for 5.9 yards per target compared to a 78.8% rate and 8.9 yards per target with Jacoby Brissett.

If Watson is the player that he was early in his career, then Njoku’s ceiling is immense.

The additions that Cleveland has made this offseason also could threaten Njoku’s target rate, which was already right on the TE1 line.

Chigoziem Okonkwo only played 37% of the offensive snaps as a rookie, but he was more than effective on those snaps.

Among all tight ends in the NFL to run 100 or more pass routes last season, Okonkwo was first in yards per route run (2.63) and second in targets per route run (26.9%). Okonkwo only played 50% or more of the snaps in two games as a rookie but posted games of 4-54-0 and 4-69-0 those weeks.

With Austin Hooper leaving the team via free agency, Okonkwo will have a full runway to test sustaining his rookie season efficiency with added opportunity.

Tennessee could outright be a wasteland for fantasy points this season, and we could see Will Levis take over for a stretch.

Okonkwo also needs the Titans to play him much more in 1TE sets, something his size (6-foot-2 and 244 pounds) can limit in a run-first scheme.

He was 47th in run blocking grade at PFF last season, and Okonkwo ran just 66 pass routes in 1TE sets as a rookie.

He did lead all tight ends in target rate per route (31.8%) on that small sample, but it is a potential thorn in preventing a true second-year breakout along with the Titans potentially being an offense we want to avoid.

While active in Weeks 6 through 16 as a rookie, Greg Dulcich was the TE10 in fantasy scoring and TE9 in expected points scored. He had five top-12 scoring weeks over those 10 games with three weeks lower than TE16.

From a rate perspective, there is plenty of room to build.

Dulcich was 26th in target rate per route (17.5%) and 25th in yards per route run (1.30) at the position over that span.

Like Okonkwo, Dulcich’s primary potential thorn as a full-time player comes down to his involvement in 1TE sets.

As a rookie, Dulcich was 83rd out of 84 qualifying tight ends as a run blocker. Denver immediately added Chris Manhertz in free agency, and Sean Payton was able to trade for his draft crush Adam Trautman, two players who are block-first players.

We want our guys running routes over blocking for fantasy, but we also want them on the field as a starting point.

From two players whose lack of blocking could prevent them from true breakouts to one whose blocking has been too good to allow him to break out.

Cole Kmet received 19.2% of the Chicago targets last season, which was fifth among all tight ends. He also tacked on seven touchdowns after catching just two touchdowns over his first two seasons in the league.

The other side of the coin is that Kmet was targeted on just 16.2% of his routes (40th among tight ends) paired with running just 25.1 routes per game (20th).

Kmet played the second-most snaps among all NFL tight ends, but 53.9% of those snaps were spent blocking, the highest rate among tight ends we have touched on so far.

With the addition of potential target-hog D.J. Moore, Kmet feels like he will be stuck as a touchdown-or-bust fantasy play.

Juwan Johnson enjoyed a breakout season in 2022, After catching just 17 passes for 198 yards and four touchdowns over his first two years in the league, Johnson caught 42-of-65 targets for 508 yards and seven touchdowns.

Johnson was rewarded with a two-year contract this spring.

Johnson played just 39.8% of his snaps at inline tight end with one tight end on the field last season, but he ran a route on 65.3% of the New Orleans dropbacks in 1TE sets, which was 12th at the position.

Johnson is not far off from the archetype of player Darren Waller was converting to tight end, who broke out with Derek Carr (albeit with far less target competition).

With the Saints passing schedule No. 2 in the league, the ancillary pieces in this passing game appear undervalued.

Tier 5 Fantasy Football TEs:

Dalton Kincaid
Sam LaPorta
Michael Mayer
Luke Musgrave

Our premier capital group of rookie tight ends. Rookie tight ends have been a tough investment for redraft purposes, so there should be a grain of salt applied within this tier for 2023 purposes.

If taking one of these rookies, you are almost forced to go with a 2TE approach.

That said, this is a talented group of pass catchers. Even if this quarter does not pop wire-to-wire for fantasy this season, all of them have the talent and potential pipeline to opportunity to make an impact at some point in their inaugural seasons.

Dalton Kincaid was a hyper-productive pass catcher, and it resulted in him being the first tight end selected in the draft and the only one in the first round.

After a 36-510-8 line in 2021, Kincaid exploded as a fifth-year senior to catch 70-of-96 targets for 890 yards and another eight touchdowns last season.

Kincaid racked up:

24.3% of the Utah receptions (third in this class)
21.9% of the targets (third)
25.5% of the receiving yards (third)
25.8% of the receiving touchdowns (fourth)
26.7% of the air yardage (second)
2.0 yards per team pass attempt (second)
51.0% of his targets went for a first down or touchdown (first)

Kincaid is all pass catcher right now so we are looking for him to find a role similar to Mike Gesicki coming out as a prospect. The only question is whether Kincaid is as good of an athlete as Gesicki since we did not see Kincaid do any athletic testing.

Kincaid lined up in line on just 35.4% of his snaps, the second-lowest rate in this class. 55.1% of his snaps came lined up as a slot receiver with 9.5% out wide. He averaged 2.52 yards per route run from the slot, which led this class.

Kincaid can immediately push Dawson Knox for playing time as well as pushing for snaps as the primary slot receiver in Buffalo.

Sam LaPorta accounted for 30.4% of the Iowa receptions (second in this class), 28.1% of the target (second), and 32.0% of the receiving yards (first).

LaPorta was Iowa’s passing game. So much so that he led this draft class in routes run as an isolation receiver (35.5% of his routes) while he ran a class-high 20.2% of his routes lined up out wide.

LaPorta led this crop of tight ends in targets against man coverage (38) while his 2.72 yards per route run against man was the highest in this class among tight ends that ran more than 33 routes such routes (he ran 115).

LaPorta’s success against man coverage is backed by his destruction at the Combine. LaPorta checked out of Indianapolis in the 92nd percentile athletically.

56.9% of LaPorta’s yardage came after the catch, which was a higher rate than the other Tier 1 tight ends here in Mayer (42.7%), Kincaid (46.1%), and Darnell Washington (46.7%).

The only thing LaPorta did not do regularly in college was find the end zone. He caught just five career touchdowns on 153 receptions (3.3%), which was the second-lowest rate in this class.

Iowa had just seven total passing touchdowns in 2022 and 12 in 2021 to add a grain of salt there, but it was the one area of production that LaPorta did not dominate.

Landing in Detroit, LaPorta has a clear runway to be the primary tight end on the roster while Detroit targeted their tight ends 36.1% of the time inside of the 10-yard line, which was fifth in the league.

Michael Mayer was the second youngest and most productive tight end in this draft class.

After posting a 71-840-7 line over 12 games as a sophomore in 2021, Mayer came back this past season to catch 67 passes for 809 yards and nine touchdowns.

Mayer was the Notre Dame passing game. Among all the tight ends in this draft class, he led the group in:

Share of team targets (31.5%)
Share of team receptions (31.9%)
Share of team receiving touchdowns (36.0%)
Share of team air yards (38.8%)
Rate of targets per route run (35.7%)
Yards per team pass attempt (2.39)

No tight end in this draft class averaged more receptions (5.0) and receiving yards (58.3) per game throughout their collegiate careers than Mayer.

Against man coverage, Mayer averaged 2.37 yards per route run (fourth in this class) while averaging 2.61 yards per route against zone overage (third).

Mayer was also someone who was moved around in college. He played 45% of his snaps in the slot and 14% out wide.

Mayer caught 17-of-26 contested targets in 2022 while no other tight end in this class had more than 11 contested catches.

The knock on Mayer is that while his career production rivals elite prospects, he was an underwhelming athletic tester at the Combine with his long speed the largest question mark many have had.

Mayer came out of Indianapolis with a 52nd percentile athletic score in my tight end model. That may move him down a peg when compared to hyper-productive prospects such as Kyle Pitts and Rob Gronkowski, but those are the only two tight ends in my database (going back to 2000) that have a higher career production score than Mayer does.

With Darren Waller traded, the Raiders traded up to grab Mayer at the front of the second round. Given Jimmy Garoppolo’s affinity for throwing over the middle of the field and on the intermediate levels, Mayer can immediately contribute once he clears Austin Hooper for full-time snaps.

Luke Musgrave entered the season on the Mackey watch list, but his senior season was cut short to only two games due to a knee injury.

Musgrave was able to return for the Senior Bowl and made a good impression. He then built on that with a strong showing at the Combine, exiting Indianapolis in the 86th percentile at his position from an athletic stance.

While Musgrave was only on the field for 50 total pass routes in 2022, he was out of the gates with 3.52 yards per route run (which would have been tops in this class on an extended sample) while drawing a target on 31.3% of his routes (which would have been third).

Musgrave averaged 3.13 yards per route against man coverage to go along with 3.84 yards per route against zone coverage. 20% of his targets were 20 yards or further downfield, which would have been second in the class.

In that two-game sample, he posted games of 6-89-1 and 5-80-0.

We are treading into nearly a full projection extrapolating his small sample to full-season success, but it was clear that Musgrave was going to be a large part of the Oregon State offense.

Musgrave should immediately be the primary pass-catching tight end for the Packers with Robert Tonyan leaving in free agency and Josiah Deguara moving to H-Back.

Tier 6 Fantasy Football TEs:

Dalton Schultz
Evan Engram
Tyler Higbee
Gerald Everett
Tyler Conklin
Hayden Hurst
Noah Fant

We are back to some veterans. While potentially boring and lacking the true upside of the previous two tiers, these are established players that have relatively solid floors in terms of their usage.

At tight end, I prefer to shoot for more for the moon, but all of these players are in contention to finish as back-end TE1 options.

You may even see guys like Dalton Schultz and Evan Engram here and think I am far too low on both since they competed with Tier 3 players last season.

Schultz is a solid baseline tight end that is reliant on volume to elevate his station in fantasy.

Averaging 10.1 yards per catch for his career, Schultz did outright pace all tight ends in scoring in two weeks last season (his two games with multiple touchdowns) but he also had eight weeks as the TE20 or lower.

Leaving Dallas to join the Texans, Schultz has live odds to lead Houston in targets next season but will also have to produce playing with a rookie quarterback. There have been just nine TE1 scoring seasons attached to a first-round rookie passer (out of 64 instances), but one did come last season via Pat Freiermuth to keep the lights on.

Engram set new career highs with 73 receptions and 766 yards. His four touchdown receptions were the most since catching six in his rookie season.

Engram closed 2022 on a high note. After catching 42-of-59 targets for 386 yards and two touchdowns over his first 12 games of the season, Engram collected 43-of-56 targets for 504 yards and three touchdowns over his final seven games through the postseason.

Engram still did have 11 games with 40 or fewer receiving yards last season, and the team added another viable target in Calvin Ridley. Still, Engram offers spike-week potential at a limited position that is inherently filled with low floors.

Tyler Higbee set career highs in targets (108) and receptions (72) in 2022 as he was force-fed more opportunity given the offense a year ago.

While Higbee was fifth among all tight ends in catches last season, his 8.6 yards per catch ranked 59th while his 5.7 yards per target were 58th.

He also blocked on 50% of his snaps, a rate only trailing Kmet among the players we have covered.

Higbee will be 30 years old with just one season of scoring more than three touchdowns (with a career-high of five), but the Rams have no real depth at wide receiver, leaving Higbee set up to be a floor-based PPR option.

Gerald Everett set career highs in targets (87), receptions (58), and receiving yards (555) to go along with four touchdowns.

The downside is that his 1.41 yards per route run ranked 20th among tight ends a year ago despite being targeted on 20.2% of his routes, which ranked 12th.

Everett also was impacted by the availability of Keenan Allen.

On 186 routes run with Allen on the field, Everett received just 10.6% of the team targets as opposed to a 14.4% target share on 258 routes with Allen off of the field.

Everett still carries an attachment to Justin Herbert, and new offensive coordinator Kellen Moore heavily utilized the tight ends in Dallas. Those are positive marks for his upside.

Tyler Conklin was second on the team with 87 targets last season, catching 58 passes for 552 yards and three touchdowns.

His 1.13 yards per route run was 33rd among all tight ends to run 100 or more pass routes, but 17.2% of his targets were also deemed inaccurate, which was the highest rate among all tight ends to have as many targets as Conklin did on the season.

New York tight ends collectively ranked 13th in receptions (80) and are getting a massive quarterback upgrade.

Conklin is one of just 11 tight ends to have more than 500 receiving yards in each of the past two seasons. I believe Conklin is one of the better best ball values at the position and is undervalued in all formats, even if there are peaks and valleys during the season.

Hayden Hurst averaged a career-high 4.0 receptions per game in 2022 while his 31.8 yards per game were the second-most of his career.

Unfortunately, Hurst was still unable to make a fantasy impact. He was the TE21 in points per game (8.1).

The biggest thorn for Hurst is that he just doesn’t create explosive plays. He averaged just 8.0 yards per catch in 2022 (66th among tight ends) while he has just 14 career touchdowns. Carolina has a wide-open passing tree to at least create a path to targets.

Noah Fant led the Seattle tight end group, catching 50-of-63 targets for 486 yards and four touchdowns.

His 2.9 receptions per game were his fewest since his rookie season while his 28.6 yards per game were the fewest he has averaged over his four years in the NFL.

Fant now has added target competition and the prospect of Seattle using more three-WR sets after they drafted Jaxon Smith-Njigba in the first round this season.

Tier 7 Fantasy Football TEs:

Taysom Hill
Isaiah Likely
Trey McBride
Irv Smith Jr.
Jelani Woods
Jake Ferguson
Cade Otton

This is our “squint to see it” tier, but you can tell yourself a positive story and an upside outcome for all of these tight ends.

Taysom Hill was the TE9 in overall fantasy scoring among tight ends (TE12 in points per game), but he had just three weeks in which was higher than TE10 in weekly scoring.

Hill is listed as a tight end, but he is far from an actual tight end.

Hill played 148 snaps at quarterback and another 24 in the backfield. He played 51 snaps in line with 40 in the slot and 61 lined up out wide. Hill ended up running 123 pass routes and was targeted just 13 times all season.

Where Hill made his impact was once again as a runner, turning 96 carries into 575 yards and seven touchdowns. The addition of Jamaal Williams (who led the NFL in rushing scores last year) does threaten Hill’s goal-line usage while the addition and investment into Derek Carr may mean that he does not come off of the field in the red zone as much as the previous New Orleans quarterbacks the past few seasons.

Isaiah Likely is unfortunately behind one of the best tight ends in the league.

Even if you believe that the Ravens get Likely on the field more in his second season, there is just no way that he will have the weekly usage to be a reliable weekly starter without Mark Andrews missing time.

Likely caught 36-of-60 targets for 373 yards and three touchdowns as a rookie while only playing 40% of the offensive snaps.

Likely was 10th among all tight ends last season in targets per route (21.4%). In the three games that Likely played 50% or more of the snaps due to injuries to Andrews, he had games of 6-77-1, 1-24-1, and 8-103-0.

Arizona selected Trey McBride in the second round (55th overall) last offseason to be the inevitable replacement for Zach Ertz.

Most rookie tight ends start slowly and that was the case for McBride.

Among all tight ends to run 100 or more pass routes, McBride was 59th in target rate per route (12.3%) and 55th in yards per route run (0.84).

When Ertz was absent from Week 11 through the remainder of the season, McBride was 28th out of 38 tight ends in yards per route run (1.04) and 24th in target rate per route (15.5%).

The Bengals could use some added weaponry here at the tight end position. Cincinnati only targeted their tight ends 16.3% of the time in 2022, which was 30th in the league.

On top of the lack of overall opportunity for the tight ends, Hayden Hurst left via free agency after leading the unit in targets (68), catches (52), and yards (414).

The team added Irv Smith Jr. on a one-year deal. Smith is a former second-round pick and will still only be 25 years old at the start of the season but had just 91 receptions over his rookie contract with the Vikings.

Jelani Woods was selected in the third round (73rd overall) last season, catching 25-of-40 targets for 312 yards and three touchdowns.

While the counting stats were modest, Woods was targeted on 19.3% of his routes (12th among all tight ends to run 200 or more routes) while averaging 1.51 yards per route run (also 12th among that group).

Woods only played more than 60% of the snaps in two games as a rookie and more than 38% of the snaps just four times, but he flashed for 8-98-0 on nine targets in the game he played the most snaps of the season. In the other game in which he played more than 60% of the snaps, Woods caught 3-of-5 targets for 43 yards.

The addition of Anthony Richardson could prevent a full breakout due to his accuracy and top-down passing volume concerns.

Jake Ferguson is expected to be the frontrunner to replace the vacated pass-catching role left open by Dalton Schultz.

Ferguson only ran 104 pass routes as a rookie, but his 1.67 yards per route run was higher than what Schultz posted (1.38) and he was targeted on 21.2% of those routes. That ranked 11th among all tight ends last season to run at least 100 routes.

The one looming threat is how much 2023 second-round pick Luke Schoonmaker cuts in Ferguson’s ability to take on a full-time role since Schoonmaker projects to be involved as a blocker in the run game.

Cade Otton caught 42-of-65 targets for 391 yards and two touchdowns in his first season. His 9.3 yards per catch were 48th among tight ends while his 4.1 yards after the catch per reception sat 49th.

There may not be much dynamism here, but Otton is going to get a larger role in 2023 with the release of veteran Cameron Brate.

In the six games that Brate missed last season, Otton ran a pass route on 86.8% of the team dropbacks.

Tier 8 Fantasy Football TEs:

Dawson Knox
Hunter Henry
Mike Gesicki
Zach Ertz

Our final tier of back-end veterans who still carry appeal as streamers and can run into more opportunities than projected.

Dawson Knox caught 48-of-65 targets for 517 yards and six touchdowns in 2022. His 14.2% target per route rate ranked 48th among tight ends while his 1.11 yards per route run ranked 37th.

Knox has scored 15 touchdowns in the past two regular seasons. That could make Knox a threat to Dalton Kincaid’s upside. On the other hand, it is a look at the scoring upside Kincaid could bring.

After a productive season in 2021 with New England (50-603-9), Hunter Henry saw a decline across the board in his numbers, catching 41-of-59 targets for 509 yards and two touchdowns.

Henry played a higher snap rate (76% up from 68% in 2021), but not many pass catchers escaped the wake of this lackluster passing game a year ago. Henry is in the final season of the three-year contract he signed with the team.

Mike Gesicki was lost in Miami’s new offense in 2022, averaging just 1.9 receptions for 21.3 yards per game.

His 52 targets were his fewest in a season since his rookie season. He played just 45% of the offensive snaps, his lowest rate since his rookie campaign.

Gesicki is a great athlete that has played more slot receiver than inline tight end over his career but has failed to live up to early expectations. Since entering the league in 2019, Gesicki has played just 19.9% of his snaps at inline tight end, the lowest rate of all qualifying tight ends.

While healthy in Weeks 1 through 9, Zach Ertz was the TE5 in overall scoring.

Due to the long window of missed time by DeAndre Hopkins and Arizona being in jailbreak game scripts weekly, Ertz was leading the NFL in pass routes run and was second in targets.

Those elements were helium for Ertz ranking 18th in target rate per route (18.7%) and 25th in yards per route (1.09).

Ertz will turn 33 during this season, is coming off a torn ACL, and averaged a career-low 8.6 yards per catch. Coming off the injury paired with the absence of Kyler Murray and Trey McBride still hanging around, Ertz comes with plenty of red flags.

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