Finding Tight End Breakouts - Champs, Chumps, and Contenders

We're going to keep this train moving here on to Week 4. Maybe this is just me, but I'm constantly torn in both directions once the NFL season starts. On one hand, I can't get enough of it and I can't wait until next Sunday. On the other hand, I want it to slow down because I'm always sad when it ends. And just like that, we're inching closer to the quarter mark, which is crazy. But, if there's one thing I will not miss is trying to figure out this tight end position.

It's a mystery every single year. That's why so many analysts were adamant about using one of their top picks on an elite tight end – if you're streaming tight ends you can certainly understand the appeal. The odd thing is despite the passing explosion that is taking over the NFL, fantasy managers have not gained any more viable tight ends, which seems almost unbelievable. One would think with the NFL continuing to shift more and more towards the pass, we'd start to have more options to choose from.

Entering the season most thought that would be true – the tight end position was the deepest it's ever been they said. But once again, the tight end position has laughed in our faces. If you don't have one of the top-five tight ends, the position becomes a game of roulette. It's a fun game – just one no one really wins. That doesn't mean we're going to stop playing though! Let's start wading through the filth and see if we can unearth some treasure.

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Mike Gesicki, Miami Dolphins

What a roller coaster this guy has been – although one could argue, isn't every tight end a roller coaster of sorts? In Week 1, Gesicki was playing behind Durham Smythe, which is just about rock bottom as far as fantasy tight ends go. But the winds of change are blowing and we must change our course. It wasn't long ago that Gesicki was a drop candidate and that was fair – Week 1 was that bad. A lot has changed since then though.

Even though Will Fuller returned in Week 3, he promptly got hurt. Pretty much par for the course. He missed practice on Wednesday and if his history is any indicator, fantasy managers shouldn't be expecting him to be on the field this weekend. There was a lot of concern Fuller's return would result in a decreased target share for Gesicki and in theory, that was 100% the right logic. However, the biggest change has been the one at quarterback. With Tua on IR and Brissett now starting under center, Gesicki's usage has been through the roof. What do I mean when I say that? How about 12 targets and 10 receptions in Week 3. We never want to pay for what someone has done though, we want to look towards the future. Is that volume repeatable?

Last time Jacoby Brissett was starter (2019), tight ends Eric Ebron and Jack Doyle combined for a 30% target share.

In his first start with the Dolphins, Brissett targeted TE Mike Gesicki 12 times.

Gesicki is back on the TE1 radar.

— Frank Ammirante (@FAmmiranteTFJ) September 28, 2021

Based on Brissett's history, it would appear it is. Coupled with the injury to Fuller, Mike Gesicki's fantasy value – at least during Tua's IR time – is through the roof. In Week 3, he ran 33 of his 41 routes from the slot. The best fantasy tight ends are the ones treated like wide receivers and in Week 3, Gesicki had that role.

Week 1 is looking more and more like an outlier, which is certainly good for Gesicki. After having been out-snapped in Week 1, he saw in big bounce back in Week 2. There he ran 34 out of his 37 routes from the slot. He's certainly in must-start territory right now. Fantasy managers will need to decide whether they ride the hot train or cash in their chips to a needy tight end team or possibly buy low on one of the other ones.

 

Dawson Knox, Buffalo Bills

Anytime a tight end catches touchdown passes in back-to-back weeks, they immediately become on our radar. While 44% of his fantasy points are currently coming from touchdowns, he is still tied for TE6 in half-PPR season on the young season with Logan Thomas. And to be fair, Thomas also has 44% of his points on touchdowns.

Let's start out with the positives. He is running a route on 90% of the pass plays in which he's on the field and is currently playing 72% of the total snaps. Fantasy managers should love to see his route participation number so high – which is actually a higher percentage than Kyle Pitts and Noah Fant. I'm not advocating to drop either player for Knox by any means. For the love of all things fantasy football, do not do that. But it's still a fact and a positive one for Knox's case. And overall, Knox has run 90 routes, which is ninth-most in the NFL. That number is somewhat being inflated by the pass-happy nature of the Bills' offense, but that isn't something that is going away either.

Now, for the bad. Despite running 90 routes, he's been targeted on only 12 of them. His target share is certainly not where fantasy managers need it to be for him to be a dependable weekly asset. That's largely due to the fact the Bills employ Stefon Diggs, Cole Beasley and Emmanuel Sanders who are all ahead of Knox on the pecking order.

Knox is in his pivotal year three-window, which is where we typically see a lot of breakouts for tight ends. It's a harder position to master and the learning curve is steeper than others. The plethora of receivers in Buffalo will likely eliminate any true chance for a breakout – unless an injury occurs – it's still nice to see the production starting to come.

Over his last 12 games (including playoffs), Buffalo Bills TE Dawson Knox has 7 TD catches, a reception percentage of 74% and Josh Allen has a 133.75 passer rating when targeting Knox. His drop rate over that stretch is only 4%. #Draft&Develop #BillsMafia

— Joe Marino (@TheJoeMarino) September 26, 2021

If there's one more positive, we missed on, it's that Knox has a 9.25 RAS (relative athletic score). The score is used to determine how athletically gifted each player is relative to their position. A 9.25 is in the elite category, which has proven to be a prerequisite for high-end fantasy value for tight ends.

 

Robert Tonyan, Green Bay Packers

There was no more obvious candidate for regression than Robert Tonyan. He caught 88% of his targets last season – completely unrepeatable. He scored a touchdown on 18.6% of his targets – again, completely unrepeatable. On top of the obvious signs for regression, the Packers also added Randall Cobb and would get Allen Lazard back for a full season. More target competition, just what a target-starved tight end needed, right?

So far, all the reasons we worried about Tonyan have played out just as we expected it to. He has only eight targets through three games, with just six catches and 66 yards. I typically despise pace stats for the sake of making a point so early in the season – they're certainly more of the entertaining variety at this stage of the game – but Tonyan's 17-game pace would be 34 catches for 374 yards. Those numbers would essentially need to double themselves for him to become fantasy viable.

Trust me, as a Packer fan, I totally get hanging your hat on the "well, his quarterback is Aaron Rodgers" argument. It's a good one. Rodgers is a boss, but look, Rodgers' touchdown rate last year was 9.1%. The last time he had a touchdown rate of 9.0% or higher, it fell down to 7.0% the following season. What does that look like? Well, if Rodgers threw the same number of passes this year as he did last, that 2% decrease would equal 11 fewer touchdowns. You couple that with Tonyan's own touchdown regression and you got trouble.

I know everybody & their mother wanted Robert Tonyan to be a thing so bad in #fantasyfootball, but you can drop him from your rosters. After 3 weeks:

Routes run: 62.5%
Target share: 8.7%
Targets/route run: 12.5%
Eight TOTAL targets
TE25 in fantasy PPG

Just run away.

— “Reasonable” Kevin Tompkins (@ktompkinsii) September 28, 2021

Those numbers above are putrid. There's nothing about them that indicates he can be a usable fantasy football tight end. Holding onto Tonyan is praying for the same touchdown luck he fell into last season to return this year. It's possible, his quarterback is Aaron Rodgers after all, but I would not be counting on it whatsoever.

 

Cole Kmet, Chicago Bears

Wow. What the hell was that? I know a lot of people were super excited about Fields' debut and I was too – to an extent, but this was still a rookie about to start his first NFL game with Matt Nagy calling the plays. Remember, I'm a Packer fan, so I've gotten to watch Nagy's brilliance for the past three years and as a Packer fan I hope he never leaves. But even as someone who had a low bar, whatever I saw on Sunday surprised me. On the bright side, it cannot get any worse.

That's true. The offense will not be this bad all season. It will get better. That doesn't mean it will be good, but it will get better. Kmet absolutely cannot be started right now, but fantasy managers shouldn't be giving up hope either. Kmet's peripherals are everything we're looking for in a fantasy tight end.

The player that is most likely to be this year's Logan Thomas down the stretch is still Cole Kmet.

Logan Thomas had great deployment but struggled with early QB changes last year.

Kmet this week:

95% of snaps
54% at WR
20% target share

Keep him stashed if possible.

— Andrew Cooper (@CoopAFiasco) September 28, 2021

The numbers listed above are elite as far as tight ends are concerned. Now, it has not led to any fantasy production, which is certainly not ideal. But if you're in the business of streaming tight ends and have a roster spot available to stash Kmet, you should 100% do so. He's playing 79% of the total snaps compared to Jimmy Graham, who sits at 24%. He's also running a route on 87% of the team's dropbacks. All of those numbers are great, but the real reason Kmet is a stash is that the Bears do not have many options in the passing game.

Sure, Allen Robinson is a beast, but the door is wide open after him. Kmet has an open avenue to being the No. 2 target in Chicago. At worst, he should be competing with Darnell Mooney for that spot. I loved Fields coming out of Ohio State and believe Nagy should stick with the rookie. If this offense can find its footing – even just a little bit – Kmet is going to be a backend TE1 because the volume should be there. Right now, that looks like a big if, but if I can, I'm holding to see if it happens.

 

Dan Arnold, Jacksonville Jaguars

Like Kmet, Arnold absolutely cannot be started – yet. The potential is there, however. The Jaguars have surprisingly involved their tight ends quite a bit this season despite having DJ Chark, Marvin Jones and Laviska Shenault. Through three weeks, the position has a 17% target share. In Week 1, James O'Shaughnessy racked up eight targets and in Week 3, Jacob Hollister had six. Week 2 was kind of funky because O'Shaughnessy got hurt and then signed Hollister before Week 3.

In Week 1, O'Shaughnessy ran a route on 40 of Lawrence's 51 dropbacks and ran 25 of them from the slot. In Week 3, Hollister ran 28 routes out of 34 dropbacks with 21 in the slot. That's good usage. The Jaguars can be expected to be behind on the scoreboard most weeks, which is likely going to force Lawrence to have to air it out quite a bit, opening up additional volume, which is good news.

STASH Dan Arnold

He was just traded from CAR to JAX...

And outside of Chark, Marvin Jones, and Shenault, there's no other pass catchers of note there

Very good athlete, and someone who could get 4-5 targets a game by default pic.twitter.com/ibiVKtKPdW

— Josh Larky ↗️ (@jlarkytweets) September 27, 2021

From what you can see above, Arnold is another exceptional athlete, which is important at the tight end position. He was just traded, so it's likely going to take some time for him to get used to the playbook, but fantasy managers should keep an eye on him. If he takes over the role O'Shaughnessy and Hollister had, he could become someone worth starting.

 

Tyler Conklin, Minnesota Vikings

Conklin popped off for seven catches, 70 yards and a score in Week 3 – likely leading many fantasy managers to the waiver wire to scoop him up, but was that the right call? Unfortunately, I do not believe it was. Although Week 3 might offer some hope. Let's dig a bit deeper.

The Vikings have called 119 pass plays – Conklin has been on the field for 103 of them. Of those 103, he's running a route on just 79 of those, good for a 77% clip. Numbers like that tell me the production we saw in Week 3 is unlikely to repeat itself very often.

Week 4 — Fantasy Football Luckbox List

Utilization says these players got lucky so don't overdo FAB or expect similar results Week 4:

WR9 - DeSean Jackson
WR15 - Hunter Renfrow
WR27 - Marquez Callaway
TE1 - Dalton Schultz
TE2 - Tyler Conklin

Borderline: WR8 Kendrick Bourne pic.twitter.com/wDmUz1UWv3

— Context Matters (@dwainmcfarland) September 29, 2021

There are just so few positive peripherals to look at with regards to Conklin. Even in Week 3 – his best week of the season to date – he ran a route on just 63% of Cousins' dropbacks. He ran 24 routes and received eight targets. That 33% target per route run number is completely unsustainable with weapons like Dalvin Cook, Justin Jefferson and Adam Thielen on the roster.

Fantasy managers should do their best not to get sucked into the pretty box score Conklin had in Week 3 – it's a mirage.

 

Dallas Goedert, Philadelphia Eagles

Panic time. Fantasy managers who are rostering Goedert are there and it's for good reason. This is a bad situation and there's nothing about it that looks like it's going to get better any time soon. How bad is it? It's kind of that bad.

Dallas Goedert’s usage and production this season with Zach Ertz compared to four games last season without

2021 w/ Ertz (three games)
- 13.7 routes run/gm
- 3.7 targets/gm
- 23.7 air yards/gm

2020 w/o Ertz (four games)
- 34.3 routes run/gm
- 5.8 targets/gm
- 60.3 air yards/gm

— Adam Koffler (@AdamKoffler) September 30, 2021

Lets's do some rapid-fire here. Targets – 10 for Ertz and 11 for Goedert. Routes Run – 69 for Ertz, 66 for Goedert. Routes from the Slot – 40 for Ertz and 31 for Goedert. Receptions – 7 for Ertz and 8 for Goedert. Touchdown Receptions – 1 apiece. His usage has been criminal especially with the lack of receiving options they have for Hurts, but it's what we got.

Right now, Goedert cannot be trusted in starting lineups – at least not more than any other tight end, which is quite the fall in just three weeks' time.

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