People don’t like this article. Plain and simple. It upsets them and they’ve told me so. Check some of the comments I shared right in last year’s article. Some of those are not very nice, to say the least.

And I get it – they want positivity. They want “breakouts” and “sleepers”. Well, guess what? A fictional Italian-American boxer from Philadelphia once told us that “the world ain’t all sunshine and rainbows”. 

 

 

 

And, unfortunately, he was right. The world is a mean and nasty place. And there are some tight ends out there that will beat your fantasy team to the bottom of the standings and keep it there permanently – if you let them. It’s our job to dodge those tight ends and keep them at arm’s length.

We want two things from the tight end position in fantasy football: We want upside, and we want consistency. Robert Tonyan in 2020 technically finished as a top five tight end in fantasy. And that was cool and all in games where he scored a touchdown. Which lasted right up until championship week when he had one catch and it wasn’t a touchdown. There is a reason folks that had Tonyan weren’t celebrating him. They didn’t win their league.

We want guys that have the floor AND the ceiling. We’ve already broken down What Makes An Elite Tight End. And we’ve shared our best guesses for Which Tight Ends Are Elite. Now, we have to go in and do the dirty work. You need to know who the fantasy football fades are at the TE position - especially if you are someone that drafts a lot of teams. Here are the guys we are avoiding at ADP in 2024.

2024 Fantasy Football Fades: Tight Ends

As always with this series, we’ll give you three sections for each player: The Good, The Bad and The Advice.

  • THE GOOD - As much factual info as possible on why this player could be good.
  • THE BAD - As much factual info as possible on why this player could be bad.
  • THE ADVICE - My opinion on whether you should draft them at current fantasy ADP or not.

Now, before reading this, I highly suggest you at least read our Tight End Bible of sorts where I lay out everything we look for in difference making tight ends - What Makes An Elite Tight End.

That article explains EXACTLY what we are looking for and what stats matter so you will better understand the conclusions we’ve drawn. And that will make it hurt less when you read the name of a player you like. Because everyone likes this first tight end – he sure seems like a great guy. 

George Kittle, San Francisco 49ers

The Good

George Kittle is an athletic specimen. It makes you wonder why he fell all the way to the fifth round of the NFL draft. In fact, the 49ers might not have even picked him had they not also already taken his college teammate and roommate, C.J. Beathard, earlier in the 3rd round. Funny how that happens. 

Here’s a look at Kittle’s freakish measurables per Player Profiler:

That combination of size and speed allows him to rip off big chunk plays at a level that no one else can. We’ve been tracking this data over the last seven years to see which tight ends are doing the most damage on big plays. And George Kittle is undoubtedly the king of the big play. Here are some highlights from that data over the last seven years:

  • Kittle has 16 plays of 40+ yards. Travis Kelce has 14. No one else has more than seven.
  • He leads all active tight ends with 8 plays of 50+ yards.
  • He leads all active tight ends with 5 plays of 60+ yards.
  • No other active tight end has had more than one 70+ yard play. Kittle has three.
  • Over that span, there were only four total 80+ yard plays by tight ends. George Kittle had two of them. In the same season.

And, if you think he’s slowing down, think again. Last year, he was the only tight end to have three or more plays of 40-plus yards. And his 66-yard scamper was the longest play a tight end had. That, and the incredibly efficient 49ers offense, is what makes George Kittle a unicorn of sorts in the tight end world.

The Bad

I say Kittle is a “unicorn” because his success has been unique – and not necessarily for good reasons. For instance, he’s the only tight end in the last half decade or so to finish top five in fantasy in a season where he blocked on more than 15% of his pass plays. I don’t think I need to explain why blocking on pass plays is bad for fantasy football. Here is an article where head coach Kyle Shanahan explains that sometimes George Kittle has to block so guys like Christian McCaffrey can run routes.

So, because of that, every so often you’ll get a game like Week 12 where Kittle blocked on 17.6% of his pass plays and only caught three passes for 19 yards. And that wasn’t even his lowest yardage total – he did that or worse four times. It’s scary that you can have a team that can win 35-16 against a team like the Cardinals and George Kittle in that game will have one target for 19 yards because Christian McCaffrey scores four touchdowns. When your quarterback has only a $1 million dollar cap hit, you can afford to have a team loaded with stars on both offense and defense.

And that’s really the big problem in terms of consistency. Including playoffs, George Kittle played in 19 games last year. In the games where Brandon Aiyuk, Deebo Samuel and Christian McCaffrey were all healthy, Kittle only caught more than three passes on three occasions. He just didn’t have to. They spread the ball around. George Kittle had six games with 7+ targets. In five of those games, one of the wide receivers was hurt. He probably doesn’t cross that coveted 90+-target threshold last year if not for those injuries. 

The Advice

I love George Kittle – in best ball formats. As we talked about, he can break off a huge chunk play at any time. Or score three touchdowns, like he did on three catches against Dallas. And Kittle still has my vote for “Most Fun Tight End To Have A Beer With”. But anyone who has had him in leagues where you need to set a lineup each week knows how frustrating he can be. 

Sure, in fantasy playoffs last year he helped you win in Week 16, but you needed to “survive” having him in your lineups for Weeks 15 and 17 when he had only 2-3 catches. That’s the Kittle experience in most seasons. Right now, there are basically four “tiers” of tight ends going in the TE1 range. They don’t always go in this exact order, but they often go within their same group of players.

And the reality for me is that I prefer the upside of Kyle Pitts and the PPR safety of Evan Engram within that third group. So, I simply don’t find myself drafting George Kittle that much. Or anyone in that fourth tier either, for that matter – as you will soon find out.

David Njoku, Cleveland Browns

The Good

You know how hard it is to make an argument against a guy this cool?

And those certainly aren’t all “show” muscles either. At 6’4”, 246 lbs, this guy has a 97th percentile “burst score” for this position per PlayerProfiler. That’s what made him a first round pick for the Cleveland Browns and, though it took him a couple of years to put it all together, he did so in a big way last year. 

In 2023, Njoku was top five in target share and had a healthy 1.7 YPRR on those targets. He had 15 receptions vs. man-to-man coverage while getting the second most screens of any tight end behind only Evan Engram, which shows he can create for himself AND he gets manufactured touches. 

His 120 targets were third amongst tight ends and targets are by far the most predictable statistic when it comes to both success and consistency for tight ends. That goes for pretty much every position, honestly.

The Bad

Here’s the problem with all that. David Njoku was playing his best football when the quarterback was someone OTHER than the starting quarterback – Deshaun Watson.

Watson has a history of moving the pocket and looking for chunk plays down field. Which often leads to fewer dump downs. And David Njoku’s average depth of target of 4.8 yards actually ranks 66th among tight ends that got at least 10 targets. There’s a real world when Watson returns as the QB and Njoku doesn’t get nearly as many of those short looks he got last year. Not to mention, Alex Van Pelt was the offensive coordinator that drew up all those tight ends screens and he left to join New England. 

We also can’t ignore that they just traded for Jerry Jeudy. I did a little study recently on “fantasy points per look” with a look being “targets plus carries”. Elijah Moore last year was far and away the worst player to get over 100 looks. Him finishing as the WR52 in PPR despite his usage is exactly why Jeudy was brought in. Jeudy really cannot be any worse than Moore and he likely inherits those looks. And possibly more.

The Advice

Whether you like David Njoku or not, this year really might boil down to how you feel about Jerry Jeudy. Amari Cooper will almost certainly lead this team in targets. My main concern is that Deshaun Watson is going to look for Jeudy more often than he looks for Njoku. And that will cap the upside of a tight end that has already never had a top-five season.  

I personally rarely ever draft David Njoku (or Jake Ferguson, for that matter). If I do draft them, I’m going Yin & Yang tight end where I will draft them to be my starter in the early weeks but I’m using a bench spot on a high-risk, high-reward player to give myself some upside. They’re just too boring for me. 

With both Ferguson and Njoku going in rounds 7-8, it just seems too expensive to go for these guys in this range and ALSO draft another tight end later. And I’m the guy who says, “It’s okay to draft two tight ends”, but the point of Yin & Yang is to NOT use up all our meaningful draft capital doing it.

T.J. Hockenson, Minnesota Vikings

The Good

T.J. Hockenson last year was flat-out awesome in fantasy football before he and Kirk Cousins got hurt. There’s no two ways about it – he was on his way to being the TE1 in fantasy. He missed two and a half games yet still had the second most targets of any tight end. He was tied for TE1 in fantasy points per game and that included games with a backup QB. He was an absolute steamroller.

Last year, he checked pretty much every box in terms of target share, route participation, wide receiver snaps, aDot, pass block rate, catches vs. man to man, red zone targets – you name it. He oddly only got four tight end screens which is crazy when you consider the targets he did have. He didn’t even need those freebies.

The Bad

This is a sad tale. Because I think we can all agree that T.J. Hockenson is a great football player. But great football players don’t always score a ton of fantasy points. Talent is cool, but you also need opportunity.

It was already going to be problematic that he’s on a team with Justin Jefferson and Jordan Addison, who obviously ascended as the season went on. After his recent legal troubles, it sure would be helpful if Addison would get moved by the Vikings. Because, even if he is suspended, that might not help Hock much as Hock himself might start slowly coming off a torn ACL.

And that torn ACL could not possibly come at a worse time. Because he’s missing a lot of time needed to get on the same page with the quarterbacks who will attempt to replace the gunslinger king Kirk Cousins. In case you missed it, Cousins left this offseason to join the Atlanta Falcons. Say what you will about him as a winner, Kirk Cousins is QB11 OF ALL TIME in passing yards per game. This guy chucks and I doubt J.J. McCarthy or Sam Darnold stroll into town and throw at that level.

The Advice

So, what we have here is a tight end coming off a major injury to a team with two star wide receivers with either a rookie quarterback or a journeyman quarterback leading the show. And they added pass-catching back Aaron Jones on top of it. It unfortunately just feels like too much to overcome for the big dog to have upside.

I’m also not even sure what the best way to go about deploying Hockenson as part of a build is. He still gets drafted in the backend TE1 range. The time to start him that would be most appealing would be during a Jordan Addison suspension (if it happens this season). But those will be his first games coming off a serious injury playing with a wildcard at QB. 

So, then we are stashing him and starting someone else hoping that he has big upside later? Even though the argument AGAINST his upside is fairly compelling? I’m just not going to go there to be honest. There are too many decent options this year to mess around with all that.

Dallas Goedert, Philadelphia Eagles

The Good

Here is another player that pretty much everyone agrees is pretty good. He’s yet to put it together for a high-end fantasy finish, but that’s mostly due to injuries. He’s a key cog within one of the NFL’s most high-powered offenses. And the RPO and play action with Jalen Hurts routinely fools the linebackers which leads to a lot of wide-open catches for Mr. Goedert.

Speaking of free catches, Nick Sirianni loves him some tight end screens. Goedert was top five in tight end screens last year despite missing three games. He also got a solid 12 receptions vs. man to man, showing that he can create for himself as well.

For fans of what Dallas Goedert brings to the table, 2024 should offer a lot of the same. There are some moving pieces on the line, and they swapped out Swift for Saquon Barkley, but they really didn’t add much in terms of additional pass catchers. And Kellen Moore’s offense could be more high flying than what Philly has seen in the past. 

The Bad

Let’s hit the elephant in the room first. Over the last three years, per Pro Football Focus, there has only been ONE team to have three players all get over 100 targets. And that was the 2022 Vikings who have a bit of an asterisk on them anyway as T.J. Hockenson was traded to them mid-season. Betting for A.J. Brown, DeVonta Smith and Dallas Goedert to all get 100+ targets is a pretty slim bet as it happens roughly 3% of the time. That’s about the odds of correctly picking a single number in Roulette.

Now, there is an argument to be made that Goedert has bigger upside if one of the wide receivers gets hurt. But, if you want to play the Dr. Fortuneteller game and start predicting injuries, it’s Dallas Goedert that has actually gotten hurt five straight years in a row. So, it’s really not the best argument to make. And it’s a big reason why Dallas Goedert has never finished higher than TE8 in fantasy.

There’s also one huge misconception about Goedert. People think that because he’s “big” he is automatically a guy that scores touchdowns. But Goedert quietly only has 7 end zone targets over the last three years combined. To put that in perspective, Donald Parham had seven end zone targets just last season. And it honestly makes sense. They have a literal unstoppable goal line play with the Tush Push, and they now have Saquon Barkley. So why would they throw the ball up for grabs?

The Advice

If DeVonta Smith or A.J. Brown were to get hurt or get traded or retire or quit football to go smoke weed in a tent (shoutout Ricky Williams), I would consider Dallas Goedert at ADP. Until then, I’m not drafting him as my only tight end in a typical 10-12 team league. I’m just not in the business of drafting some kind of tight end handcuff plus where I need another player to get hurt at just the right time to unlock his upside for my fantasy playoff stretch. 

There’s plenty of upside out there already. Again, if you get him for really cheap, you can go Yin & Yang tight end with Goedert. But he’s not typically “really cheap” – he almost always goes in the top 12 tight ends per our composite ADP. So, I’m just going to let someone else draft this boring option who is always hurt.

Dalton Schultz, Houston Texans

The Good

Dalton Schultz broke out in 2021, finishing as the TE3 in PPR with the Dallas Cowboys. In 2022, he came back and had another top 10 tight end season with the Cowboys despite missing two games. In 2023, he left Dallas, Texas making the long trek allllll the way over to Houston, Texas where, guess what – he was a top 10 tight end in fantasy again. Yeehaw and a yip skiddly doo.

Dalton Schultz doesn’t necessarily wow us with athleticism, but he has been able to get the job done both vs. zone and man to man in both offenses. The Texans have Bobby Slowik who brought his scheme over from San Francisco where George Kittle has obviously been eating well. And C.J. Stroud is looking like an incredible pick for the Texans and the next big NFL star for years to come. 

The Bad

Dalton Schultz was already in big trouble. Because things were already quietly not great for Schultz in Houston when guys were healthy. In games when one of Nico Collins or Tank Dell were out with injury, Schultz averaged 7 targets a game. In the games when they were both healthy, he averaged 4.4. That’s simply not going to cut it.

And that was before they added Stefon Diggs. We already talked about how insanely rare it is for a team to have three pass catchers that are all fantasy relevant. To find a team with four, you actually have to go back to the 2013 Broncos. Which was the year that Peyton Manning set an NFL record with 55 touchdown passes. That’s a pretty tall order.

The Advice

If C.J. Stroud is 2013 Peyton Manning, it doesn’t matter who has Dalton Schultz. Whoever drafts Stroud will win the league. So, if you want to make that bet, there’s an obvious way to make it – just draft Stroud. The reality though is that Schultz is probably TWO injuries away from upside in fantasy, not one.

If Tank Dell or someone gets hurt, that doesn’t make Schultz a top two target on the team – it makes him third behind Nico Collins and Stefon Diggs. Schultz is going just outside the top 12 tight ends on average, and he gets drafted in every single best ball, tight end premium or two tight end league. And my advice to folks out there is to stop doing that.

Cole Kmet, Chicago Bears

The Good

Cole Kmet is a 25-year-old ascending NFL talent. He was rewarded handsomely with a four-year, $50 million dollar contract. Congratulations Cole, you are rich. He’s finished as the TE7 overall in fantasy football in back-to-back seasons now so, if you’ve drafted him where he was going, maybe you are rich, too. And Kmet just (presumably) got a quarterback upgrade, going from Justin Fields to first overall NFL Draft pick Caleb Williams.

Behind the scenes, things were pretty solid for Kmet as well. He had a 17.2% target share which was 8th among tight ends. He played more than half his snaps at a wide receiver spot. His 18 targets vs. man to man is also pretty solid. He clearly has a knack for finding the endzone with 6 or 7 touchdowns in back-to-back years. All around, Cole Kmet feels like a rock-solid NFL tight end. 

The Bad

There are a LOT of moving parts for this Bears team and nearly all of them are bad for Kmet. First off, let’s hypothetically assume Cole Kmet is the every-down starting tight end for the Bears. As we know from our research, every TE1 in fantasy last year was a top two target on their team. Kmet was the second target in 2023 after DJ Moore. This year, they added Keenan Allen to go along with DJ Moore, which would have already been a problem for Kmet. But then they ALSO drafted stud prospect Rome Odunze with the 9th overall pick.

That pushes Kmet down that pecking order. And we don’t know that Kmet will even be an “every-down starting tight end” this year. Going back to 2017 when he was the Rams tight end coach, offensive coordinator Shane Waldron has NEVER had a tight end play more than 75% of the snaps. He has always rotated them. And what was one of the first things he did? 

He had them sign Gerald Everett to a $12 million dollar deal. The same Gerald Everett that the Rams drafted in 2017 when Waldron was the TE coach. The same Gerald Everett that went with Waldron to the Seahawks when he left the Rams. The same Gerald Everett that has always had a pass-catching role for Waldron because he’s not a good blocker. And that’s the problem we run into with a lot of tight end rooms. It’s not a linear depth chart. The TE coach looks around at who can do what. Who blocks, who catches, who can play slot, who can play fullback. 

With the Eagles in the past, Dallas Goedert was probably just as good as Zach Ertz at catching the football. But Goedert was a much better blocker. That put Goedert inline and Ertz in the slot. And that same situation could happen here with Everett and Kmet. We actually saw it happen in the past with Jimmy Graham getting to run routes while Kmet blocked. They brought Everett in for a reason – he’s going to play. And he’s not going to be blocking.

The Advice

So, to sum up what we just talked about, Cole Kmet is likely going to be in a TE rotation with Gerald Everett – and not on the good side of the rotation. They will be battling with the running backs to be the fourth target on the team behind DJ Moore, Keenan Allen and Rome Odunze. With a rookie quarterback and a new offensive coordinator. Does any of that sound appealing in any way?

I don’t think Gerald Everett will be particularly relevant either. But I would not be shocked if the targets were split fairly evenly and Gerald Everett flat-out outscored Cole Kmet in fantasy. Right now, Kmet still gets drafted as a mid-to-high end TE2. And I personally would not draft Kmet if he were there with the very last pick in the last round of a fantasy draft. Is that clear enough on where I stand?

2024 Fantasy Football: Related Draft Guide Articles

Take a gander at our additional fantasy football draft guide articles for 2024 to find even more helpful tips and advice as you prepare for the upcoming season: