Nothing says “fantasy football season” like breaking down the Kyle Pitts situation.
He was an elite prospect and posted one of the better seasons by a rookie tight end in history (2021: 68 catches for 1,026 yards), but he has been unable to build or even sustain that level of production in the three years since.
He’s still just 24 years old, and this offense has more long-term optimism now than in years past. Lucy is teeing up the football again. Are you willing to take a swing?
Kyle Pitts’ Fantasy Outlook
The discourse around Pitts will be a fascinating cultural study for psychologists down the road. However, we are still in the middle of it and faced with an interesting ultimatum: completely give up or embrace the discount.
WHAT A THROW BY MICHAEL PENIX JR. TO KYLE PITTS ON FOURTH DOWN TO TIE IT 🔥
(via @NFL)pic.twitter.com/b21LMa3BUp
— ESPN (@espn) December 30, 2024
We can agree that Kirk Cousins was a mess last season, right?
We can agree that this team had as many target threats last season as this, right?
Poor QB play and strong usage competition aren’t usually a winning formula for a fringe player like Pitts, yet there was a month window (Weeks 5-8) during which he was the third highest-scoring tight end on a per-game basis.
Over that run, Pitts averaged 5.3 catches per game and reached 65 receiving yards in all four games. In fact, he averaged more PPG during that spurt than Trey McBride (Pitts’ 16.1 to McBride’s 15.1), a consensus Tier 1 option at the position this season.
Much of the data around Pitts up to this point needs to be thrown out because of the change under center, but the raw talent is still worthy of our attention. In 2024, he ran 71 routes with Michael Penix Jr. at QB and caught seven of 10 targets for 66 yards with a score. That’s a start.
The catch on Pitts is his standing in terms of public perception. Due to his early peak and the general growth of the TE position, he’s being deprioritized. As things stand now, he’s not considered a top-15 tight end, and if we are talking streamers at the position, good luck entering the season with a player with a better best-case scenario.
All of the risk has been sucked out of this profile, and that changes the math from years past. Atlanta opens the season with Tampa Bay, Minnesota, Carolina, and Washington before their Week 5 bye, a run of defensive schemes that don’t generally scare me when it comes to projecting Pitts.
MORE: Free Fantasy Football Mock Draft Simulator
The early bye week is a beautiful thing as it allows you to take a test drive of the 2025 model of Pitts. Like what you see through September? Great, stream your way with one of the 10 viable options in Week 5 and be on your way. Discouraged? His draft capital doesn’t require you to give him a long leash, and you can move on without feeling too bad about wasting a pick.
The third pass catcher role in this offense is begging for Pitts to assume it, and as a part of a unit with two high-end skill players, cheap exposure to this scoring environment passes the smell test for me.
Mason LeBeau‘s Kyle Pitts Fantasy Projection
Are we really doing this again? I don’t know, but sadly, I’m not sure if I really care anymore. Fantasy managers largely agree that he’s fallen to ~TE18, barely being drafted as a backup option at a thin position. For that reason, I say, why not?
Pitts enters his contract year and his second year with offensive coordinator Zac Robinson. More importantly, it’ll be the first full season of young QB Michael Penix Jr, who played just a few games at the end of the last season. This is a pretty open and shut case to me; if Penix becomes a fantasy-friendly quarterback and this offense moves, Pitts was worth a late draft pick. If he struggles and this offense is anything less than very good, then Pitts is an easy cut.
For the price of “free”, I think it’s worth kicking the tires on a late pick to see if you get a potential breakout on a great offense. Anyone who’s been spurned before or simply doesn’t care enough, you aren’t without reason. You can pivot to a few higher upside tight ends late, like Dalton Kincaid or Tyler Warren. Anyone would be justified in doing so. The players around him offer a similar floor with much less upside: Darren Waller, Pat Freiermuth, Zach Ertz. I’d rather have an easy “keep or cut” option than a “maybe I can get six points out of Freiermuth this week.”
