Fantasy football managers of a certain age will remember Evan Engram as a first-round pick impressing during his rookie season with the New York Giants. He scored six times, earned 115 targets, and generally looked like a future asset in both our world and the evolving NFL.
He’s made his fair share of money since, but the production has largely lagged. As he prepares for his age-32 season, is there a path for him to actually be a value late in drafts now that expectations have all but evaporated?
Should You Draft Evan Engram in Fantasy Football?
Just 12 months ago, there was talk of Engram filling the “Joker” role in this Sean Payton offense. We, as an industry, fell in love with the idea of him being a knockoff Jimmy Graham and drafted him as a weekly starter as part of an offense ready to take a step forward.
The offense held up its end of that bargain, but it was in spite of its new TE, not because of him. In a 32-team league, Engram was not one of the 34 tight ends to post multiple 50-yard games, and he saw just a single end zone target in 16 games of work.
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Last season wasn’t a run of bad variance — it was a team admitting that they had made a mistake and deciding that their path to growth looked drastically different from what they had thought. Oops.
The cap hit this season (over $14.1 million) comes before he becomes a free agent next summer, so he’s tied to this team but assured of nothing after the disaster that was 2025.
Adam Trautman is back for a third season with the franchise, and while he’s a fine player, he’s not exactly an offensive threat (115 catches in 94 career games). That means Engram is likely to at least run some routes this season, but with Jaylen Waddle added to make the aerial attack more versatile, it’s hard to envision the TE position being anything close to a priority for Bo Nix and company.
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I’d believe you if you told me that, in November, Engram’s route participation is trending in a positive direction and you want to pay down at TE during a bye-week situation in the DFS streets, but outside of that, this is a name you know and production you don’t want.
Preseason Fantasy TE Rankings
- Brock Bowers | LV
- Trey McBride | ARI
- Colston Loveland | CHI
- Tyler Warren | IND
- Tucker Kraft | GB
- Sam LaPorta | DET
- George Kittle | SF
- Harold Fannin Jr. | CLE
- Kyle Pitts Sr. | ATL
- Isaiah Likely | NYG
- Travis Kelce | KC
- Dallas Goedert | PHI
- Jake Ferguson | DAL
- Mark Andrews | BAL
- Juwan Johnson | NO
- Dalton Kincaid | BUF
- Chig Okonkwo | WAS
- Brenton Strange | JAX
- Hunter Henry | NE
- Kenyon Sadiq | NYJ
- Dalton Schultz | HOU
- Greg Dulcich | MIA
- AJ Barner | SEA
- T.J. Hockenson | MIN
- Oronde Gadsden II | LAC
