Fantasy football managers know the struggle all too well – the tight end position remains one of the most unpredictable spots on your roster. Week after week, you wonder if your guy will deliver double digits or leave you scrambling for answers.
The landscape shifts constantly, with injuries creating opportunities while others fade into irrelevance just as quickly as they emerged. Whether you’re chasing touchdowns, banking on volume, or simply hoping to avoid a complete dud, navigating this position requires equal parts strategy and luck.
AJ Barner | SEA
It’s been over a month since the last time a target to AJ Barner hit the ground, and he has a touchdown or a 20+ yard reception in five straight.
There are volume concerns, and that much is obvious. He’s cleared three targets in a game just once this season, and if not for an outlier 61-yard gain in Jacksonville last week, he would have been useless.
That said, Sam Darnold is playing at a high level right now, and streaming a tight end attached to that isn’t a terrible idea. I’m not committing to him long-term in any way (yet to run 25 routes in a game this season), but what is the tight end position but speed dating?
If you have him, I probably hold for this week and then cut ties to move on to the next TE with touchdown upside in Week 8 with Seattle going on bye.
Brock Bowers | LV
The knee injury continues to nag Brock Bowers, and the Raiders are staying the course by not forcing a piece they view as part of their future into their lineup.
That’s probably the right move for the franchise, but it’s getting difficult for fantasy managers to swallow. With a Week 8 bye for a team with no real postseason aspirations, it seems very possible that the consensus TE1 from this summer misses another game this week.
I wish I could give you some savvy advice to get you out of this situation, but there’s only so much you can do. At this point, you’re pot-committed and can’t sell him for pennies on the dollar.
Bowers was targeted on 25% of his routes before the injury this season and 25.9% as a rookie. You’re not crazy to want to chase the ceiling … we just need him on the field, and it stands to reason that his return to performance is more likely to come in Week 9 than anything else.
Cade Otton | TB
After a bunch of nothing in September, Cade Otton has recorded double-digit PPR points in back-to-back games as he takes advantage of his teammates dropping like flies.
Mayfield has put himself in the center of the MVP conversation, and that’s helping Otton’s move onto our radar. Still, if he regresses in the slightest OR reinforcements start to come for this offense, this Otton mini run of relevance will likely be a thing of the past.
Tampa Bay is going to be low on reliable pass catchers again this week, and that puts Otton on the TE1 radar. I’m just not confident he’ll stick around long-term.
Chig Okonkwo | TEN
Chig Okonkwo is a good reminder of just how little it takes to get our attention at the tight end position.
He’s reached 50 yards just once and plays for an offense that is rarely in the same zip code as the end zone, but because he has an athletic profile and has caught 4+ passes in four of the past five weeks, he’s always a part of the streaming questions I get entering the week.
There’s essentially zero upside to chase (no end zone targets this season and under 20 air yards in five of six games this season). But some fantasy managers are comfortable enough with the rest of their roster that 7-10 PPR points is a completely fine outcome.
Most of my teams don’t have that sort of luxury, but if yours do, this is a reasonable spot to look, especially with Calvin Ridley injured. Okonkwo has caught 10 of 11 targets on 54 routes this month: take it and move on.
If you’re willing to take on risk in the hopes of striking gold, there are a handful of options on your wire that I’d add ahead of Tennessee’s chain mover.
Cole Kmet | CHI
Is the writing on the wall?
Cole Kmet was technically on your TV screen more on Monday night, but not in a fantasy-friendly way. He ran a route on 36.7% of his snaps, a rate that fell well short of Colston Loveland’s (60%) as the rookie returned from a hip injury.
We haven’t gotten consistent production from the TE position in Chicago yet this season. But the scales seem to be tipping in favor of Loveland, making Kmet unrosterable in almost all formats.
Colston Loveland | CHI
Colston Loveland sat out Week 4 (hip), but walked right back into a split TE situation with Cole Kmet on Monday night, coming out of the bye.
In the win over the Commanders, he ran 15 routes to Kmet’s 11 despite being on the field for five fewer snaps. I think the Bears are showing their hand a bit (remember that the rookie saw three targets on six routes before the injury took him out in the last game we saw him) by wanting Loveland to be the guy.
That makes him the only TE in town worth rostering, but let’s not forget that Williams has two receivers we like and versatility out of the backfield. The second-year signal caller is averaging a respectable 235.8 passing yards per game, but that’s going to make it tough to feed everyone in this offense weekly.
Loveland is a sharp add now for those with roster space to stream another option. I’m not sold on him as a top-12 option for October, but as we near Thanksgiving, it wouldn’t surprise me if that’s where I rank him weekly as Chicago fully unleashes him over Kmet.
Dallas Goedert | PHI
Just like we all thought: this Philadelphia offense that lacks passing volume would stabilize the value of one pass catcher, and that pass catcher would be their 30-year-old tight end coming off of a three-season run that featured 15 missed games and a touchdown less than once a month.
That’s fantasy.
Dallas Goedert was clearly highlighted in the planned script on Thursday night, as he was responsible for five of Jalen Hurts’ first seven completions. That early surge resulted in his fifth touchdown in four weeks and led him to catching more balls in Week 6 than he did in his first three games back from the hamstring injury combined.
Ride the wave.
I’m not sold that Goedert is a Tier 2 tight end (for the record, Tier 1 is the elite and Tier 2 is the “must roster”), but you ride the wave. He’s getting there on volume in a low-volume offense (29% target share over the past two weeks, and for reference, Brock Bowers was at 25.8% last season), and that’s a tough math problem to count on.
This run of production has earned Goedert more leash than others in this range, but I’m not holding my breath on him sustaining weekly value.
If someone in your league sees him as such, I wouldn’t hesitate to cash in this chip.
Dalton Schultz | HOU
Before the bye, Dalton Schultz eclipsed 40 receiving yards for the first time this season with a 5-60-0 effort against what was left of the Ravens in a 44-10 runaway victory.
He can be an efficient player, and he showed a nose for the end zone before last season with 5+ scores in three straight, but I’m not in the business of betting on this Houston pass game more than I have to.
Even with exactly five catches (and six targets) in each of his past three games, Schultz has yet to crack the top 15 at the position in a week this season. He’s earned just four end zone looks over his past 25 games, and without high-end volume upside (3.6 catches per game since joining the Texans in 2023), there’s not a real path for him to generate interest from me every week.
Fine play, not a fantasy asset right now.
Darren Waller | MIA
This is the shakiest of all profiles, but it still gets home.
Darren Waller was pretty clearly written into the opening script with Tua Tagovailoa distributing two of his first three targets to the tight end.
And then, he ghosted him.
And not in a “it took me a while to respond to that text, sorry” sort of way. It was more of a “have a nice life” sort of ghosting situation with Waller going the next 50+ minutes of game time without a single look.
But he just can’t quit him.
With 46 seconds left in a one-score game, guess who is standing in the end zone?
Waller scored the go-ahead touchdown, and while Justin Herbert led a game-winning drive to ruin the plot line, the fact of the matter is that the once-retired tight end has scored four times in three weeks and has caught 83.3% of his targets.
We see tandems work together all offseason and struggle to develop this sort of chemistry, but it’s working. He only played a quarter of the snaps in his 2025 debut, but it rose to 60.4% in Week 5 and settled at 67.9% last week.
Cleveland hasn’t exactly played a murderer’s row of tight ends this season, but they have allowed over nine PPR points to a player at the position in four of six weeks and have allowed a touchdown on a league-high 80% of opponent red zone trips.
This game isn’t as easy as Waller makes it look, but the good vibes will hold for at least another week in an offense that lacks depth.
David Njoku | CLE
David Njoku was being ushered off the field on Sunday about as often as my wife demands we stop for bathroom breaks during a car trip, but on his 24 routes run, Dillon Gabriel did throw him the ball six times.
The 5.8 PPR points were disappointing, but if he continues to earn targets at the rate he has in the two games that the rookie has started (one every 3.7 routes), we have an asset that is, relative to the rest of the position, reliable.
Harold Fannin led Cleveland in catches (seven) and receiving yards (81) in the loss, a further indicator of just how much Gabriel is leaning on the position.
I don’t make a habit of chasing TE tandems, but this is one spot where I think it’s in play. Cleveland lacks a WR2, and with Jerry Jeudy struggling in terms of efficiency, the easy-button targets that both of these athletic tight ends offer are appealing.
Assuming that Njoku plays, I’d have both ranked in the TE12-16 range, where streaming either is in play. If he sits, Fannin moves into the TE1 discussion.
Evan Engram | DEN
Sean Payton is laying breadcrumbs, and I’ll scoop them up.
Evan Engram had three catches in the first quarter against the Jets last weekend. He followed it up with a rush and a reception in succession during the second quarter.
This is what we had dreamed of this offseason, and maybe it’s coming. I’m not fully ready to invest just yet (he had just one catch for the rest of the game and has yet to reach a 50% snap share), but there is at least positive momentum, and that’s worth a ton at this position.
I’m going to continue to rank Engram above the streaming tier and think it’s more likely that he elevates to the next tier up as opposed to falling back into the “how lucky do you feel” tier at the toughest position to feel good about in fantasy sports.
George Kittle | SF
The top of the TE board has been brutal this season. Brock Bowers has been banged up, Trey McBride’s QB missed Week 6, and we haven’t seen George Kittle since the opener.
The latter could be rectified this week, as there is cautious optimism that we get San Francisco’s former All-Pro back from the hamstring injury that he suffered after turning 13 routes into 12.5 PPR points in the Week 1 win in Seattle.
Outside of “bad injury vibes” for the 49ers, I can’t imagine a world in which you’re not jumping at the opportunity to reinsert him into your lineup the second he’s deemed active. He set career highs in fantasy points over expectation, red-zone target rate, and PPR points per target in 2021, production levels I’d expect to return sooner rather than later.
Is there risk involved with betting on a tight end who is at less than full strength? Of course, but there’s more risk in betting on the inferior talent that you’ve been replacing him with over the past month-plus, so I’m not wasting time overthinking this one.
For those who celebrate, National Tight End Day occurs one week from Sunday.
Hunter Henry | NE
The Bills, the Packers, the banged-up 49ers. We’ve been going through the backfield committee revolution for a while now, and we are seeing more and more teams capable of winning games with a very democratic approach to target hierarchy.
The Patriots seem poised to join that list.
Hunter Henry has had his moments, but so has Kayshon Boutte. Stefon Diggs has looked like the prime version of himself for the better part of a month now, and the second you forget about DeMario Douglas, he’s burning you for a 53-yard score.
Drake Maye is progressing faster than even the most bullish of fans would have expected, and that’s kind of left the Pats in a weird spot: they have a QB ready to win now without a win-now supporting cast.
That’s not a bad problem to have, by the way. Not for New England, anyway. For us, it’s a pain. Maybe Diggs is the answer, but for now, the question of who the top target for Maye is changes weekly.
The wheel will land on Henry at times, but it just hasn’t lately (three straight games under five targets). If you want to hitch your TE wagon to Maye and stick out duds like Sunday (3-27-0 from Henry) in the hope that you’ll be there for the big games, I won’t say you’re crazy.
The problem is if you’re expecting more. I don’t expect any pass catcher in this offense to be consistent: that’s just an easier profile to deal with at the tight end position, where weekly production is hard to find outside of the top two tiers.
Ja’Tavion Sanders | CAR
Ja’Tavion Sanders suffered a high ankle sprain in Week 3, and while he is trending close to returning (logged a full session on Thursday), he did miss another game last week.
The 22-year-old tight end sparked in Week 2 against the Cardinals with seven catches, but even that came in that chaotic comeback attempt where Bryce Young threw 30 (!) passes in the fourth quarter.
I continue to think there is something in this profile. The blend of size and athleticism is that of an asset in this league, especially for an offense that is theoretically in the process of building. His target share, albeit in a small sample, was improved last season, and that’s impressive with an aDOT that was up 25.4% from his rookie campaign.
Tetairoa McMillan is going to be the alpha target earner in this offense for years to come, but after that, we are looking at a lot of middling talents without much proof of concept in the target-earning department.
Sanders doesn’t need to be held onto in redraft leagues if he was ever on a roster in the first place. Maybe he can be a streaming option in the second half of this season, but we will address that when we see that he is fully healthy and involved.
Jake Ferguson | DAL
Sometimes it’s less about quantity and more about quality.
Jake Ferguson saw just three targets, but he caught them all in the red zone and scored for a third consecutive week. Fantasy TE1 has run at least 28 routes in five of six games (the Week 5 blowout of the Jets being the lone exception), and that sample includes a stretch of time in which Lamb was healthy.
The star receiver could return to this high-flying attack this week, and it shouldn’t impact your usage of Ferguson in a season-long setting at all. You could argue that he becomes less attractive in a DFS setting, but even then, I’d take the other side: if you can get a low-owned elite at the position in a strong matchup, I think you do it.
I couldn’t be less concerned with the low target count from last week. Ferguson is a key member of this pass game, and with the defense showing no signs of improvement, there will continue to be targets to be earned in Big D.
Jake Tonges | SF
There’s a real chance you couldn’t have told me if Jake Tonges was running to be mayor in Idaho or a pro athlete two months ago, and yet, for the past three weeks, he’s stabilized a spot on your fantasy roster.
I mean, it’s him, Jake Ferguson, and Tyler Higbee when it comes to listing the tight ends with 11+ PPR points in each of their past three games.
This is a crazy world.
He’s seen 23 passes thrown his way over this stretch and has made the most of them, but I don’t think there’s anything he could have done to have earned himself a role alongside George Kittle.
Reporting is cautiously optimistic around the former All-Pro, and if he does return this week, the Tonges experience is over. If you have the roster flexibility to hold onto him for the first game Kittle returns, I would, but I understand if you don’t.
Jonnu Smith | PIT
An ultra-conservative offense with limited depth at the receiver position should be a breeding ground for tight end production, but not all “shoulds” translate cleanly into fantasy production.
Steelers TE Data (Week 6)
- Smith: 69% snaps, 22 routes, 4 targets
- Darnell Washington: 79.3% snaps, 19 routes, 5 targets
- Pat Freiermuth: 36.2% snaps, 14 routes, 1 target
That might be the grossest three-way split at the position in recent memory. In any committee situation (RB, WR, or in this weird case, TE), I tend to lean toward the player who does something unique.
That’s often the chain-moving receiver (consistency) or the goal-line back (single-carry potential). In this situation, it’s really quite simple: Darnell Washington is bigger than the guys being asked to tackle him.
He’s caught three passes in consecutive games, and if the plan is to get the ball out of Aaron Rodgers’ hands quickly, why not prioritize the 264-pound mountain of a man that has defenders making business decisions?
At the end of the day, I think that if a Pittsburgh tight end is the answer to your question, you’re asking the wrong question. But if you’re hellbent on exploiting this matchup, I’m taking advantage of the Bengals’ 31st-ranked YAC allowed and taking my chances with the bully on the playground.
Juwan Johnson | NO
Juwan Johnson is still out there plenty, but with 32 yards on his 50 routes since Taysom Hill was activated, I think it’s fair to tie a bow on this portion of the 2025 fantasy season.
With Chris Olave continuing to earn looks at an elite level and Hill playing almost exclusively in high-valued spots, the Johnson profile is as thin as a dozen other options on your wire. If you’re streaming the position, wanting to target the Bears on short rest is a perfectly reasonable idea. I’d rather look in the direction of the versatile Hill.
Kyle Pitts Sr. | ATL
With under 40 receiving yards in three of his past four games, at this point, I’d love to tell you that Kyle Pitts is a TD-reliant tight end, but that’s like saying I’m a pickup basketball player who relies on his height.
I’m 5’10”. On a good day.
Pitts has played 66 games across his five seasons, earning 361 targets in the process and scoring just 11 times. If you’re waiting on a single target to get you 7-9 points, more often than not, you’re going to be waiting for all four quarters in that given week.
This, to me at least, looks different than Pitts’ tease runs of years past. His PPR points per target are trending toward a career high, and the efficiency is in a good spot to sustain, given his target diet.
- 2021: 11.2 aDOT
- 2022: 13.7 aDOT
- 2023: 12.0 aDOT
- 2024: 8.7 aDOT
- 2025: 4.9 aDOT
There’s a world in which he’s racking up 5+ catches a week, and that fuels double-digit PPR production every week.
I’m just not sure we are living in that world.
Mason Taylor | NYJ
In the year 2025, every offense should have two pass catchers that are, at the very least, on our radar.
“Should.”
When Justin Fields struggles the way he did on Sunday in London, we are lucky to get a single teammate of his to pay off.
Mason Taylor is a talented rookie, but the combination of inexperience and a lack of offensive stability makes him a weekly dart throw.
There’s nothing wrong with that. He’s one of a half dozen TEs with this profile, but I do think there was the desire to elevate him into the top-12 conversation after consecutive games with 65+ receiving yards.
He’s not that. It’s not all his fault, but he shouldn’t be viewed as anything more than a streaming option.
Sam LaPorta | DET
Sam LaPorta has scored in consecutive weeks (19 touchdowns in 39 career games), and I worry less about his target ceiling than I do others at the position.
Of course, I’d love to see him clear six looks in a game, something he hasn’t done since Week 1, but the track record of efficiency is enough to make him a lineup lock, especially in a home game like this that carries shootout potential.
If you include the playoff loss, LaPorta has hauled in 39 of his past 47 targets, a success rate that looks more like my high school GPA than a catch percentage. Much like Travis Kelce in Kansas City, Detroit has dialed back his average depth of target (5.9 yards after posting 7.4 and 7.9 in his first two NFL seasons), and it’s helped stabilize his fantasy floor.
Don’t bemoan the target count; be happy you’re one of the five highest floors at the position.
T.J. Hockenson | MIN
To say that T.J. Hockenson has underwhelmed up to this point would be a bit of an understatement. After being viewed as a strong Tier 2 option during the summer, his only top-15 finish at the position to date came during the one week he found the end zone (Week 3 vs. CIN).
That game included, he’s yet to hit 50 yards or notch a 15-yard reception this season. His predictive numbers suggest he is doing essentially what is expected with the opportunities he’s getting (1.3% below expectations is well within the range of acceptable outcomes); it’s just a quantity issue.
Entering this season, he’d never been targeted on fewer than 20% of his routes in a season, but through five games, he sits at 16.6%. I don’t think he’s lost his juice, and the changing nature of the QB position certainly factors in.
I want to believe that better days are ahead, but getting the defending Super Bowl champions when they, too, have had a long week of prep, doesn’t exactly look like much of a “get right” spot. Another 4-6 target game with 45 yards seems most likely, and without a ton of TD equity, he’s a fringe TE1 at best.
I’m still not selling my Hock stock until we get past the halfway mark. Give it some time post-bye to see if Kevin O’Connell can unlock him; I think he’s earned that level of trust.
Taysom Hill | NO
“Taysom Hill”
I don’t want to give bland advice (hit me up on X at KyleSoppePFN with your specific questions), but I get questions every week about which TE streamer has the most upside in a given slate, and “Taysom Hill” is likely going to be my answer.
He’s only run five routes total as he’s spent the last two weeks working into form, but he found the end zone with a direct snap last week, and the Saints continue to use him in exotic packages.
He’s the answer to that question, not because I think he’s any better than those around him on the waiver wire, but because he simply has more ways to produce for you. This New Orleans offense isn’t exactly functioning at a high level, leaving them open to all the crazy Hill-centric packages we’ve seen in the past.
There aren’t many of them weekly, but Hill is prioritized when New Orleans threatens the red zone, and in the game of chasing single plays that pay off, isn’t that what you want?
Theo Johnson | NYG
Theo Johnson was responsible for the first three touchdown passes of Jaxson Dart’s career, and that might one day be handy for a trivia question. But when it comes to the question of the TE position in fantasy football, he’s no different than the massive tier at the position that extends deep into the waiver wire.
He’s an ultra-athlete who has run at least 27 routes in five of six games, but that means there’s little room for his role to expand, a role that has seen him yet to reach 35 receiving yards.
You can chase a touchdown, and I wouldn’t blame you, but there are eight tight ends that I could say that about at this level. In spots like that, I try to take things two weeks at a time. That is, “who has the best two-week run of matchups that I can reasonably gamble on?”.
Johnson isn’t that, with the Broncos on tap this week and the Eagles rematch next. Maybe streaming Johnson makes sense after the Week 14 bye (Commanders, Vikings, and Raiders to close out the fantasy season), but that’s not a Week 7 conversation.
Travis Kelce | KC
Travis Kelce isn’t what he once was, but his connection with Patrick Mahomes is special, and his role in this offense is clear: post up and move the chains.
His aDOT is down 22.2% from a season ago, but there are like three tight ends in the sport that you want challenging defenses downfield anyway. Instead, he’s leveraging his experience to find holes, and that’s resulted in him catching 18 of 20 targets over the past three weeks.
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I’d be surprised if he finishes any week moving forward as the top-scoring player at the position, but I won’t be at all shocked if he continues to post top 10s in two-thirds of his games, even with Rashee Rice back in the fold.
In 2024, across two games, Kelce recorded 25 targets, 158 yards, and a score against the Raiders. The volume is safe for him in most spots, and that’s been especially true against the Black and Silver, as he has earned at least seven looks in six straight matchups with the divisional foe.
Trey McBride | ARI
Trey McBride has earned at least seven targets in every game this season and has even scored twice over the past month. Bonus!
This Murray injury impacts the Cardinals in a huge way, obviously, but with a professional backup in Jacoby Brissett, I think McBride managers can sleep easily knowing that their guy is going to be given every chance to succeed (28.2% target share on Sunday).
There isn’t the type of separation he had hoped for at the top of the TE position, but McBride is giving you weekly volume that is hard to find, and it should pay off against a Packers team that hasn’t held a TE1 under nine PPR points this season (Tanner Hudson went for 11.0 against them in Week 6).
Tucker Kraft | GB
Tucker Kraft caught both of his targets over the weekend against the Bengals, a lack of volume that resulted from Green Bay never trailing and running the ball well (33 carries for 153 yards and two scores).
The two times he was given the chance to produce, he did. Gained 19 and 24 yards, the former being a fourth-quarter touchdown that all but iced the game. Kraft is a high-end athlete at the position, and that’s allowed him to have at least one 15+ yard reception in all five games this season, a trend I like to continue.
Jordan Love misfired on two of four passes thrown his way in Week 1, but he’s 16-of-18 going that direction since. While a different receiver seems to pop for this offense weekly, Kraft is the consistent option that fantasy managers can feel good about.
Tyler Warren | IND
That’s now two straight weeks with a TD catch, three with a touchdown from scrimmage, and four games this year with more than 60 receiving yards. We naturally pencil in a learning curve for college kids entering the pros, but if you watched these games without color, I’m not sure you’d be able to identify Warren’s Penn State tape from what he’s done 1.5 months into his pro career.
He’s the same versatile weapon he was at Happy Valley, and the Colts’ offense is thriving off of what the rookie brings to the table. The touchdown last week came when he positioned to block and then ran a slow drag route: I have no idea what you’re supposed to do to stop that.
He’s too big for cover guys and way too nimble for the bulky linebackers that are often asked to keep up with him. Warren is a walking mismatch and is positioned to be one of the storylines when this season is over, and you look back at your draft board to see how the champion built a winning roster.
Round 1 Picks With 60+ Receiving Yards in 4 of First 6 Games Since 2005
- Malik Nabers
- Ja’Marr Chase
- CeeDee Lamb
- Tetairoa McMillan
- Emeka Egbuka
- Warren
Zach Ertz | WAS
Coming off a thrilling two-week stretch that saw him average under a half-yard per route run, Ertz hauled in all six of his targets on Monday night against the Bears and finished with 16.3 PPR points.
You know what you’re doing here: chasing a touchdown. Your confidence in the veteran tight end has less to do with him and more with your point projection for the Commanders. In a week like this, where 30 points is very much on the table, Ertz slides in as a back-end TE1, understanding that the floor is a goose egg, just like it is for the six-or-so tight ends that he shares this tier with.
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For the season, 41% of his fantasy production has come from his touchdown receptions. He’ll be a top-12 option if he scores, not a top-20 guy if he doesn’t.
Welcome to the world of streaming the position.
