Fantasy Football Today - Tight End Breakouts! Who Other Than the Elite Guys? (08/14 Fantasy Football Podcast)

Starting point is 00:00:00 This is Fantasy Football Today from CBS Sports. What a play! Can you believe this? It's a no idea. It's time to dominate your fantasy league. This is going to go the distance. Now here's some combination of Adam, Dave, Jamie, and Heath. Welcome everybody to Fantasy Football today, presented by BEDMGM, the sports book born in Vegas.

Starting point is 00:00:25 It is Wednesday night. This is our third show of the night. And we are here. to talk about breakout tight end. Or maybe there's more than one, we'll see. Not a lot of candidates here, not like the other positions, but you never know. They come out of nowhere.

Starting point is 00:00:41 Who could have predicted Jono Smith last year, for example? Who could have predicted Sam Laporta two years ago when he finished as tight end won? And I don't think anybody would have had Brock Bowers as tight end one this time last year. So we welcome you on Matt Amazer with Jamie Eisenberg and Heath Cummings. You know, there was an angle that I wanted to explore of this position

Starting point is 00:00:59 and I want to, you know, Heath, you got your projections, so you probably speak to this. Do you think tight end is worse this year than it usually is? And if so, does that make the standards for Bowers and McBride as a breakout lower than what they normally would be? Because they still would have such a big advantage over the rest of the position. So I don't think that it makes the standard for Bowers and McBride lower, because their standard is how good they were last year and improving noticeably on that. Like they were 15.5, 15.6, whatever they were, fantasy points per game. If they go score 16, they're not breakouts.

Starting point is 00:01:41 They might be better relative to the position than they were last year. I think it makes the standard lower for Tyler Warren, Colston Loveland, Tucker Kraft, guys like that who are coming from not being elite. tight ends that if they go average 12, that might be a top three season or top four season this year. And that might qualify them for a breakout more than it would have in pastures. All right. So we were talking before the show, who are the breakout tight ends? We're going to talk about Brock Bowers. Is Trey McBride a breakout tight end? You know, do we like Bowers' chances of really breaking out? Let's say, I don't know, 17 points per game. They were both and Kittle were around

Starting point is 00:02:22 15 and a half last year. I don't know. If you guys have a different number in mind, but what are the chances for Bowers, but about McBride? Tucker Kraft is going to be someone we talk about. Tyler Warren is going to be someone we talk about Colson Loveland as well. Someone said, please let the first breakout tight end be Kyle Pitts, L.O.L. That's going to be the last guy I wanted to talk about, just to throw him a bone in case Starnel Mooney misses any significant time. But Jamie, your thoughts on Bowers and McBride being breakouts? Do you think they will be? How do they get there? they get there by scoring touchdowns you know and replicating what they did a year ago like that's the

Starting point is 00:03:00 the easy path to doing it clearly from McBride you know i mean we we've seen you know a year and a half of how good he can be uh for bowers it was one year of of what his you know production was but like there's so much room there's so there's a lot of room to grow in that category alone you know so is it eight touchdowns is it 10 touchdowns i don't think they're going to be but i don't I think they're both going to be double-digit touchdown scores. But, I mean, the fact that McBride was top three in Red Zone targets last year is, like, he's right there. Like, he just has to convert them.

Starting point is 00:03:38 I really hope the effort that we saw to get him into the end zone, you know, it was like, it felt like the Mike Evans push. You know, we get the end of the season and we need to do something. And the Cardinals, Kyler Murray, and, and Tray McBride were, we're really trying to make that happen. And so for Bowers, it's just continuing to build. off what he did. You know, I hope that it's not the Kyle Pitts and Sam LaPorteur regression of rookie tight end having phenomenal season and then taking a step back. I can't see it. I just can't

Starting point is 00:04:08 see that happening for him, barring an injury of him taking, you know, a huge step back in his second season. So really for both those guys, you know, I know Heath is going to make the case because of where he hasn't ranked. Like they have to get to, I think, that 18 plus point per game range. Like if they're 15, 16, they obviously had a great. season but I just don't think it's a breakout candidate you know so it's it's kind of splitting hairs on you know what you would what you would categorize them as okay so heath you wanted to talk about bowers because you say where you have him ranked you have him as a breakout not someone who's just going to average a ho-hum 15 and a half pprisoner fantasy points

Starting point is 00:04:43 per game yeah and I think like in in today's mock I took McBride in the middle of the third and if you take him in the middle of the third and he repeats what he did last year it's probably be okay. Especially with the weakness at the bottom of the tight end group. But for Bowers, early in round two, where I have him ranked, he does have to break out. And I think the path for him is a little different than the touchdowns.

Starting point is 00:05:05 You see the sports line projections here on YouTube having for six touchdowns. He scored five last year. He probably needs to score a couple more than six to get to that 17, 18 fantasy points for game. But the other side of it is, we've talked about how some of us expect a target downturn for Bauer.

Starting point is 00:05:22 Chip Kelly experience shows at least in his past experience as a play caller, it's about 50-50, whether the Raiders are going to throw as much as they have in the past. If it's a similar target share, I think there's another thing that could happen for him. His last year, he was remarkable in terms of the targets that he earned 153, but the 73% catch rate isn't elite for a tight end.

Starting point is 00:05:46 The 7.8 yards per targets, good, but not elite for the tight end. The 3% touchdown rates just awful. for a tight end and he got a quarterback upgrade and he got an offensive coordinator upgrade. So I think for Bowers, he could stay in that same target range and it's not just the touchdowns that improve, but he catches a higher percentage of his targets because there are more on target throws from Gino Smith, opposed to Gardner-Menschue or Aidan O'Connell. And he does more with those targets in terms of yardage. And so the yardage goes up, the catches go up, and the touchdowns go up.

Starting point is 00:06:20 and we get a Travis Kelsey slash Rob Gronkowski first round value tight-end. I hope also in the case of Bowers, I know this isn't a tight-end preview show, but like the people in the case of Bowers, if you're panicked about Ashton Jensi, which would be stupid, but if you are, you better be pumping up where you have Brock Bowers. Because that's been kind of one of the main arguments is, oh, they're going to be better at running the wall. So if you got scared after what you saw in three carries,

Starting point is 00:06:46 which would be, again, be stupid, don't do that. But if you are concerned, like you better be all in on Bowers then Because if they're going to be throwing the ball And a lot of long down and distance situations Like we may see 180 targets for this kid And these two guys, yeah, didn't have the touchdowns last year But Trey McBride, if he repeats his 17 game pace Which was 118 catches 1,218 yards

Starting point is 00:07:08 And then there was that rushing touchdown too All he needs is three more touchdowns, Trey McBride If he repeats that 17 game pace of catches and yards Three more touchdowns to get some to 17 PPR points per game. Bowers, yeah, I mean, to be similar, just needs a little bit more touchdowns. But also, these two guys, they caught 20% or less of their end zone targets last year. So that's really, actually, no, for McBride, that was this career, 20% career catch rate on his end zone targets. Travis Kelsey's at 46%.

Starting point is 00:07:38 George Kittle, 43%, Mark Andrews, 50%. These two guys for their careers, which is only one year for Bowers, 20% or lower. So you just think law of averages, they're going to start catching more of their end zone targets. So it's exciting. You know, you could definitely make an easy case for these guys to be better than they were last year when they were so good, but just didn't have the touchdowns to go with it. All right. I know it's hard.

Starting point is 00:08:01 You can't call them a breakout, but would it shock you? Kittles better, too? Definitely not. I mean, look at the way it's shaping up at this point with the San Francisco 49ers. Like he's having a dominant camp, no I yuk for maybe until week six. Who knows what's happening with Jennings? And you're like, that's probably going to swing it, like, when Jennings plays, like, how good Kittle can be. Not that, you know, Joanne Jennings is the speed bump to George Kittle being tied in one again.

Starting point is 00:08:23 But, like, you know he's going to get the touchdowns with this guy. And if there is a bump in targets, you know, I know Heath has talked about this a lot, like, the 49ers passing game and how efficient they are in getting the ball to George Kittle and the things he does. Like, if there is more opportunities for him, like, he may be the one, like, where I don't want to say overlooking because he's getting drafted in the third round. But, like, is he going too late? even well and and i think i could see george kittle being better than he was last year more than i could see george kittle having a career year just because that 2018 season when he had almost 1400 yards um probably not going to overcome that but yeah he might he might be i every time i adjust my rankings george kittl goes up a couple spots and part of that

Starting point is 00:09:08 is what jamie just talked about part of that is as we've talked about we don't love the end of round three. He's mid round three for me at this point. Like, I'm, I'm not, I don't want to pass him up. Yeah, he's going to be 32 years old. If I'm inclined to take a tight end early, he's, he's in the conversation. Yeah. I think that, you know, excuse me, especially if you're someone who doesn't think McCaffrey's

Starting point is 00:09:34 going to stay healthy, then you should definitely be looking at George Kittle. That's some obvious target competition. He's, he's had like in 2022, he had a 13.6% target. when McCaffrey, Iy, and Debo were healthy. That was only five games. 2023, he had 90 targets in 16 games, and they threw for 4,600 yards and 33 touchdowns that year. He was really good, but Kittle has had a little bit of trouble

Starting point is 00:10:02 separating himself in terms of targets when guys have been healthy. However, Ayuk, Puplist, Debo, commanders. We don't know who Pierce all. It just doesn't seem like as stiff of competition this year. I don't have it in front of me, but I'm pretty sure if this is correct, 13 games in his career without Debo Samuel, he averages over 16 ppr points per game without Samuel

Starting point is 00:10:22 on the field. Twelve games without Iuke, it's over 14 ppr points per game. Three times it's been where both those guys were not on the field together. I don't have the numbers with McCaffrey. Those three games was pre-Brock Purdy, so I don't really look at that as enough of a situation to warrant it.

Starting point is 00:10:40 But like, it could just be monstrous for him. It really could. Yeah, and he's been pretty, I'd say, like, solid end zone targets with Brock Purdy. Okay, so those are your top three tight ends. Just to recap here. Heath, you're higher on Bowers and Jamie is. Where do you have Bowers? 13.

Starting point is 00:11:00 13. Wow. Jamie, where do you have Bowers? He's at 18. Okay. And where do you guys have McBride? 20. 23, I think.

Starting point is 00:11:12 22, 23 in that range. I just want to go back to. And format matters, I think, with this. Again, I know it's not a tight-end preview, but if you're in a two-tide-end league, a two-receiver league, excuse me, I think it's in your best interest. If you have the opportunity in round two to draft one of those two guys, you might regret passing it up unless you think McBride can fall to you in round three. Like getting that position advantage in that type of format is huge.

Starting point is 00:11:37 And in the 10-team league, to get one of these elite difference makers. So we did that 10-team draft. Dave did a segment on HQ, and he said, I would not take Bowers in round two at 18. Like, I don't get that. You get an opportunity to take that type of guy at that position. Same with the quarterbacks. You know me.

Starting point is 00:11:54 I'm waiting on quarterback as much as they come. In a 10-team league, get difference makers. And Brock Bowers, you can make a case to be a round one pick in a 10-team league. Like, he's got that much potential dominance. Then you're taking him, you know, I think for Dave, he'd probably say something. I'm not taking him over Bucky Irving and Chase Brown. Those are breaking into him, too. To be fair, like you're going to get one of those running backs potentially around three.

Starting point is 00:12:15 Maybe. Yeah. Okay. So we're going to take a little break here. By the way, if you ever want to stream, if you ever want to watch anything that we're live streaming, whether that's a podcast, whether that's a tennis match, whether that's a live stream, our Sunday morning starter sit, Q&A's from 1130 to 1 p.m. Eastern that we're going to start, obviously, during week one.

Starting point is 00:12:36 That's all at YouTube.com slash fantasy football today. Go there, subscribe, like the videos, YouTube.com slash fantasy football today. We're going to take a break after we tell you about BetMGM. If you haven't signed up for BetMGM yet, use the bonus code fantasy, and you're going to get up to a $1,500 first bet offer on your first wager with BetMGM. So here's what you do. Download the BetMGM app, sign up and use the bonus code fantasy, deposit at least $10 and place your first wager on any game, and you'll receive up to $1,500 in bonus bets if your bet

Starting point is 00:13:07 loses. Just make sure that you use the bonus code fantasy when you sign up. We'll be right back on FFT. All right. Who else could break out at the position, Jamie Eisenberg? Tyler Warren and Tucker Kraft, I think, are the two candidates, I would say, based on where they're getting drafted and what their potential outcomes could be, would be the two that I would put there. And probably Colston Loveland as well. But I think just in the case of at least the first preseason game. Warren looks like he's going to see a hell of a lot of opportunities, no matter who the quarterback is. And Tucker Kraft, you're seeing it now. Jaden Reed's banged up. Romeo Dobbs slightly banged up, but should be fine. But he could easily be second on the team

Starting point is 00:13:51 and targets. And I know that wasn't a big role last year, but they're expected to throw the ball more and have a little bit more success throwing the ball. And there's a chance that what Matt LaFleur said, that they want to feature him a little bit more. opportunity role. He doesn't have to do much to get from that 10 point per game range to 12 to 13, 14 maybe, if you want to be really optimistic.

Starting point is 00:14:15 It's easy to gravitate toward those two tight ends if you're talking about the later options. So Kraft and the two rookies, I think, qualify as breakout candidates for me. I mean, Kraft has basically been George Kittle on even lower volume early in his career, 8.5 yards after catch per reception.

Starting point is 00:14:33 and every one of the Packers' wide receivers except for Matthew Golden might be hurt right now. Maybe is Romeo Dobbs okay? I don't remember if he had an injury, but everybody else. He had a back issue. I don't know if it was serious. Everybody else is dealing with some type of injury. So, yeah, Kraft is the one.

Starting point is 00:14:51 He's my tight end eight and a fantastic value based on ADP, I think. I'd rather draft him than a lot of guys that are going ahead of them, including both the rookies. All right. That was my next question. You have Kraft ahead of both the rookies. Jamie, how about you? I have the rookies ahead of craft, but it's something that I changed quite a bit. Tucker Kraft had 70 targets in 17 games last year.

Starting point is 00:15:14 Over the last 14 seasons, 14 seasons, there have been four tight ends who have finished top five in PPR with fewer than 90 targets. Oh, can I guess? Can I guess? Yeah, go ahead. Robert Tunyon? Yep. Andrews? No.

Starting point is 00:15:33 he six he finishes tight-in six one year with 89 targets is the same guy multiple years no actually okay george kittle once george kittle once another uh hall of famer or future hall of fame actually maybe well it's great robert tunion and three like legendary tight ends ronk gronk kittle andtonio gait vernon davis vernon davis ron davis and in non ppr is only six guys who have done it with fewer than 90 targets finished top five in the last 14 seasons that does not include Tasea Mill. Another legend. Same four?

Starting point is 00:16:08 No. I don't know if, oh, Grunk, yes, plus two Mark Andrews seasons. I will say he had a 14.6% target share. If they return to their pass volume from the year before last, we talked about how run heavy the Packers went last year, maybe because of Jordan loves injuries, it would be 85 targets without increasing his target share from last year. So it doesn't take much of a target share increase if the past. volume just bounces back. Okay.

Starting point is 00:16:35 Let me see if I have these Tyler Warren stats that I gave yesterday. Yeah, Tyler Warren. So, the only team over the last three seasons that averaged fewer

Starting point is 00:16:47 than 227 passing yards per game and produced a top five tight end overall was Baltimore in 2022 with Mark Andrews. Anthony Richards, that's 227

Starting point is 00:17:01 passing yards per game is pretty much the baseline line for what top five tight ends have been on. Anthony Richardson averaged 174 passing yards per game last year. I really am rooting for Daniel Jones in this. And to be fair, Daniel Jones has only once averaged more than 227 passing yards per game, and that was his rookie year. So I've got it twice if you remove some injured games. He's had a lot of those. Yes, two out of six seasons. But he's always been better than what you're going to get from a pass standpoint from Anthony Richardson.

Starting point is 00:17:34 I think at least usually. You know what it is. I mean, he's going to throw a lot more than Richardson. It's not like he's a great quarterback, but I don't know. For me, it's a big deal for me. Well, I mean, look, first off, if you liked what you saw from Warren in the first preseason game, it was with Daniel Jones. And I do think that this is going to be the guy that Jones leans on quite a bit because, A, play design, B, he's going to panic and look for somebody that's close to the line scrimmage, is probably beat Tyler Warren. I would just love to see some semblance of a good quarterback, let alone a great quarterback.

Starting point is 00:18:09 These weapons are amazing. I know. They could be so amazing. Like, you know, Pittman, without the back injury, could be great. Josh Downs looked so awesome at times last year. And Tyler Warren has the potential to be a star. Like, imagine what it would be as a good quarterback. And that quarterback situation is the only reason that I still.

Starting point is 00:18:29 have Colston Loveland ahead of Tyler Warren. I think Jacob Gibbs not only thinks Colston Loveland could break out, but just expects him to break out. He absolutely loves that guy. And we talked about it on one of the 17 podcasts that we've recorded today, that over, under for Caleb Williams' passing yards, like 3,600 yards. That was today? I think so.

Starting point is 00:18:56 And so, like, there's maybe the Bears just throw for 3,800 yards. And then there's a much, like, a much clearer path to a tight-in breakout in that offense. And the fun part about it is if you like both of them, the ADP is wildly in favor of Colston Lovell and like Tyler Warren is going at least 30 picks ahead of them. Wow. It's kind of nuts. You know, I think, again, based on one preseason game, probably the, the poor reports

Starting point is 00:19:23 out of Bears camp, but like, it's not like the Colts. have given you reason for, like, the utmost confidence. So it's a little surprising that the guy who was drafted first, remember the bear's had the opportunity to take both, and they chose Loveland. And this is a head coach that featured the tight end in his rookie season with Sam LaPorta. And you're looking at it at get the ball out quick, middle of the field. You know, somebody just asked in the chat.

Starting point is 00:19:44 What about Cole Comette? Yeah, Cole Commet's there. Absolutely. He's going to probably be the Dawson Knox to Dalton Kincaid. You know, it could be an issue for Loveland's upside. But I can't see a scenario where, he's not getting chances at least early in the season unless he's hurt or just completely stinks. So if you really just want one of the rookie tight ends, you might as well just wait

Starting point is 00:20:04 for Loveland. And we did see, and it's an easy strategy to pull off. We saw it in the draft Tuesday night with St. Jude. Somebody took both rookie tight ends. They took Warren first, Loveland second, and that was the only tight ends that they had. So, you know, if you want to just throw two, throw two darts and see which one connects, like it might be worth it. And then you fall back to a Zach Ertz who may not get drafted, a Jake Ferguson who might not get drafted. You know, even like, you know, worst case in there, like a Joanne Johnson who could give you maybe 10 PPR points. Okay. I've got to wrap it up because we have Chris Harris about to join us for wide receiver breakouts.

Starting point is 00:20:35 Last two things I'll tell you, I say this all the time. You got it usually got to be top two on your team and targets. We've only had three tight ends in the last nine seasons finish in the top five at the position without being first or second on their team and targets. So that's what kind of draws me away from Loveland, not saying it can't happen. And then Kyle Pitts, you know, Kyle Pitts last year amongst the tight ends. with 50 or more targets. He ranked 10th and yards per target. He ranked 3rd in yards per catch,

Starting point is 00:21:01 but he just didn't get targeted. 27th and target per outrun rate. He's always been pretty good when he's gotten targeted. He just needs more of them. They lowered his A-DOT. They could still afford to lower it a little bit more. They played him out wide less,

Starting point is 00:21:11 which was a good thing. He was out wide way too much. So I like the adjustments they made. It just didn't throw it to him, which might be his fault. But if he maybe can take advantage of Mooney. All right, we will have to get going here so we can talk wide receivers with Chris Harris.

Starting point is 00:21:24 Thanks so much for watching and listening fancy football today to see you.

Fantasy Football Today - Tight End Breakouts! Who Other Than the Elite Guys? (08/14 Fantasy Football Podcast)

There aren't comments yet for this episode. Click on any sentence in the transcript to leave a comment.