Hi everybody and welcome back to the Rookie Report. I hope you all had a successful weekend of fantasy football and are ready for Week 3.
Week 2 was a pretty grueling week in fantasy football. If you drafted one of the elite tight ends in your draft, odds are they are already showing up on their teams’ injury report.
The good news is that every year, the NFL injects fresh blood into its ecosystem: rookies. Rookies don’t often perform well for fantasy football in their first season, but this year’s rookie tight end class is shaping up to be one of the strongest we’ve ever seen.
This past week, four rookie tight ends finished in the top 10 at their position in PPR scoring. Today I’ll be breaking down those performances to help you evaluate each of those rookies going forward.
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When the Giants drafted Evan Engram with the 23rd overall pick in the 2017 draft there were mixed reactions. Engram had a stunning profile of college production to go alongside his superb athleticism, but it was unclear if his skills would translate to the NFL level.
Engram’s Week 2 performance as this week’s third-overall tight end was certainly encouraging for those who believed in him, and there is reason for optimism going forward.
Engram is already playing over 80 percent of the Giants’ offensive snaps, far outpacing the other tight ends on the team. In fact, his snap percentage of 80.53 percent is more than double the snap percentage of his next-closest competition on the team, Rhett Ellison at 36.28 percent.
If that doesn’t show you how confident the Giants are in their rookie, maybe this will: Engram has the second-most targets on the team and the most red zone targets.
Those red zone targets led to fantasy football production on Monday night, as Engram found pay dirt in just his second NFL game. The score came on a nice play where Engram faked the Lions into believing he was blocking, before running completely uncovered into the end zone for the catch.
His usage so far is encouraging, and his matchup next week is a pretty choice one. The Philadelphia Eagles just surrendered over 20 fantasy points to fellow tight end Travis Kelce. The combination of Engram’s usage and matchup could make him a great pickup for those of you who lost your starter this past week.
Though he was drafted in the second round of the 2017 draft, Gerald Everett was the first pick of the Los Angeles Rams and the first pick with Sean McVay as the team’s head coach. In case you missed it, Sean McVay is the guy who made Jordan Reed a thing.
That’s why many in the fantasy community were excited about Everett’s potential in the Rams’ offense. Like Reed, Everett is a slightly undersized tight end, measuring out at 6’3″ and 239 pounds at the combine and like Reed, Everett was dominant at the college level.
When you think of Everett as a work-in-progress Jordan Reed it’s not as surprising to see the rookie score a touchdown in his second game. He, unfortunately, suffered an injury during the game but did post a team-high in receiving yards in addition to his score.
It’s not all sunshine and good news for Everett, though. Despite drawing at least one target in each of the past two contests, Everett is still far behind teammate and fellow tight end Tyler Higbee in terms of snap percentages. This means that for now Everett likely won’t be on the field frequently enough to produce consistent numbers for fantasy football purposes.
In addition, the Rams still aren’t exactly (yet) a team we associate with high-level fantasy production. That could change if Sean McVay is able to turn things around in a post-Fisher world, but for now, we can afford to wait and see how things develop.
It’s encouraging to see Everett produce at such an efficient level so early in his NFL career. Per AirYards.com, his 68 yards after the catch are currently the third-most in the league at the tight end position. Good things may be to come for Everett, but temper expectations for this season.
David Njoku is another first-round draft pick from this year’s NFL draft that set the dynasty fantasy football community aflutter back in the spring. Whereas Everett and Engram both had college production but were on the small size for tight ends, Njoku had the prototypical size of an NFL tight end along with great college production.
The Browns released veteran tight end Gary Barnidge just days after drafting Njoku, further amplifying the hype his size, athleticism and college production had garnered. And now we’re seeing those attributes come to fruition on the football field.
We’ve only just finished Week 2 of the 2017 season and Njoku is already leading the Browns tight ends in offensive snaps played. It’s great to see a rookie lead his team in snaps at his position. However, while he may be on the field more often than his fellow Browns tight ends, his 45.99 percent snap share isn’t quite as high as we would like it for fantasy football.
The Browns have targeted their tight ends 17 times through the first two weeks of the season despite their relatively low snap counts. Njoku will have to battle through sophomore tight end Seth DeValve (who leads the Browns tight ends in targets) to fight for additional playing time and additional targets.
There’s plenty of reason to get excited about Njoku. He’s exceptionally young at just 21 years old, and in Week 3 he faces a weak Indianapolis Colts defense. He’s certainly a risky play this early in the season, but other than NFL experience he has every other attribute you could hope for in a tight end. As far as weekly streamers for the tight end position go, you could do much worse than David Njoku in Week 3.
Jonnu Smith rounds out this week’s top rookie tight end performers as yet another prospect with exceptional college production and athleticism. In Week 2 he recorded two receptions on three targets for 30 yards and a touchdown, good enough for 10 fantasy points and a finish as the 14th overall tight end.
His touchdown in Week 2 was particularly impressive. On a first and 20, Smith held onto a block for long enough to earn Mariota time to make his reads before breaking off and opening himself up as a receiver. Mariota dumped it off to him and Smith took the pass for a 32-yard catch and run into the end zone.
Smith is out-snapping his nearest competition, veteran tight end Phillip Supernaw, at 60 offensive snaps to Supernaw’s 34 snaps. But that’s the thing: Supernaw is closer to Smith’s snaps than Smith is to Delanie Walker’s 109 snaps through two games.
Smith won’t be unseating Delanie Walker anytime soon. Walker’s presence eclipses Smith for fantasy purposes, so don’t expect many more touchdowns out of Smith this season.
At age 33 Walker is no spring chicken, but he has finished as the seventh and fourth overall tight end in fantasy points in Weeks 1 and 2 respectively. Smith’s fantasy outlook is bleak for as long as Walker is ahead of him, but Walker’s usage in the Titans’ passing game shows that the Titans use their tight ends in the passing game often.
The Titans have a difficult matchup against the Seahawks this week, so by almost no means should you start Smith now. But if Walker is injured at any point in the season, then Smith becomes instantly valuable as the next man up.
Conclusion
It is pretty wild to see rookie tight ends producing for fantasy football already. Remember last season when we thought that having both Austin Hooper and Hunter Henry as fantasy-relevant tight ends was rare?
This tight end rookie class will be one to watch for years to come, as other young talents like O.J. Howard, Adam Shaheen, and Jake Butt come into their own as well. These rookies have spoiled us.
That’s it for this week’s Rookie Report. I hope you are as excited as I am about these rookies and that this information is helpful for you and your fantasy team.
I’ll be back next week to break down more rookie performances. Until then, good luck in your games this weekend.
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Aidan Mcgrath is a correspondent at FantasyPros. For more from Aidan, check out his archive and follow him @ffaidanmcgrath.
