Tight end is a tricky position to navigate in dynasty fantasy football. Don’t have one of the truly elite tight ends? Then you’re probably stuck in a week-to-week grind, hoping the option you plugged in can scrape together a couple of catches and maybe find paydirt. Yes, it would be nice to have Travis Kelce during his decade-long run of dominance or Trey McBride during last year’s record-breaking campaign, but we all can’t be so lucky.
Like any position, the key is identifying the next wave of potential difference-makers before your league mates catch on. With various price points in mind, I’ve highlighted a higher-end option, a cheaper veteran set to take on more volume and a young dart throw who might blossom. Here are a few tight ends worth targeting right now. Take a look and happy trade hunting.
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Dynasty Trade Targets: Tight Ends | Fantasy Football
Tucker Kraft (TE – GB)
People may have forgotten because we didn’t see him in the second half of the season, but Tucker Kraft was absolutely balling in 2025. He was in the midst of a full-fledged breakout and well on his way to a career-best campaign before it got cut short, finishing with 32 receptions for 489 receiving yards and six touchdowns.
Currently, Kraft sits at TE6 on KeepTradeCut and TE5 on FantasyPros’ consensus dynasty rankings. He was better than that on the field, though. Through eight weeks, Kraft was actually the TE2 in total points and TE1 on a per-game basis, even slightly ahead of Trey McBride. He averaged 16.2 fantasy points per game, with two overall TE1 weekly finishes in that span.
Then, sadly, a major gut-punch for fantasy managers everywhere. Kraft went down in Week 9 with a torn ACL, and we were robbed of what looked like the position’s next big thing.
So why am I suggesting you go after a tight end who’s already valued highly and coming off a major injury? Easy: I believe we haven’t seen the best of Kraft yet.
Kraft has a few things going for him. For starters, he’s still young — he doesn’t turn 26 until November — and theoretically hasn’t hit his prime yet. He’s also entering a contract year, which might give him some extra motivation. And last but not least, he appears to be the top weapon for Jordan Love in the passing game, especially now that Romeo Doubs has moved on to New England.
Kraft’s main competition for targets is the oft-injured Christian Watson and 2025 first-rounder Matthew Golden, who caught just 29 passes for 361 scoreless yards as a rookie. All that is great on its own, but Kraft brings some absurd efficiency to the table as well. He was in the top five among all tight ends in these categories, per PlayerProfiler:
- First in dominator rating (34.9%)
- First in fantasy points per target (2.66)
- First in yards per reception (15.3)
- Second in yards per target (11.1)
- Second in yards per route run (2.56)
- Second in fantasy points per route run (0.61)
- Second in quarterback rating per target (148.6)
- Third in first downs per route run (0.115)
Feed this man targets and watch him obliterate defenses, similar to how George Kittle was winning for years.
If you want Kraft, send some offers out and see what happens. He’s expensive, but he’s not untouchable. I was recently able to land him in a TE-Premium league for Jake Ferguson and Xavier Worthy, a price I felt comfortable paying given how deep my wide receiver room is in that league.
If the manager wants picks, it’ll probably take a 2027 first-rounder. That’s fine, as long as it’s not projected to be in the top half of the round, but see if you can send one from 2026 or 2028 instead.
Chigoziem Okonkwo (TE – WSH)
If you’re looking for a cheaper tight end target who has some room to climb, Chigoziem Okonkwo might be your best bet. He doesn’t have the ceiling of a player like Tucker Kraft, but he also doesn’t have the same price tag. It shouldn’t take much to acquire him, and now there’s a path for him to become a useful fantasy piece in 2026 with his arrival in Washington.
This was a good landing spot for Okonkwo. Jayden Daniels has shown in his two seasons that he likes to lean on his tight end. He helped drag Zach Ertz back to fantasy relevance when it looked like his career was on the fritz. Ertz was the TE9 in fantasy points per game (10.4) in 2024 and averaged 11.2 in six games together in 2025 before they both got hurt in Week 14.
Enter Okonkwo, who has always been a tad bit more promising than productive since arriving as a fourth-round selection in 2022. He’s never topped 600 yards, 60 receptions or three touchdowns in a season, but he’s coming off a 2025 campaign where he set career-highs in targets (79), catches (56) and yards (560). He also posted a career-best 7.3 fantasy points per game.
Maybe the best ability Okonkwo brings to the table is his availability. He’s always been a durable pro, never missing a game in four NFL seasons. For a Commanders team that was riddled with injuries last year, Okonkwo’s constant availability is a nice bonus.
As of now, Okonkwo is firmly in the TE2 range. But there is some sneaky upside with Okonkwo if he becomes a featured part of the offense. Currently, Terry McLaurin is the only proven pass-catcher on the Commanders’ roster, but even he is on the older side — he’ll be 31 when the season kicks off — and coming off a year when leg injuries limited him to 10 games.
The Commanders could certainly add a rookie wideout with the No. 7 overall pick in April’s draft, but as of now, the receiver room behind McLaurin is a ragtag group consisting of Luke McCaffrey, Treylon Burks, Jaylin Lane and Dyami Brown. None of those wideouts should impede Okonkwo from becoming the No. 2 target in the passing game.
Contenders looking for a little juice in their tight end spot could toss a late 2026 second-round pick for Okonkwo. That price seems about right. If you’d rather move a player than a pick, someone like Rashid Shaheed makes sense, especially since most of his fantasy value comes in return-yardage formats. Same with Courtland Sutton, who just lost his top dog status in Denver with the arrival of Jaylen Waddle.
Gunnar Helm (TE – TEN)
Need a really cheap dart throw? How about the tight end who appears to be Chig Okonkwo’s successor in Tennessee?
Despite a strong senior year at Texas, finishing as the team’s second-leading receiver with 60 receptions for 786 yards and seven touchdowns, Gunnar Helm fell to the fourth round of the NFL Draft last year. He slipped down boards after a poor combine performance, but it was later revealed that he suffered an ankle injury on his first 40-yard dash attempt and tried to gut it out.
In Tennessee, Helm started in a timeshare with Okonkwo, but he built a rapport with fellow rookie Cam Ward and put together some decent games down the stretch. From Week 8 on, Helm had three TE1 and two TE2 weekly finishes, while averaging 6.6 fantasy points per game.
The potential for Helm to take a large Year 2 leap is there; he just needs a couple of things to break right. If the Titans don’t add a veteran like David Njoku or spend a Day 2 pick on the position in April, Helm should easily be the top tight end in Tennessee. With only newly signed Wan’Dale Robinson a threat to receive a large share of targets, Helm could work his way into being Ward’s No. 2 option.
The appeal here boils down to this: He’s young, flashed some chemistry with this quarterback and is set to take on a bigger role in the offense going forward. If you have inflated tight end scoring or deeper rosters, taking a shot on Helm could pay off. It shouldn’t cost more than maybe a pair of third-round picks, or an aging veteran like Chris Godwin or J.K. Dobbins to land him.
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Wolf Trelles-Heard is a fantasy football contributor for FantasyPros. Find him on X at @DynastyFFWolf.