Fantasy Football Fades 2025 - NFL Tight Ends To NOT Draft This Season

Here it is, ladies and gentlemen. The article that everyone loves to hate. The Tight End Fades. I like to picture the article What Makes An Elite Tight End as the menu. The next article covering the 2025 Elite Tight Ends is the big juicy stake. The article that follows this one, covering the sleepers and the Yin & Yang Tight End article, is the sweet, sweet dessert. This article is your side of vegetables. You might not love it but it’s damn good for you and, arguably, the most important thing on the plate. Knowing which tight ends you need to fade completely is crucial, especially for folks doing multiple drafts.

Did I do a good job of selling you on reading it? Did I mention that it still has a bunch of good stats and silly gifs like the first one?

Let’s take a moment first to define what a “fade” is here, then we’ll dive in. When we say we are fading the player, that doesn’t mean we hate them. Believe it or not, there are players that we LIKE that we are “fading”. Why? Because ADP is everything. And when guys go super early, you need to LOVE them, not just like them. It’s easier to lose your league in those first couple of rounds than it is to win it. From those early rounds, we need certainty AND upside. 

So this article is going to include the guys that we really don’t love at ADP. And we’ll let you know if it’s someone we feel you should still consider taking if they slide way past ADP or if it’s a landmine that you should avoid completely (like Dalton Schultz and Cole Kmet last year). If a player was included in the previous write-up, we’ll mention them here and link to the write-up. For everyone else, we’ll cover things the same way we always do with The Good, The Bad, and The Advice. 

• The Good - the objective good things about the player
• The Bad - the objective bad things about the player
• The Advice - my subjective advice on whether this is a good player to draft at their ADP

2025 Fantasy Football Tight End Fades

Brock Bowers, TE Las Vegas Raiders

Please read the full write-up on Brock Bowers in the first article, especially the section labeled “The Advice”. This is a player that we like and would love to have on our rosters - if he falls to the right price. But, as of now, he goes a little bit too early for us in drafts, which technically makes him fade. If he improves on his season from last year and actually becomes the next Travis Kelce, we will have years and years to draft him in the first or second round. But it’s incredibly rare for tight ends to have the type of difference-making season that warrants a second-round pick. Check out this thread from Ryan Heath at Fantasy Points for some additional good info on that. 

Trey McBride, TE Arizona Cardinals

Very similar sentiment to Brock Bowers, as this is not a guy we actively dislike, but we just don’t love where he currently goes in drafts. If you can get him at a discount from his ADP, then great but by definition, not drafting him at ADP means that we are fading him a bit. Fourth round, Trey McBride would really make us feel warm and cosy if that were possible, but he goes closer to the 2-3 swing based on our composite ADP data. The full write-up on him was in the previous article.

Sam LaPorta, TE Detroit Lions

Another one that we broke down in the previous article, and it boils down to a simple bet. Amon-Ra St. Brown is a target machine. Do you think Sam LaPorta gets more targets than Jameson Williams this year? We don’t like chasing touchdowns. We need to realistically project 100+ targets from Sam LaPorta to be worth his ADP. And Jameson Williams is just threatening enough to not pick Sam LaPorta as the TE4 off the board. About half the people we polled think LaPorta is the second target, the other half think he is third. So half of those people should be willing to draft him, the other half should not. 

T.J. Hockenson, TE Minnesota Vikings

The Good

We have yet to do a full write-up on T.J. Hockenson, so his time has come. And, naturally, there is a lot of “good” with a player of this caliber. Let’s start with a crucial one - over the last three years combined, only Travis Kelce has more targets than Hockenson’s 318. That encompasses his full time in Minnesota, and it needs to be mentioned that he suffered an ACL tear that saw him miss a combined seven games from the end of 2023 through the start of 2024. Yes, he still got the second-most targets of any TE over a span of games that included a torn ACL.

And it wasn’t just about the games he missed. When Hockenson returned to action in 2024, they did their best to ease him back in. So, a guy who was playing 85-90% of the snaps in 2023 only played one game all season in 2024, where he played over 70% of the snaps. For his first three games back, he didn’t crack 50% of the snaps. Yet he still accumulated 59 targets over those 10 games, which is that target pace of ~100 that we so desperately crave.
 

Yes, the snaps were limited, but a lot of the underlying metrics were as favorable as ever. He blocked on only 2.4% of his pass plays per Pro Football Focus. If you take all the tight ends that got 50+ targets, his average depth of target of 9.2 was just second behind Mark Andrews (10.8) and ahead of George Kittle (8.9). Even in his limited deployment, he made 9 contested catches, which was tied for third. Success in those contest catch and man-to-man situations is crucial in creating for yourself, especially in the red area, and Hockenson was top five in separation score vs. man-to-man coverage per Fantasy Points Data Suite. 

The Bad

Despite Justin Jefferson, Jordan Addison, and T.J. Hockenson all being on the team the last two years, we have a shockingly small sample size of games where all three were healthy and in a full-time role. If you remember correctly, KJ Osborn was actually the full-time WR over Addison early in 2023. Addison didn’t play a full-time role until Jefferson got hurt in Week 5. And, after Jefferson played his first full game back in Week 15, Hockenson tore his ACL in Week 16. As we mentioned, T.J. Hockenson only played more than 70% of the snaps in one game in 2024. That one Week 15 game in 2024 was the only time all three played more than 75% of the snaps together.

So this idea that all three have thrived alongside one another has mostly lived in our imagination. A great example of how injuries can misconstrue season target totals is the 2019 Falcons. Looking back on season totals, especially points per game, it felt like everyone was eating. Julio Jones was the WR3 in points per game, Austin Hooper the TE3, and Calvin Ridley a top 20 WR as a rookie. But the truth is that Ridley got a THIRTY target boost during the three games Austin Hooper missed, and then, conveniently, Ridley missed the end of the year where both Julio Jones and Hooper got boosts in targets. Here are the targets per week. 
 

And this second chart below does a better job of showing how those target totals progressed over the season. Ridley clearly was behind Hooper until the injury, but that stretch did wonders for his season-long target total. It’s also worth noting that the Falcons threw 50 more passes than any other team in the league that year, thus furthering the myth of these three guys coexisting in fantasy while also tricking the Browns into making Austin Hooper the highest-paid tight end in the league. Whoopsies.
 

Which brings me back to the situation at hand. Last year, per Pro Football Focus’s numbers, the two players to finish third on their team in targets and score the most fantasy points were tied with 174.6. It was Rashod Bateman and Sam LaPorta. These were not players we were happy with. Rashod Bateman was the WR40 in PPR. Last year, in the games that featured all three players, including playoffs, Justin Jefferson got 97 targets, Jordan Addison got 78, and T.J. Hockenson got 64. Hock was the third fiddle.

The Advice

If we were JUST betting on who gets more targets out of Jordan Addison or T.J. Hockenson, this would be a little bit of an easier call. But we are also betting on JJ McCarthy. Say what you will about Kirk Cousins and Sam Darnold, but they were putting the numbers on the board. Sam Darnold got MVP votes for Pete’s sake - he threw for over 4,300 yards and 35 touchdowns.

If we were getting a discount on Hockenson because of all this, I’d be in too. But he goes off the board as the TE5, per our composite ADP. If I’m drafting a top 5 tight end off the board, it’s because I think he can be the TE1 in fantasy, not because I think he can be TE5. And a lot needs to break right, even for Hock to be TE5.

That said, there obviously are paths for Hockenson to have big upside. This is a good player. Maybe he does get more targets than Jordan Addison. Or maybe this is one of the rare anomaly teams that has three guys get 100+ targets. Or maybe someone gets hurt. Or maybe JJ McCarthy is immediately a superstar. All that personally makes me more interested in taking a stab on JJ McCarthy at his ADP than T.J. Hockenson at his, but you are free to do what you want there. It’s your damn fantasy team, after all, I’m just trying to help.
 

Jonnu Smith, TE Pittsburgh Steelers

The Good

There is an argument to be made here that the trade to the Steelers is a good thing for Jonnu Smith. On the Dolphins, his top target competition was Tyreek Hill, Jaylen Waddle, and De’Von Achane (who quietly had 87 targets last year). On the Steelers, it is who? DK Metcalf is the top dog. After that, we’re looking at Pat Freiermuth, Calvin Austin, Roman Wilson, and Jaylen Warren. He could easily be a top-two target for Aaron Rodgers, a guy who managed to throw 11 touchdown passes to Robert Tonyan one season.

His biggest threat is Pat Freiermuth, but there’s really no comparison athletically. Jonnu Smith is a ~90th percentile athlete in most metrics per Player Profiler. His best comparable player over there is David Njoku, who, as we mentioned in the first article of the series, is an absolute freakazoid. Pat Freiermuth is more in the 40th percentile range with his best comparables being guys like Hunter Henry and Zach Ertz - who can have success obviously but need to be peppered with targets. 
 

It’s not like Jonnu is competing against another athletic WR-style tight end in Kyle Pitts here like he was in Atlanta. And, even then, Smith was able to get 70 targets while Pitts got 90 (on a team where Arthur Smith threw to the tight ends more than any other team in the league). Jonnu ran 70% of his routes from a WR spot last year, so the Steelers might just deploy him like a WR in Pittsburgh.

The Bad

You know who else was deployed like a wide receiver last year? Pat Freiermuth. Arthur Smith already has a premium blocking tight end in Darnell Washington. There’s a very real possibility that he just uses Jonnu Smith and Pat Freiermuth interchangeably to keep them fresh and keep the defense guessing. Here’s how they were deployed last year, from an article we just wrote breaking down the trade.

The team the Steelers are building makes their theory fairly simple. They LIKE the offense that Arthur Smith runs. The hypothesis being that, had the Falcons had a better quarterback than Desmond Ridder in 2023, they would have done better than 7-10. And it’s not that crazy of a theory since winning 7 games with Desmond Ridder is impressive. The problem is that the offense is not super fantasy-friendly for everyone.

In that season, Drake London played 76% of the total snaps, which isn’t ideal but should be fine for DK Metcalf (he did miss a game, so his average was 81%). After him, the next highest WR was KhaDarel Hodge at ~33% which is a nightmare for that WR group. The tight end was also a big rotational mess with Kyle Pitts playing 64% of the snaps, Jonnu Smith playing 58%, and Mycole Pruitt playing 36%. It almost doesn’t matter which of Jonnu or Freiermuth is the “Kyle Pitts” role, as that’s not a great role either. Between the two of them, there was only ONE game played at over 80% of the snaps. 

And if you are thinking, “Well, Coop, that was just one season” - it wasn’t. Over the last seven years, Arthur Smith has been the Titans' TE coach, Titans' OC, Falcons' HC, and the Steelers' HC. Not one tight end for him has played more than 75% of the snaps. Not Delanie Walker, not Kyle Pitts, not Pat Freiermuth, not Jonnu Smith on the Titans, not Jonnu Smith on the Falcons.

The Advice

The reality about normal fantasy football is that you don’t need to draft every tight end. If you are a best ball maxing sicko like me, you might sprinkle in a little bit of all them at the right values or with the right correlations. But these articles are geared towards a “one important league” mindset. You are either drafting a single “standalone” tight end that you trust. Or you are going Yin & Yang Tight end. And right now, neither Jonnu Smith nor Pat Freiermuth fits into that strategy.

He’s obviously not a standalone tight end given the circumstances. And the Yin & Yang tight end strategy is about combining safety with upside. Neither tight end offers any semblance of safety right now. And the path to upside is difficult to paint unless Arthur Smith changes his ways, which seem to be pretty set, going back to when he was a tight end coach himself. I don’t know what to do with these guys.

And, as of the writing of this article, their ADP is a complete mess. Jonnu Smith was being drafted as a top 10 tight end - he absolutely shouldn’t be. We need to see where this settles in, but these guys should probably end up on waivers in your typical 10-12 team league. Then you can add them off waivers if Arthur Smith stops being weird and rolling Mycole Pruitt out there for a bunch of snaps. But I doubt it. 

Pat Freiermuth, TE Pittsburgh Steelers

See above where I said Pat Freiermuth was in a worse spot than Jonnu Smith, who is in a bad spot.

Dallas Goedert, TE Phildelphia Eagles

The Good

The Eagles are pretty good. I actually think they won some kind of trophy for being the best team in the league last year or something. And, even better, it is a highly consolidated offense. The ball really only goes to a handful of guys. Jalen Hurts, Saquon Barkley, AJ Brown, and Dallas Goedert. This is a fairly underrated concept that we discussed in What Makes An Elite Tight End, as some teams spread the ball around so much that you don’t feel good about any of the pass-catchers (looking at you, Green Bay). With the Eagles, we know who the main characters are and, when one of them is hurt, the others have monster games. Just look at Week 3 last year when AJ Brown was already out, then DeVonta Smith left the game, and Goedert had 170 receiving yards.

The Eagles were able to win the Super Bowl and be one of the best offenses in the league despite attempting the fewest passes of any team in the league. The 49ers actually won the NFC the year before that while being bottom three in pass attempts. Not every season goes as perfectly as those, however, so the 49ers naturally were not at the bottom of the league in attempts last year - and I expect the Eagles to have to throw a bit more this year.

Goedert’s deployment is great as he plays a big snap share. Part of that is because he’s a great blocker and even graded out as the second-best blocking tight end in the league on season per Pro Football Focus. But that doesn’t necessarily hurt his role as he was only asked to pass block on 2.9% of pass plays last year. His efficiency within this offense translated to a yards per route run of 2.2 last year, which was second behind only George Kittle. If the only guy ahead of you is a fantasy football unicorn that defies all logic, that’s not so bad.
 

The Bad

Let’s start off with the biggest issue here. No one predicts Dallas Goedert to be a top-two target on this team. If you can find one analyst that doesn’t have the target pecking order as AJ Brown, DeVonta Smith, then Dallas Goedert, let me know. You really shouldn’t spend any time looking for them because they don’t exist. That’s essentially been the case with this team when everyone has been healthy for four straight years since they drafted Smith. And, if you are betting on someone to get hurt of the bunch, Dallas Goedert himself has been the guy to miss time in six straight seasons.

There’s also a big misconception with Goedert. Folks think “he’s big, so he’s an endzone target”. Yes, he’s big. But, in the Jalen Hurts tush push era, he’s not an endzone target. He hasn’t gotten more than four endzone targets in a season, going all the way back to when Carson Wentz was the QB. Even with Zach Ertz on the team, he was more of a threat to score touchdowns than he is on a team that has Jalen Hurts, Saquon Barkley, and AJ Brown. They have a literal unstoppable goal line play that teams unsuccessfully tried to make illegal - why would they throw it to Dallas Goedert? 
 

The Advice

For Dallas Goedert’s entire career, he’s been more of an idea than an actual thing. Everyone loved him when he was stuck behind Zach Ertz, waiting for him to get the job. By the time he had gotten the job, they had added AJ Brown and the Heisman trophy-winning DeVonta Smith. Our entire goal is to find a top 5-6 tight end, and Dallas Goedert, in seven seasons, has never finished higher than TE10 in PPR. And that was back in 2019 when Zach Ertz was actually still there. It’s like one of those monkey paw wish situations where we got what we wished for with Ertz getting traded, but it all backfired in some horrible way with Ertz continuing to outscore Goedert no matter where he goes.

I’ve seen folks sharing Dallas Goedert’s quotes about him being excited about the new offensive coordinator, Kevin Patullo. But I’m not seeing anything that suggests Goedert will now surpass DeVonta Smith or AJ Brown in that pecking order. And that is truthfully all that matters. Goedert himself is a guy who had to take a pay cut to even remain with this team. So, how truly excited can they be to make him a focal point?
For me, Dallas Goedert is the prototypical dead zone tight end. The same guy in your league drafts him every year. They missed out on the position completely and, instead of giving themselves a chance at upside, they do what they are “supposed to do” and take Goedert. Sure, you can go Yin & Yang tight end with Goedert as your Yin option paired with an upside play, but he’s kind of boring even for the “safe but boring” options.
 

Tyler Warren, TE Indianapolis Colts

The Good

The bet here is really fairly simple. The Colts drafted Tyler Warren in the first round, a rarity for tight ends, because they believe he is an elite prospect. They believe that Tyler Warren is special. They have been using a rotation of guys like Mo Alie-Cox, Kylen Granson, Trey Burks, etc. for years and are tired of it. Warren will be their every-down starting tight end.

Not only that, but this guy does a little bit of everything. He’s a converted quarterback, so he lined up at wildcat QB in college at times and even threw a touchdown pass. He could potentially be used as a “Tush Push” quarterback, the way the Packers use Tucker Kraft. Either way, he’s a tremendous runner with the ball in his hands out of the backfield or after the catch. His 19 broken tackles led all tight ends in this rookie class, and his 13 contested catches were second only to Orande Gadsden II, who was playing at Syracuse, not Penn State. The numbers he put up were truly scary, considering that he’s still learning the position. 

Folks used to be adamant that rookie tight ends can’t break out in fantasy football. In 2021, we dispelled that myth by writing an article explaining exactly the conditions we need for a rookie tight end in fantasy. And, since then, we got a 1,000-yard season from Kyle Pitts and two TE1 overall seasons from Sam LaPorta and Brock Bowers. 

The Bad

If you actually read that article linked above about the conditions needed for rookie tight ends to break out, they might not be present for Warren. Yes, he will be the starting tight end. But, as the second half of the article gets into, that’s not enough for a tight end breakout. They also need to be a top two target on the team.

The fantasy community LOVES Josh Downs. The Colts love Josh Downs. I love Josh Downs. Last year, Downs got 107 targets while missing a couple of games with a toe issue. So he could have an even bigger year this year. Also on that team is Michael Pittman, who had 141 and 156 targets in 2022 and 2023. He once again led the team in targets last year despite playing with a broken back. Who do we think will lead this team in targets? Two great veteran wide receivers that are smack in the age apex for the position?  Or a rookie tight end? Even if one of them gets hurt, they have Alec Pierce and Adonai Mitchell. 

And the wildcat stuff sounds nice in theory until you remember that they already have a 6’4 245-pound Anthony Richardson. Plus, Daniel Jones is a more mobile quarterback than folks give him credit for. We like Bo Nix, who ran for 0.40 yards per snap last year - well, Daniel Jones ran for 0.39 yards per snap last year. If the QB was Jared Goff or some other tin man, then it makes a lot of sense to switch in a wildcat QB, but regardless of who starts, the Colts already have a wildcat option that actually plays QB.

The Advice

I actually don’t think Tyler Warren is a FULL fade here. I’m not drafting him to start Week One for my fantasy football team, though, are you crazy? And, with his composite ADP in the top 12 tight ends, that’s kind of where he’s going.

If we aren’t starting him right away, then he can’t really be a Yin tight end for our Yin & Yang strategy. And the big problem with picking him as your Yang tight end is that we really like to go after guys where we can get an answer QUICKLY. Are they a top two target on their team within the first game or two? If yes, keep them. If no, drop them. Rookies are often a “slow burn” where their role grows over time, and they hopefully hit down the stretch. But that means you need to stash them for the long term. I’m not sure we want to be using our bench space that way.

That said, if you can get him at a cheap enough value or you have a ton of bench spots, it’s not a crazy move. We like him in dynasty. Maybe this guy IS that special. Maybe they do make him the goal-line QB. Maybe someone gets hurt. There are outs there, but it’s not the slam dunk situation that guys like Sam LaPorta or Brock Bowers were in. 

Colston Loveland, TE Chicago Bears

Look, these articles are already pretty long. So I’m going to save you some time. If you just read what I wrote on Tyler Warren, that applies to Colston Loveland as well. Perhaps Rome Odunze isn’t as entrenched as Michael Pittman and Josh Downs, but Loveland is also competing with Cole Kmet for TE snaps and Luther Burden for slot snaps. That’s on top of DJ Moore being a target monster. So you can take stabs on Loveland as a mystery box late, just in case he simply cannot be denied. But the path is pretty muddied. 

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