Rewriting Tight End Value

TheFFGhost

grahamRemember last season when the tight end position was clear? Remember when you could be certain that if you drafted one of the first three, or even four, tight ends that you could assured of elite tight end production in your league? Do you remember how great it felt to get one of those players, especially if you were in a tight end premium league that awarded extra points per reception for every reception a tight end, specifically you elite tight end, made?

As we all know, many of those feelings have been lost in this off-season. An owner attempting to draft an elite tight end now is faced with an incredibly, almost unbelievably, different landscape and set of decisions than that same owner would have faced just one short year ago.

For those of you living under a rock, new to fantasy football or even football in general I’ll take you on a voyage back to a time when giants roamed the fantasy landscape at the tight end position. For those of you familiar with this history, it will be a stroll down memory lane, indulge me as I give some background to those readers unfamiliar with the pain we are all feeling recently regarding this position.

We’ll start our cruise back in time at the 2010 NFL Draft. In that draft, three tight ends were drafted who would completely and totally transform the tight end position from that point forward. Those three players were Rob Gronkowski (drafted by the New England Patriots in the second round), Jimmy Graham (drafted by the New Orleans Saints in the third round) and Aaron Hernandez (drafted by the New England Patriots in the fourth round). At the time no one, no one at all, could have foreseen just how much these players would transform their position.

Like most rookies, two of these three players took some time to get acclimated to the professional game, move up their respective depth charts and to develop a measure of trust with their quarterbacks. One of these players (Aaron Hernandez) made an immediate impact right out of the gate. Gronkowski and Graham on the other hand, started to come into their own at roughly half way through the season. Both Hernandez and Gronkowski finished the 2010 season with over 40 receptions a piece while Graham finished with over 30 catches. These numbers placed all three outside of the top 15 tight ends in 2010 in terms of receptions. However, the strong second halves of both Gronkowski and Graham, as well as such a strong full season put in by a rookie in Hernandez made several people take notice.

The 2011 season was a true coming out party for all three players with all three of them finishing as the top three tight ends that season. That success continued, for the most part, in 2012 with Graham and Gronkowski finishing as the top two tight ends despite Gronkowski only playing in 11 games. Hernandez only played in ten games and saw his production fall as such. Despite the injuries faced by the two Patriots tight ends, their value appeared to stay intact from a dynasty perspective with all three solidly ranked within the top three dynasty tight ends by our rankers at DynastyLeagueFootball.com after the 2012-2013 Super Bowl.

Then things changed.

Persistent rumors kept surfacing in the 2013 offseason that Gronkowski’s forearm was having difficulty recovering. Constant mentions of a staph infection in the tissue of his forearm created significant cause for concern on his healing time. When all was said and done, Gronkowski  underwent four surgeries to his forearm in order to repair the twice broken bone and remove the staph infection. When undergoing his fourth surgery, new rumors began to surface. These rumors stated Gronkowski would need to undergo another surgery, this time on his spine. This would be his second spinal surgery, with the first occurring when he was in college and which caused him to miss significant playing time in order to fully recover. One of the top three tight ends now had significant question marks surrounding him.

Literally days after Gronkowski’s back surgery was performed, a second tight end from the group saw their value plummet. Hernandez can only be described as displaying hubris the like of which has rarely been observed. There simply isn’t a good way to put this, Hernandez is accused of murdering his former friend and associate Odin Lloyd. The evidence against him is substantial and it is being supplemented with what appears to be a history of violence that is coming to light with new revelations nearly every day. If even a fraction of what has been revealed thus far turns out to be true, Hernandez will be going to jail for a long time.

Where does this leave the position of tight end when it comes to dynasty fantasy football?

Well, the drop at the top of the position couldn’t have occurred at a worse time. Currently, there are four tight ends in the top ten who are either over, or coming into, their tenth year in the league. These players do not have much time left in the league, and one of them (Tony Gonzalez) has announced he will be playing his last season. So, what does all of this portend for how dynasty owners should be drafting tight ends? Well, let’s look forward to next year when taking into consideration Gronkowski’s injury with a possibly to probably missing two games, Hernandez completely out of the equation and four players nearing retirement age. If we apply last year’s numbers to the current tight end situation we come up with this picture:

 te-scores

Notice the huge drop off from the top two tight ends to the rest of the tight end leaders. The number two tight end with this subset would be Jimmy Graham at 237.2 points scored and the number three tight end is Brandon Myers with 183.6 points scored, a 23% drop off. Such a drop off is of huge importance in a dynasty league where several top tight ends are getting close to retirement age and those tight ends who are left are thus far unable to compete against two super elite players at the position. Think of the drop off in these terms – at quarterback, if we applied the same drop off we would see Drew Brees and Aaron Rodgers at the top of the position and the next available quarterback available to be drafted would be Andy Dalton. This would exclude Tom Brady, Cam Newton, Peyton Manning, Matt Ryan, Robert Griffin III, Tony Romo, Matthew Stafford, Andrew Luck and Russell Wilson or quarterbacks three through 11. Could you imagine trying to compete against teams that have Drew Brees or Aaron Rodgers when the best you could start is Andy Dalton? Applying this same test to the running back position you would see Adrian Peterson and Doug Martin at the top of the position and the next running back an owner would be able to draft would be Frank Gore. The league would lose Arian Foster, Ray Rice, Marshawn Lynch, CJ Spiller, Alfred Morris, Trent Richardson and Jamaal Charles. Finally targeting the wide receiver position with this test would see Calvin Johnson and Brandon Marshall available to be drafted but the next wide receiver available to be drafted would be Victor Cruz. This test would eliminate Dez Bryant, AJ Green, Demaryius Thomas, Andre Johnson, Wes Welker, Eric Decker, Roddy White, Julio Jones, Vincent Jackson and Marques Colston. These scenarios even include players who may be close to retiring, as we applied to the original tight end test, if we applied the same age criteria the effects would be even more profound.

I don’t really have to draw much in the way of conclusions with this data, it speaks very loudly and clearly for itself. However, take this away from the data shown above, in leagues where scoring rewards tight end performance with a premium if you aren’t getting Jimmy Graham or even Rob Gronkowski with all the question marks surrounding him you are already going to be placing your team significantly behind the eight ball at that position for the foreseeable future. The owners who draft either of these players simply needs to draft any player before Andy Dalton, Frank Gore or Victor Cruz at their respective positions in order to keep pace with any maneuvering you may do! As long as they are staying within 23% of the score of your players then they are winning the numbers game.

So, what am I suggesting? I think it is fairly clear, get Jimmy Graham or Rob Gronkowski at any cost in tight end premium leagues. Sell the car, mortgage the farm, trade your first born child, but get one of them. In the absence of doing so you’re going to have to hope and pray that players such as Kyle Rudolph, Rob Housler or even rookie Tyler Eifert take that next step, and they do so in the biggest way possible.