Every year we hear the same mantra about the tight end position, that they actually deep this year. “Don't worry, it's finally happening. The influx of talent, combined with the old stalwarts, means it has to happen now. Right?”

And then it doesn’t. It’s been like that for years. Each year we go in, hoping to make a late round TE selection work, or not need to spend high capital to snag an elite player. But it doesn't work. We are forced to stream the position, unless you are one of the lucky few who grabbed an every-week starter, be it by drafting one early or lucking into one.

2025 was no different. We were looking excitedly at snagging Brock Bowers and Trey McBride in the early rounds. George Kittle looked like a screaming value in drafts. Then we had the rookies Tyler Warren, Colston Loveland, and Harold Fannin joining the ranks of tight ends. Don’t forget about possible third-year breakouts for Tucker Kraft and Dalton Kincaid!

But then Bowers, Kittle, Kincaid, and Kraft got hurt. Loveland didn’t see the field much to begin the year. But hey, we had Trey McBride and Tyler Warren! Wait, Warren fell off towards the end of the year. And then…Loveland started to see the field. Fannin took over in Cleveland. Craziest of all, Kyle Pitts decided to put up numbers we haven’t seen since his rookie year.

I hate to say it, but I got to thinking, did tight end actually get in 2025? There was only one way to find out: look at the numbers.

Using data from Stathead, I got a list of every tight end since 2015 who played at least 8 games. Our focus is going to be on tight ends averaging 10+ PPG. Tight ends who average less are still going to be featured here as part of our positional analysis, but not our focus. 10+ PPG implies at least a little stability and usability week in and week out, even if it’s not high-end production. These are the tight ends that we can generally see inserting into our lineups in a given week.

I then wanted to see how many tight ends were giving us 10, 11, 12, and 14+ PPG in a given season. Usually, we talk in terms of say, 2 or 3 point increments for quarterbacks, running backs, or wide receivers, but this is tight end we are talking about. They generally don’t score as much as any of those other positions. We need to have smaller thresholds to see the “tiers” of tight end and how they are improving or waning. I’ll also use TE1-16, as sometimes it makes certain aspects of the research a little easier to understand. I also group them into groups of four: TE 1-4 in PPG, TE 5-8, 9-12, and 12-16. Those closely follow the 10, 11, 12, and 14+ PPG thresholds, but sometimes they will vary slightly. So in general, our main idea is focusing on tight ends scoring 10+ PPG, but I will venture out into “TE16” territory (which is right around that 10 PPG threshold anyway) for ease of discussion.

In the following charts, I’ve gone color-coded. Elite tight ends are green, next tier is yellow, then back end TE1’s are red, then beginning of TE2 range is blue. Make enough sense? In both charts, the higher the number, the better. However, you will notice the color rainbow flips; that’s just due to there are only a few tight ends who can reach high PPG averages. But both charts are consistent about what color represents which group.

🔎 Let’s look at overall TE PPG first. The first thing we notice when looking at recent history is that tight end score has, overall, been on the rise since 2022. In 2025, the TE12-16 group averaged more PPG, 10.5, than any previous season all the way back to 2015. The back-end TE1s (TE 9-12) haven’t averaged this many points since 2016!

Things start to change once we get up past the TE8 range. The mid-tier TE1’s averaged more PPG in each of the previous two seasons compared to 2025. The elite of elite tight ends also saw an uptick in scoring since seeing heights they haven’t reached since 2021.

Not only are they scoring more, but the number of usable tight ends has also increased.

Since 2022, more and more tight ends have reached the 10 and 11+ PPG threshold, with both 12 and 14+ PPG having more tight ends hit those marks compared to 2022, even with a slight downturn in 12+ PPG tight ends in 2024 and 2025.

So tight ends are scoring more, and there are more of them. What’s causing this exactly?

Is it volume? Not really. When I looked at how many targets per game each bucket was getting on average, things were actually trending slightly downward or remaining steady, depending on how you look at it.

I won’t bore you with everything I looked at as a cause, but I think I found a good way to explain the why behind everything: success rate (or SR for short).

For those who are unfamiliar with success rate, it’s a measure of efficiency. Any play that gains at least 40% of the needed yards to gain a first down on first down, 60% on second down, and 100% on third or fourth down is deemed successful. So a three-yard gain on first and 10 is not successful. But a four-yard gain on 2nd and 6 is successful.

When I looked at SR, I looked at each year’s TE1-16 as a whole group. Success rate has generally mirrored how tight ends have been doing overall in fantasy PPG. And when you think about it, it makes sense. In order for a tight end to have a successful play, they first must catch the ball. Then they must gain a decent amount of yards, aka be efficient, on those plays, or score a touchdown.

Success rate, while not scored for fantasy, captures that whole picture. And tight end success rate has increased in each of the last three seasons. The highest success rate in any season prior to 2023 was 57.5% among top 16 fantasy tight ends. In 2022, SR dropped from right at 57% the previous three seasons to 55%. Then in 2023, it rose back up to 57.4, then 58, and finally 59.2% in 2025, the highest SR rate since 2015! 📈

Touchdowns, receptions, and receiving yards can fluctuate in any given year. I looked at each of those statistics. And they have, in general, increased in the last few years. But none of them were the sole reason that tight ends have produced better (actually, in 2023 and 2024, tight end scoring was the worst TD/Gm seasons in our sample set!). It’s the combined whole. When lacking in TD, they may catch more passes or get more yards. 

Now, of course, much more research could be done on this subject. Defenses have gotten lighter in recent years since speed and the passing game took over the game towards the end of the 2010’s, but I don’t think that is impacting things. Tight ends might be bullying lighter defenders to get open for bigger plays, but they aren’t breaking tackles at a higher rate because of lighter defenders. Actually, our fantasy-relevant tight end sample has gotten worse in recent years in broken tackles per reception.

Are coaching decisions driving this? We have seen teams like the Rams run 3TE sets more and more, and Pittsburgh under Arthur Smith also ran a lot of multi-tight-end sets. Having more tight ends deployed on a given play means that fewer receivers are on the field at the same time. That forces more opportunities to tight ends in situations where you have to have yards or a score. There is a lot that can be explored with this subject that I won’t be able to here.

Whatever the reason, tight ends have been succeeding more often and have become more efficient, scoring more PPG in the process. So yes, it does appear tight end has finally gotten deeper. We have more fantasy-relevant players to insert into our lineups, and those players are scoring more than they did in the past. Will this continue? Time will tell.

But before we close, I want to leave you with the inverse effect this is having on receivers. Here is a chart of WRs in that same time period, grouped into 12, 14, 16, and 18+ FPPG, essentially, from WR3s up to the elite WR1s.

It appears the league featuring more tight ends is the primary culprit for their scoring increasing, and receiver scoring decreasing, at least on the surface. We might be getting a tight end surge, but non-elite receivers are having to pay the price.

I hope that this was a fun and thought-provoking exercise! I’ll see you guys next week when we revisit the tight end position!