Rookie fever is a pandemic that many fantasy football players have been suffering from for generations. Every year, highly touted rookies come out of college and the football world obsesses over them from the moment the Super Bowl ends to the moment the next season begins. This, inevitably and predictably, leads to people over-drafting rookies in their fantasy drafts every season.
To make matters worse, Justin Jefferson, who set an NFL rookie record for receiving yards last season, has people looking for “the next Justin Jefferson '' this season. This search for an outlier inflates the draft price of these rookies even further.
Nowhere is this more evident in 2021 then at TE, where Kyle Pitts is currently the TE4 (Sleeper ADP available through the Fantasy Football by BRoto App) and the 45th overall player off the board, in the company of guys like Lamar Jackson, Kyler Murray, Cooper Kupp, DJ Moore, and Mark Andrews.
To the naked eye, this may seem like a good pick but a closer look reveals that not only are people drafting Pitts at his ceiling, but well beyond any reasonable expectation.
1. Rookie TEs just don’t produce.
In the history of the NFL, there have only been six rookies to ever record 700 receiving yards in their rookie season and only two (Jeremy Shockey in 2002 and Evan Engram in 2017—both for the Giants) have done it since the year 2000. Furthermore, only eight TEs have produced at least six TDs in their rookie seasons since the year 2000. In that same timespan, only Engram, who saw 115 targets in his rookie season, has had a combination of both, slashing a line of 64/722/6 in 2017.
These are not arbitrary milestones. These are the numbers hit by last year’s PPR TE4 TJ Hockenson, who put up 67/722/6 in his third year in the league.
Over the last five seasons, the PPR TE4 has averaged 195.6 PPR points per season (extrapolated for 17 games). In the last 20 years, there have been a grand total of ZERO rookies that have reached that point total and only two TEs ever—Keith Jackson in 1988 and Mike Ditka in 1961—have ever put up as many points in their rookie seasons.
In order for Kyle Pitts to simply match the average amount of points it takes to justify his draft slot, he would need to do something that hasn’t been done since people used newspapers and pencils to track fantasy stats.
2. Rookie pass catchers have a low hit rate
Many people argue that Pitts is a “unicorn.” A hybrid WR/TE that the league has never seen before. It’s a description we’ve heard before (more on that later) for a plethora of TE prospects, but does it matter?
In the history of the NFL, of 265 pass-catchers (WRs and TEs) drafted in the first round, only 25 rookies reached the 195.6 PPR threshold that TE4’s have averaged, nine of whom are currently still playing in the league, most of which are certified superstars: Julio Jones, AJ Green, Sammy Watkins, Mike Evans, Odell Beckham Jr., Amari Cooper, Calvin Ridley, CeeDee Lamb, and Justin Jefferson.
In fact, of the 1632 rookie pass-catchers drafted in any round in the last 20 years, only 24 total players (1.4%) have reached the 195.6 average point threshold needed to be the TE4.
3. Matt Ryan and the Falcons offense aren’t nearly as good as people think they are.
The argument for Kyle Pitts usually starts with a projected role: A high-powered offense, a terrible defense, and a bunch of vacated targets should equal success (or so the argument goes). That argument loses traction quickly because it operates under the assumption that Matt Ryan, at 36, still possesses the skills to run a high-powered offense when last year showed just the opposite.
Despite having a reputation as a high-powered offense, the Falcons have finished as a top-10 scoring offense only once (10th in 2018) since the Super Bowl season in 2016 and had missed the top-10 every season since 2012 before that. A big reason for that is Ryan’s inefficiencies.
Outside of a few standout seasons, a barrage of garbage time stats and highlight plays by Julio Jones, Calvin Ridley, Tony Gonzalez, Roddy White and others have largely masked the lack of efficiency Matt Ryan has displayed for a majority of his time with the Falcons. Last season was possibly one of the least efficient in NFL history.
Despite throwing the most passes, completing the most passes and having the most time in the pocket per pass of any QB with 500 pass attempts or more, his numbers were pedestrian at best. Ryan finished 24th in True Throw Value, 21st in TD rate, 21st in QB rating, 15th in FPPG, 12th in passing TDs, 4th most interceptions and only put up six QB1 performances all season. This lack of efficiency resulted in just 14 weekly positional performances in the top 12 by pass catchers. Ryan also averages 5 PPG less without Julio Jones on the field.
This will also be Ryan’s first year in a new system, a situation where he has struggled in the past. Including the hiring of Kyle Shanahan as OC in 2015, this will be the 4th time Ryan will go into the season with a new offense to run in the last seven years. In those seasons where he had to learn a new offense, he has averaged a touchdown rate of 3.8 which would have tied him for 23rd with Tua Tagovailoa in 2020. 3.8 is also a whole percentage point lower than his career average, resulting in an average of about 22 TDs a season, 5 less than his career average of 28 TDs in other seasons.
The myth of the Falcons being a “high-powered” offense is a deeply entrenched narrative that we have all accepted as fact but a deeper look shows that a perceived positive for Pitts may actually be a negative.
4. Is Pitts really a unicorn?
In terms of workout metrics, we've seen players in recent years who have had similar athletic profiles coming out of college. Noah Fant, George Kittle and, going a little further back, Vernon Davis (picked 6th overall in 2006) all measured very similarly to Pitts in workout metrics and, in some cases, graded out as superior to Pitts.
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Although all of those players eventually became stars, none of them produced at a TE1 level in their rookie seasons and Kittle is the only player to ever pass the 195.6 PPR point threshold at any time in his career.
I love the prospect of Kyle Pitts in dynasty but the rookie hype that has surrounded him has made him just too expensive. Currently he is ranked as my TE8, so even in his rookie season I expect him to outperform most tight ends. At the price tag of TE4, however, you are drafting Kyle Pitts way too high.
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By Tim Petropoulos (@BRotoFFTim)
For a second straight season, I am betting against Mahomes.