I am leery of O.J. Howard and Cameron Brate. Nice players, but I worry that they won’t be used enough.
Bruce Arians is orchestrating the offense now in Tampa Bay. He doesn’t tend to use tight ends much. In his scheme, they’ve tended to be used more as blockers than pass catchers.
Arians has had control of 11 NFL offenses either as the head coach or as the offensive coordinator). Only four of those teams had a top-20 tight end. It was Heath Miller on all four occasions – the No. 8 tight end (using PPR scoring) in 2007 and 2009, and 15th and 19th in the 2008 and 2011 seasons.
Arians, of course, hasn’t had a lot of good pass-catching tight ends. But he had Dwayne Allen (when he could still run) and Coby Fleener in Indianapolis, working with Andrew Luck, and neither of those tight ends finished higher than 25th.
Howard (pictured) is a tough case. He’s a very athletic guy, with unusual speed for the position. But I don’t expect I’ll be selecting him in drafts this year.
BRUCE ARIANS TIGHT ENDS (2007-2017) | |||||||
---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
Year | Player | No | Yds | Avg | TD | PPR | Rk |
2009 | Heath Miller, Pitt. | 76 | 789 | 10.4 | 6 | 190.9 | 8 |
2007 | Heath Miller, Pitt. | 47 | 566 | 12.0 | 7 | 145.6 | 8 |
2011 | Heath Miller, Pitt. | 51 | 631 | 12.4 | 2 | 126.1 | 19 |
2008 | Heath Miller, Pitt. | 48 | 514 | 10.7 | 3 | 117.4 | 15 |
2012 | Dwayne Allen, Ind. | 45 | 521 | 11.6 | 3 | 115.1 | 25 |
2010 | Heath Miller, Pitt. | 42 | 512 | 12.2 | 2 | 105.2 | 24 |
2013 | Rob Housler, Ariz. | 39 | 454 | 11.6 | 1 | 90.4 | 28 |
2016 | Jermaine Gresham, Ariz. | 37 | 391 | 10.6 | 2 | 88.1 | 29 |
2017 | Jermaine Gresham, Ariz. | 33 | 322 | 9.8 | 2 | 77.2 | 31 |
2014 | John Carlson, Ariz. | 33 | 350 | 10.6 | 1 | 76.0 | 29 |
2015 | Darren Fells, Ariz. | 21 | 311 | 14.8 | 3 | 70.1 | 35 |
2012 | Coby Fleener, Ind. | 26 | 281 | 10.8 | 2 | 66.1 | 37 |
2013 | Jim Dray, Ariz. | 26 | 215 | 8.3 | 2 | 59.5 | 45 |
2017 | Ricky Seals-Jones, Ariz. | 12 | 201 | 16.8 | 3 | 50.1 | 45 |
2015 | Jermaine Gresham, Ariz. | 18 | 223 | 12.4 | 1 | 46.3 | 44 |
2016 | Darren Fells, Ariz. | 14 | 154 | 11.0 | 1 | 35.4 | 51 |
2008 | Matt Spaeth, Pitt. | 17 | 136 | 8.0 | 0 | 30.6 | 48 |
2017 | Troy Niklas, Ariz. | 11 | 132 | 12.0 | 1 | 30.2 | 63 |
2011 | David Johnson, Pitt. | 12 | 91 | 7.6 | 1 | 27.1 | 52 |
2013 | Jake Ballard, Ariz. | 7 | 75 | 10.7 | 2 | 26.5 | 57 |
2007 | Matt Spaeth, Pitt. | 5 | 34 | 6.8 | 3 | 26.4 | 53 |
2010 | Matt Spaeth, Pitt. | 9 | 80 | 8.9 | 1 | 23.0 | 60 |
2014 | Rob Housler, Ariz. | 9 | 129 | 14.3 | 0 | 21.9 | 64 |
2015 | Troy Niklas, Ariz. | 4 | 33 | 8.3 | 2 | 19.3 | 76 |
2009 | Matt Spaeth, Pitt. | 5 | 25 | 5.0 | 1 | 13.5 | 72 |
2014 | Darren Fells, Ariz. | 5 | 71 | 14.2 | 0 | 12.1 | 81 |
2010 | David Johnson, Pitt. | 4 | 46 | 11.5 | 0 | 8.6 | 83 |
2007 | Jerame Tuman, Pitt. | 1 | 9 | 9.0 | 1 | 7.9 | 82 |
2016 | Ifeanyi Momah, Ariz. | 2 | 50 | 25.0 | 0 | 7.0 | 93 |
2014 | Troy Niklas, Ariz. | 3 | 38 | 12.7 | 0 | 6.8 | 95 |
2017 | Ifeanyi Momah, Ariz. | 1 | 46 | 46.0 | 0 | 5.6 | 98 |
2008 | Sean McHugh, Pitt. | 3 | 24 | 8.0 | 0 | 5.4 | 84 |
2012 | Weslye Saunders, Ind. | 2 | 15 | 7.5 | 0 | 3.5 | 87 |
2009 | David Johnson, Pitt. | 2 | 9 | 4.5 | 0 | 2.9 | 93 |
2013 | Kory Sperry, Ariz. | 1 | 16 | 16.0 | 0 | 2.6 | 100 |
2016 | Troy Niklas, Ariz. | 1 | 0 | .0 | 0 | 1.0 | 114 |
2012 | Nathan Palmer, Ind. | 1 | -4 | -4.0 | 0 | .6 | 100 |
—Ian Allan