We're proofing the magazine this week, and just yesterday I was reading the tight ends section. "George Kittle is a huge injury risk," writes Ian. And hours later I saw the news item that Kittle will be shut down until training camp due to the nebulous "lower body injury."
Kittle is one of the best at his position, awesome when he's healthy and on the field. But availability counts for a lot, so I had no trouble passing him up in an ongoing best-ball draft I'm currently participating in. I just can't count on him to be healthy.
Kittle in his last three seasons has missed 2, 8, and 3 games. He's also played hurt in a lot of the ones he suits up for, contributing to lesser production. Tight end is a punishing position; I'm not questioning the guy's toughness. But I want to select someone at the position who I can feel better about being on the field.
Using the search tools at pro-football-reference.com, I pulled up all the tight ends who have been in the league for each of the past three years, sorting them by missed games. New Jets tight end C.J. Uzomah, Packers tight end Robert Tonyan, and Kittle are the three guys who've missed the most contests the last three years. New Jaguars tight end Evan Engram has missed 10 games.
It's not reasonable to just avoid all tight ends who have been hurt for a chunk of games. With some of them it's just one injury a couple of years ago; doesn't make them more likely to get hurt in 2022 than somebody who's played in every game, like Dalton Schultz. I'm not about to draft Jonnu Smith over T.J. Hockenson just because Smith has been available more, due to Hockenson's injury last year.
But there is an increased comfort level in looking at the durability shown by guys like Kelce, Andrews and Schultz. Give me highly productive players who also have a track record of avoiding injury, and I'll win more often than not.
With the table, I went with all tight ends who have caught at least 75 passes over the past three years (I'm sure there are a few tight ends who've suited up for every game just to block, but we don't care about those players here).
| TIGHT ENDS GAMES MISSED, 2019-2021 | ||||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Player | G | Tgt | Rec | Yds | TD | Missed |
| C.J. Uzomah | 34 | 114 | 84 | 822 | 8 | 15 |
| Robert Tonyan | 35 | 103 | 80 | 890 | 14 | 14 |
| George Kittle | 36 | 264 | 204 | 2597 | 13 | 13 |
| Evan Engram | 39 | 250 | 153 | 1529 | 7 | 10 |
| T.J. Hockenson | 40 | 244 | 160 | 1673 | 12 | 9 |
| Dallas Goedert | 41 | 228 | 160 | 1961 | 12 | 8 |
| Jordan Akins | 42 | 137 | 97 | 1035 | 3 | 7 |
| Austin Hooper | 42 | 228 | 159 | 1567 | 13 | 7 |
| Dawson Knox | 42 | 165 | 101 | 1263 | 14 | 7 |
| Zach Ertz | 43 | 319 | 198 | 2014 | 12 | 6 |
| Hunter Henry | 43 | 244 | 165 | 1868 | 18 | 6 |
| Darren Waller | 43 | 355 | 252 | 3006 | 14 | 6 |
| Gerald Everett | 44 | 185 | 126 | 1303 | 7 | 5 |
| Kyle Rudolph | 44 | 124 | 93 | 958 | 8 | 5 |
| Jared Cook | 45 | 208 | 128 | 1773 | 20 | 4 |
| Tyler Higbee | 45 | 234 | 174 | 1815 | 13 | 4 |
| Hayden Hurst | 45 | 158 | 112 | 1141 | 11 | 4 |
| Mark Andrews | 46 | 339 | 229 | 2914 | 26 | 3 |
| Noah Fant | 47 | 249 | 170 | 1905 | 10 | 2 |
| Travis Kelce | 47 | 415 | 294 | 3770 | 25 | 2 |
| Jonnu Smith | 47 | 154 | 104 | 1181 | 12 | 2 |
| Tyler Conklin | 48 | 123 | 88 | 845 | 4 | 1 |
| Mike Gesicki | 48 | 286 | 177 | 2053 | 13 | 1 |
| Cameron Brate | 49 | 146 | 94 | 838 | 10 | 0 |
| Dalton Schultz | 49 | 195 | 142 | 1429 | 12 | 0 |
--Andy Richardson