In our final piece in this series looking at how position groups perform a year after serious injury, we have finally come to the tight ends.
Tucker Kraft, George Kittle and Sam LaPorta are the standout names from the 2025 season who will be working their way from substantial injuries heading into the 2026 campaign.
Just like the previous entries to this series, we’re going to take a 10-player sample size from 2015 onward (perhaps with one exception) and average them out to give us a baseline.
In order in which the players sustained their injuries, our 10 players are:
Dennis Pitta (2015, hip), Rob Gronkowski (2016, hamstring and herniated disc), Greg Olsen (2017, broken foot), Jordan Reed (2019, concussion), George Kittle (2020 knee, foot), Logan Thomas (2020, hamstring, knee), Zach Ertz (2023, quad injury), T.J. Hockenson (2023 torn ACL), Darren Waller (2024, retirement) and Evan Engram (2024, torn labrum).
Below are the seasons the players turned in prior to injury.
Pre-Injury
PlayerPFF Receiving GradeCatchesYardsTDsYards/Route RunaDOTPitta (2014)70.91612501.395.1Gronkowski (2016)91.02554033.2015.1Olsen (2017)67.71719111.0911.0Reed (2018)75.25458821.646.7Kittle (2020)87.74863422.847.9Thomas (2020)64.47267061.107.8Ertz (2023)51.72718711.017.0Hockenson (2023)82.49596051.897.6Waller (2024)73.15255211.557.9Engram (2024)70.24736511.515.8Taking the above numbers for those players and averaging them out, we get 45 catches for 481 yards and two scores. It totals 106.62 fantasy points, enough for the TE28 in 2025 — a highly droppable asset in nearly every form of fantasy football.
The numbers are bleak, but some of these tight ends boasted genuinely monstrous seasons before their injury. Engram, for example, posted a 114-catch year with the Jacksonville Jaguars in 2023, notching 963 yards and four scores on his way to a TE2 overall finish.
Prior to foot issues robbing Olsen of much of his 2017 and 2018 seasons, the former Carolina Panther was the center of Cam Newton’s passing attack, with 122 targets, 80 catches, 1,073 yards and three touchdowns on his way to a TE3 overall finish.
Similarly, Gronkowski was looking to follow up a stellar 2015 season in which he recorded 1,176 yards and 11 touchdowns, led all qualifying tight ends in average depth of target (10.9) and ranked second in yards per route run (2.31).
So, while our hypothetical average player posts bleak numbers, they would have had some incredible totals had we taken the last fully healthy season of some of these players.
What comes next is not encouraging, however. Before we take a broad look at how the 10 aforementioned players performed post-injury, it’s important to look at some outliers.
Waller is an interesting case. The former Raider retired in 2024 before returning for the 2025 season with the Miami Dolphins. Injury restricted Waller to just nine games this past season, but he still posted the second-highest PFF receiving grade of his career (87.6), as well as the second-highest touchdown total (six).
Projecting that across 17 games would have resulted in 45 catches for 535 yards and 11 touchdowns — the TE12 overall for the 2025 season.
Pitta is also interesting. The former fourth-rounder was plagued by injuries and played only six NFL seasons, and his last was his finest from a fantasy standpoint.
While Pitta earned a 62.6 PFF receiving grade in 2016, the second-lowest mark of his career, he did log 86 catches for 729 yards and two scores, which was enough for him to be the fantasy TE8.
Let’s take a look at the 10 players in their entirety.
Post-Injury
PlayerPFF Receiving GradeCatchesYardsTDsYards/Route RunaDOTTE FinishPitta (2016)72.68672921.366.4TE8Gronkowski (2017)90.3691,08482.4211.9TE2Olsen (2018)68.62729141.188.9TE25Reed (2020)70.02623141.319.0TE34Kittle (2021)91.47191062.348.3TE4Thomas (2021)67.91819631.3010.2TE44Ertz (2024)69.36665471.308.0TE8Hockenson (2024)77.44145501.529.2TE34Waller (2025)87.62428361.7511.9TE32Engram (2025)58.35046111.274.2TE28When we average that out, it results in 48 catches for 529 yards and four scores — 124.9 fantasy points, or the TE20 in 2025. It’s a slight jump from the TE28 mark when averaging out the injury-hit seasons, but it’s a low-end TE2.
Even scarier is the long-term viability of the players in our sample size. Pitta retired after the 2016 season, as did Reed after his 2020 season. Thomas played until 2023, with his final season being his best since his 2020 career year (55 catches, 496 yards and four touchdowns).
Olsen suited up until the end of the 2020 campaign. But the dynamic rumbling playmaker who notched three straight 1,000-yard seasons from 2014 to 2016 was long gone, with his best year from 2016 being a 52-catch, 597-yard 2019 campaign.
Perhaps the only player in 2026 threatened by the same thing happening is Kittle. The San Francisco 49er will be 33 by the time he recovers from a serious Achilles injury.
He could experience a downturn, and that uncertainty is playing out in his dynasty value, which is at a low point currently. Dynasty managers are best suited to hold on to the former Iowa product until he returns to the field.
Kraft and LaPorta may not return to post Gronkowski-type numbers, but there is no reason to believe they could not step back on the field and accomplish what Kittle did in 2021.
Read More Stories Explore PFF Tools 14 min read Quick Read Wide receivers tend to bounce back well from serious injuries, but treat things with caution in fantasy football. Fantasy Football: How do wide receivers perform after serious injuries? By Ryan Conway 16 min read Quick Read While running back injuries may cause panic for dynasty fantasy football managers, history tells us that it's not all doom and gloom. Fantasy Football: How do running backs perform after serious injuries? By Ryan Conway 16 min read Quick Read After Patrick Mahomes' seasong-ending injury, what should we expect from him in fantasy moving forward? Fantasy Football: How do quarterbacks perform after serious injuries? By Ryan Conway Try the tool Mock Draft Simulator Make picks, trade up, and run your own draft in minutes. Build your board Big Board Builder Create custom rankings with Scouting Mode at the core. Subscribe For Full Access Mock Draft Simulator Be the GM for any team in the 2026 NFL Draft with a fully immersive simulation that lets you trade picks and players for a realistic, in-depth draft experience. Customizable Draft Big Board Trevor Sikkema’s Take control of your rankings with a customizable big board that lets you add players, share with friends, export to CSV and save your personalized list. Scouting Assistant Master the evaluation process with a customizable grading system built for serious scouts. Choose your own scouting categories, assign 0–10 grades in each area and generate a finalized prospect grade tailored to your criteria. NCAA Premium Stats Our exclusive database, featuring the most in-depth collection of NCAA player performance data. Subscribe For Full AccessIf you’re a fantasy manager who is potentially looking to get cute and wait for a returning injured tight end to fall to you in fantasy drafts, don’t do it. Invest in the position early and take one of Brock Bowers, Tyler Warren or Trey McBride.
If you’re a dynasty manager, just beware that you may need to spend extensive draft capital to bring in a tight end should your current rostered one suffer a serious injury. Unless they’re rare, like Gronkowski and Kittle have proven to be, you may be waiting for a bounce-back that never comes.