Top 10 TE Rankings + UDK-for-LIFE, Cup of Tea - Fantasy Football Podcast for 8/17

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Uh, all right, tight ends. The last ranking show, right, Brooksie? Oh, yeah, unless you want to do a tight ends part two. Oh, thank you. No, no, no, there is no part two to the tight end position. Or top ten kickers? Uh, no, no, enough with your suggestions. Okay. Just pull the levers over there, okay? Top 10, tight in rankings are consensus top 10 by half PPR, scoring, uh,

Last year was a good year for a handful of tight ends. I mean, super efficient in the red zone. 31% of tight end touchdowns occurred there that is the most in the last decade. So teams were looking to the tight end in the red zone, those high value targets. And you even had some low volume guys with big years. Yeah, we talked about Robert Tunyon, the tied in three with the touchdowns. But look, Jimmy Grandpa had, what, eight touchdowns last year?

Jonu Smith, Rob Grankowski, even Jared Kyuk last year were low volume, high efficiency tight ends. So today we'll talk about our top 10. We'll talk about the separation between the elite tier. And we'll talk about some guys we think could jump into that range. I mean, Tunian was an example of somebody that made a big fantasy impact, late draft pick, waiver wire pickup type of player. And this is what, that's everything.

That's everything when you're drafting the tight end. We've been recommending all off-season. Try to get one of the elites. Try to get one of the big three, Kelsey Waller, George Kittle. Don't forget about George Kittle, even though he didn't finish very high. And maybe Mark Andrews can sneak into that crew. But otherwise, if you don't get one of them, you don't settle. Don't settle for your guy in the middle rounds. You think, well, he's going to be fine.

I need a starter at the tight end position. He'll be okay. He'll get me some points. No. Go after someone that you believe can actually make that jump into becoming a true top five tight end. Because otherwise you're just, you're wasting your pick. Yeah, there are, I think.

six players that you can have an argument about drafting with capital. So obviously the big three, meaning three other players that we should have a discussion today about whether we would be willing. And I think each person on their own needs to decide, are they willing to take a shot in those middle rounds? And that would be Mark Andrews, Kyle Pitts, and T.J. Hawkinson, whether or not those are worth it. And then outside of that, if you decide that they aren't worth the shot, just go late.

Yeah, and in my opinion, you go late with the upside. Like Mike said, you go late with somebody that, you know, well, we'll get into the name. Yeah. And then we'll go from there. Our seventh pick, the guy after that, is being drafted in double digit rounds as the last tight end. So yeah, we're good. Travis Kelsey is number one on the rankings. Not a surprise. 105 for 1,411. Goodness gracious. The tight end won. And if you look at the game log, like we have the consistency charts.

in the ultimate draft kit. You get to see week by week. It's mesmerizing to see what he did for your fantasy team. Green is good. I mean, he had a run where four of six weeks, including three in a row, he was the number one on the week. He had five number one overall finishes. You know, he just won you weeks at the position in the advantage when you got one of those games was so massive over your opponent. That's why we've been.

This has been the year of the first round tied in pick for us. If you're late in the first round, just go Kelsey. You're not going to be sad. Kelsey cannot bust outside of injury. Everybody that you draft in the first round can have a season ender and you lose your first round pick. You're going to have to roll with the punches and figure out how to scrap and claw your way to the playoffs, still win that championship losing your first round pick. You could do it. We've all done it before.

But outside of that happening to Kelsey, there is no way on the planet that he's not a great pick. He is the number one target for the number one quarterback and the number one offense with the best offensive mind at head coach and, you know, the offensive coordinating system. The last five years he was the tight-in one, the tight-in one, the tight-in one, the tight-in one, the tight-in one, the tight-in one. So.

He good. So the bigger discussion then is not, we're not breaking news that Kelsey is good. The bigger discussion is how do you view him in a dynasty league? Because everyone wants to know when you, you know, when do you trade him in for a newer model, so to speak? Well, I mean, that's the truth. I mean, I've seen a lot of, I've seen a lot of those questions of should I trade Travis Kelsey for Kyle Pitts? Do I, you know, in a dynasty league. And that's a question of, well.

Can you win the championship this year? Because if you can, keep, I would keep Travis Kelsey. I would go win a championship. Well, there's some good research here. Tony Gonzalez had a tied in one finish in his age 32 season. That is what Kelsey is going to be going into here. It turns 32 in week five of this season. He actually, Tony Gonzalez ended up with four more top five seasons after age 32. Tony Gonzalez is not, you know,

every tight end out there, Jimmy Grandpa being an example of one that didn't do that. But haven't seen a sign of Kelsey's slowing down and the quarterback is there for the next 10 years. Yeah, I mean, when you talk about Tony Gonzalez, you're like, well, that's not fair. He's first ballot Hall of Famer. So is Travis Kelsey. I think we've already gotten there with Kelsey. Exactly right. If he's not a first ballot Hall of Famer, then. So what about if you're not, you know, what if you're in the middle and you're kind of competing? You don't know if you have a shot in Dynasty.

Are you viewing Kelsey? What window are you looking at him through? Like is it a five year or three year? I would give him a three year window, which is what we say is always good enough. That means I keep him. Yeah, that means I keep him. I would not trade him for Kyle Pitts straight up. If I am a completely rebuilding team that, look, my team just does not have a chance to win. I'm not going to even make the playoffs this year. I'm playing for the future. Then sure, I might be willing to make that move. But you keep them right now. All right.

is... Well, he's feeling good, right? Yeah. Are we okay there? Yeah, he's back. So, Darren Waller comes in at number two. We all have him at two. Last year, he was the third... He was an early third last year? Or is that this year? That's this year. Okay. No, last year he was... Oh, yeah, people doubted the volume last year. Yeah, yeah. So...

What's the discussion around Darren Wallet? The doubt has been removed. Jason and I were talking in the studio yesterday. Derek Carr, I mean, he didn't come up on the first or second episode of the quarterback rankings for some reason. I'm not sorry. Well, you can not be sorry, but that is the sentiment. In a nutshell, he always is better than that, and he's actually playable in a lot of leagues on a lot of weeks. You can't make me. Well, all right. If you're in a super flex.

He's one of my three favorite targets for your third quarterback. But the point is that he is good enough as an NFL quarterback to give you confidence in Darren Waller. Darren Waller is great. If you're in any kind of half PPR or full PPR league, that's where when you're looking at Darren Waller versus George Kittle, you know, I made the transition more recently. Like you guys had Darren Waller as your number two pretty much the whole off season. I had George Kittle as my number two.

Questions with the targets and Iyuk and Debo and potentially a rookie coming in. There's no questions here with Darren Waller. He is the number one target for this team. We've seen it in multiple years. He's got the athleticism that's through the roof. So I don't think there's anything to dislike. In fact,

I question whether or not. Like, I would rather, I would talk to you, Mike, about this when we were doing our last mock draft show. And you had, I think, the sixth pick. If you are in the middle of the first round, that's where it's like, okay, you might be at the seven spot. And that's where a lot of people are deciding, do I take Travis Kelsey there? Personally.

I would rather grab an Aaron Jones or a great running back there and then grab Darren Waller in the third round, just like you did in your mock. You've still got a positional advantage, but you're stocking up on the more important position. So I love Waller this year. That's where I was going to ask. I mean, Darren Waller, incredible season, 24 red zone targets, over 27% of the team's targets, which is, that's absurd for a tight end. But he's not, he's not Travis Kelsey.

Like he has in some inconsistent weeks. He was on fire to end the season. But, I mean, you have, what, five games where he wasn't even a top 12 tight end on the week. You know, then that's pretty disappointing for a tight end that you drafted in the third round to finish outside of the top 12 that many times. I'm just completely, I'm completely stuck on Derek Carr deep dive over here. Oh, no. I'm staring at this. Don't do it. He's never, this is eighth season.

He's never finished as low as we have him ranked this year. Ever. He had his best season finish ever last year. His last seven games, he was on 4,800-yard pace. Last year he finished as the quarterback 13. He never misses a game. And now he's got Torello. I mean, Randy Ma'am. I mean, Brian Edwards. So you promised yourself we weren't going to do this anymore, Andy. It is just, 4,000 plus yards for three consecutive years. Abort. I love it, man. Get hot for them. I guess early, early exam. I'm not hot for him. I think Friday.

I think we know one of the players now. No, we do not. My guy. We do not know one of those players, although. Send in the car. Send in the car. Sorry, Darren Waller, tight ends. Yeah, that was going to be the question of when discussing these two players, your strategy in a draft in the, would you rather leave the draft with, and Jason answered it? Would you rather be Aaron Jones and Darren Waller or would you rather be?

Travis Kelsey and let's go. Uh, we'll just go running back to running back. We'll go, but that's Travis or, uh, Kelsey and Clyde. I'd stop myself because they're both on the same team. Well, Clyde is not usually making it to the middle of the third. So I think more fair. If we're going middle of third, it would be someone like David Montgomery. Okay. So Kelsey and Montgomery or Aaron Jones and Darren Waller, Andy. Yeah. Um, it's really close.

It's really close. What if I told you... I think Kelsey is a... Yeah, I'll go Kelsey Montgomery. What if I told you that if you draft Darren Waller, you can stack him with Derek Carr? And no one in our league will stop you. You can do it the day before kickoff. You can just go right to that waiver and say, I'm rolling this. I feel like I'm being tricked. Yeah, I mean, that's tough. That's tough. I mean, the consistency of...

Kelsey versus Waller, it was a vast disparity. Both of these are good starts, and I think this is where we should at least remind people or illuminate the concept that if you are going after one of these guys, we're about to talk about George Kittle, but if you're going after Waller, Kelsey Kittle, and you're spending that high-end capital, right? We're talking about you're giving up Aaron Jones, or you're giving up a David Montgomery, or you're giving up Calvin Ridley to take a tight end.

don't also draft an early quarterback. That would be our recommendation because if you're taking two of your first five picks away from running back and wide receiver, yeah, I mean, you'll have Lamar Jackson and Travis Kelsey and they'll be great, but your running backs and wide receivers as the season goes on are going to be really, really hurting. And those are the positions that are far more difficult to figure out on the fly as the season goes on. Kittles at three.

The difference for me, I mean, it's minor, but the injuries do factor in. I mean, he dealt with injuries two separate times last year. He also dealt with the knee injury the year before. I don't know if it's just the aggression with which he plays. It probably is. I mean, he has reminded me of Thomas Rawls out of the back field. He is just a very aggressive player with the ball in his hands. It's one of the things you love about him. It's what let him.

break the yardage record, but it's also something that has cost him starts in the last couple of seasons. So that's the difference between them for me, just a little bit of concern about re-injury. And I would say my little bit of concern is it was, George Kittle, I still think is the number one weapon for this team. But if you happen to have both wide receivers for San Francisco be healthy,