Key to the table below:

0-4% - This column represents the percentage of games in which a receiver/tight end received no more than four targets.

0-4 - This column represents the actual number of games in which a receiver/tight end received no more than four targets.

Note: You may sort the table by clicking on the column headers.

I did not set a games played or target-average limit at wide receiver or tight end as I wanted to focus more on relevant players for the 2012 season as opposed to include 25-50 more players that may have little to no impact . Players in the next two tables with “****” after their names in the next two tables will be receivers/tight ends who failed to average five targets per game last season.

With his record-breaking season in 2011, it’d be foolish of me to not discuss Gronkowski first. As incredible as he was last season, he wasn’t a consistent high-volume target when compared to some of the other top tight ends. Four tight ends had a higher percentage of eight-plus targets last season – including teammate Aaron Hernandez – and two others tied Gronkowski at 43.8%. Unlike their receiver brethren, though, an elite level of targets (percentage-wise) did a relatively good job at identifying a fantasy TE1 as the nine tight ends that saw eight-plus targets in 37.5% of their games or more secured a top 12 finish in fantasy. Once again, it isn’t hard to figure out why the other three – Antonio Gates (missed three games and struggled with injuries all season long), Jermichael Finley (had an uncharacteristically high drop rate) and Brent Celek (didn’t emerge as a consistent option in the passing game until about halfway through the season) – were not able to collect a higher percentage of eight-plus target games.

There are many in the fantasy community who dubbed 2011 “the year of the tight end”. You will get no argument here: 20 tight ends saw at least five targets in a game half of the time in 2011. Of that group, only Dallas Clark finished outside the top 20 fantasy tight ends! Not surprisingly, he played only 11 games. Obviously, if Clark failed to crack the top 20, it means another player that lacked a lot of opportunities did and that player was Heath Miller, who finished 19th despite seeing four targets or less in 56.3% of his games last year. Another tight end who was on the outside looking in was Scott Chandler, who finished 21st. Miller benefited from a career-high 12.4 YPC while Chandler’s TD rate was 15.79%, almost double the rate of the top 50 fantasy tight ends (8.83%).

Some more notable percentages to point out as we close this week: Vernon Davis’ 37.5% in the 0-4% column and Jimmy Graham’s otherworldly 81.3% in the 8+% column. I believe we can chalk up Davis’ rather high low-target percentage number to the fact that it took a while for the Niners to get adjusted to the new offense that HC Jim Harbaugh and OC Greg Roman installed last summer following the lockout. Consider how impressive Davis was from Week 15 on and it isn’t a stretch to say he could rival Gronkowski and Graham this season. As for Graham, his aforementioned percentage tied that of Fitzgerald, Roddy White and Wes Welker. In the entire NFL last season, only Fitzgerald and Graham did not register a single game with fewer than seven targets, which probably goes a long way in explaining why I like Graham a bit more long-term in PPR leagues than Gronkowski (although I’d be thrilled with either player).

Fantasy impact: While 2011 was the latest “year of the tight end”, obviously not every team has a weapon like Graham or Gronkowski. Since there are still relatively few “big-play” tight ends, more opportunities will generally mean more production when so many similarly-talented players are fighting for fantasy relevancy at the position. Even though I often warn about jumping to a conclusion based on a small sample size, I’m reasonably certain this trend isn’t going away anytime soon at tight end as the draft is unlikely to produce more than 2-3 Graham-like tight end prospects over the next five years with the S-S-W (size-speed-weight) dimensions necessary to become instant matchup nightmares. And even if that somehow happens, the odds of them landing in a high-octane passing offense led by an elite quarterback are equally slim. Unfortunately, I can’t give you a foolproof rule of using an elite QB to find your potentially elite fantasy TE, but I will say that is a good start.

Quarterbacks

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