I won’t be drafting George Kittle this year. I don’t like the injury history, and I don’t like the potential for that passing game to slip a notch (or two) with Trey Lance at the controls. I will concede, however, that Kittle is a heck of a player.

Kittle is a ferocious blocker, embracing being a complete player. On the one hand, that’s cool. But at the same time, it might give him a better chance of staying healthy if he were involved in fewer collision. He misses time every year.

Kittle also does a better job of getting downfield than other tight ends. He’s consistently averaging 12-plus yards per catch, and he’s doing it despite also catching a high percentage of balls.

If you marry those stats together, Kittle has averaged at least 9 yards per target four years in a row. Since 2018, only 13 other tight ends with at least 50 targets have averaged 9 yards per target, and nobody else has done it more than twice.

AVERAGING 9 YARDS PER PASS PLAY (last 4 yrs)
YearPlayerTgtRecYdsTDYPT
2018Mark Andrews, Balt.5034552311.0
2021Dallas Goedert, Phil.7656830410.9
2019Jared Cook, N.O.6543705910.8
2018George Kittle, S.F.136881377510.1
2020George Kittle, S.F.6348634210.1
2020Robert Tonyan, G.B.5952586119.9
2019George Kittle, S.F.10785105359.8
2019Darren Waller, Oak.11790114539.8
2020Travis Kelce, K.C.1451051416119.8
2021George Kittle, S.F.947191069.7
2018Rob Gronkowski, N.E.724768239.5
2021Kyle Pitts, Atl.11068102619.3
2019Travis Kelce, K.C.13697122959.0
2018Evan Engram, NYG644557739.0
2021Rob Gronkowski, T.B.895580269.0
2018Chris Herndon, NYJ563950249.0
2021David Njoku, Cle.533647549.0

—Ian Allan