This year’s class of college football fantasy tight ends is very speculative, but there are several intriguing talents who bring a lot of upside to the table. Tyler Warren and Colston Loveland, among other mainstays, are in the NFL now so there has been a lot of turnover at this position overall.

I would highly recommend fading tight ends in drafts behind bellcow backs, dual-threat quarterbacks and #1 wide receivers, in that order. I have three reasons why.

One, college teams do not use tight ends like NFL teams do–it’s a totally different game that way. Two, because of that trend, tight ends are not nearly as explosive or consistent as those other positions. Finally, you’re going to be able to wait and wait and wait and still get my pick for TE1 of CFF in the later rounds of your draft. You’re welcome.

1. Jack Endries, Texas: I realize this is a radical ranking based on what others are doing, but y’all know by now I am a fantasy rebel, unafraid to deviate from the herd mentality. I want anything and everything that is attached to Arch Manning, who is going to absolutely take over CFB this season. Texas is going to be unstoppable. Endries was a star tight end for Cal the last two seasons, peaking with a line of 50-623-2 as a sophomore last year. If Endries, who is obviously capable, can just duplicate what now-NFLer Gunnar Helm did last season (60-786-7), he’s the TE1 in CFF. I am betting on that to be the case with Arch, who is a large step up from Quinn Ewers.

2. Eli Stowers, Vanderbilt: Stowers has taken an interesting career path to get to his fifth college season as the TE2 in CFF. He started out at Texas A&M as a tight end, then switched to quarterback, then transferred to New Mexico State, where he was a productive do-everything player. Last year, he was a tight end for Vandy and posted a line of 49-638-5 in 13 games. Dynamic QB Diego Pavia is back so there is only upside here as Stowers makes his final case for the NFL Draft.

3. Kenyon Sadiq, Oregon: Sadiq, who has been described as an “athletic freak”, enters his third year at Oregon and first as the starter after Terrance Ferguson graduated to the NFL. Ferguson racked up a line of 43-591-3 last season, while Sadiq had 24-308-2 as his understudy. The upside here is obvious, but it needs to be mitigated a bit by the fact that last year’s QB Dillon Gabriel has been replaced by the talented but unproven Dante Moore. Sometimes QB changes go well, sometimes they do not. That said, Sadiq killed it in the Spring Game as the TE1, so we are heading in the right direction.

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