2013 Fantasy Football Rankings: Tight Ends (Kevin Hanson)
Updated: Tuesday, April 30th
Scoring: These rankings are based on standard scoring (one point per 10 rushing yards, six points per rushing touchdown plus one point per ten receiving yards and six points per receiving touchdown) and are for the 2013 season.
For our point-per-reception (PPR) tight end rankings, click here.
New Orleans Saints tight end Jimmy Graham. That's it.
That's the list of tight ends that finished ahead of Patriots tight end Rob Gronkowski in fantasy points this season even though Gronk missed five games.
One of the biggest mismatches at any position, Gronkowski is at his best in the redzone.
Gronkowski led all tight ends in receiving touchdowns (11) in 11 games played and he now has double-digit touchdowns in all three of his NFL seasons. He has a total of 39 touchdowns (38 receiving and one "rushing") in 43 career games.
Since he entered the NFL, no player has more receiving touchdowns than he has. Detroit wide receiver Calvin Johnson is second (33) and Dez Bryant is third (27).
Only three other tight ends have at least 20 scores during that span: Graham (25), San Diego's Antonio Gates (24) and Atlanta's Tony Gonzalez (21).
At this point, the biggest concern with Gronkowski is his health. It is possible that the arm he broke, and then broke again, could potentially keep him out of the lineup to start the season due to a lingering infection. Once he has surgery to have a new plate installed in his forearm, he will need 10 weeks of recovery time.
If you have to draft before more is known about his status, I would prefer Graham over Gronkowski. If both are expected to available for the start of the season, however, I'd still prefer Gronkowski over any other tight end.
Early in the season, Steelers quarterback Ben Roethlisberger stated several times that it was his goal to get tight end Heath Miller to the Pro Bowl.
He did. For the second time in his career, Miller was selected to the Pro Bowl.
Unfortunately Miller didn't get a chance to play in the game (then again, who watches it anyways?) as he suffered a knee injury to his ACL, MCL and PCL and underwent surgery at the end of 2012.
Miller finished the season with 71 receptions for 816 yards and eight touchdowns in 15 games.
Of course, the biggest question with Miller is: Will he ready for the start of the 2013 season?
Vernon Davis: A One-Game Wonder With Kaepernick
The Colin Kaepernick era started well for San Francisco tight end Vernon Davis. In Kaepernick's first start (Week 11), Davis had six catches for 83 yards and a score.
From there on out, however, Davis had a total of six receptions in the final six games of the regular season and had more than 15 receiving yards only once (27 yards in Week 16).
That said, Davis had another strong postseason.
In three games, he had 12 receptions for 254 yards and a touchdown with back-to-back 100-yard games in the NFC Championship Game and Super Bowl. Last year, he had 292 yards and four touchdowns in two playoff games.
With five career postseason games under his belt, he has 100-plus yards in four of them (or 80 percent of his playoff games). In 104 regular-season games, he has only eight 100-yard games (or less than eight percent).
Here are my fantasy tight end rankings for 2013 (standard scoring):
