After back-to-back weeks as the No. 1 tight end in fantasy football (pending Monday’s results), Tucker Kraft has burst onto the scene as a top fantasy tight end, but can he continue to be a great play the rest of the season?
I was a little skeptical of Kraft after Week 4’s breakout thinking it was just because of the Packers in catch-up mode against the Vikings. As I dove in though, I saw that he was much more involved than I thought throughout the first three weeks of the season as well. Kraft had multiple catches every game of the year, even when the Pack was reining it in under Malik Willis.
Kraft’s breakout came when Jordan Love returned and found him for 53 yards and a touchdown against the Vikings. In that game, wide receiver Christian Watson went down with a high-ankle sprain and Romeo Doubs was suspended later in the week.
Without Watson and Doubs, Kraft played a larger role in the offense in Week 5, hauling in 4-of-5 targets for 88 yards and two touchdowns, including this memorable and impressive stiff-arm score.
Kraft finished as the top tight end for the second straight week with his big game against the Rams and was clearly one of the early options in many of Love’s reads.
Spinning it forward, can Kraft be a top-five option the rest of the season? To me, that seems to be a little bit of a stretch. I’d still put him behind Travis Kelce, Sam LaPorta, Trey McBride, George Kittle, Brock Bowers and Jake Ferguson. He’d be right there, though, after those options.
I would definitely rank him ahead of Kyle Pitts, Dalton Kincaid and Evan Engram at this point. Pitts had a good game last week with seven catches for 88 yards against the Bucs, but he was completely shut out in Week 4 against the Saints. While Kraft has pushed his way to the front of the line for targets in Green Bay, Pitts has fallen behind Darnell Mooney and Drake London. Ray-Ray McCloud is also regularly in the mix and has more big-play ability than Pitts has shown.
Pitts is still a starting TE in most leagues, but Kirk Cousins is finding other options to get involved, and I don’t think Pitts’ ceiling is quite as high as Kraft’s the rest of the way.
This week, I ranked Kraft as my No. 5 TE on the board against the Cardinals and Pitts as my No. 7 even though he has a juicy matchup against the Panthers. Unless major injuries happen in Atlanta or Kraft disappears from the Pack attack, I think Kraft will be ranked ahead of Pitts most weeks for the rest of the season.
In this week’s DFS contests, including the NFL $3M Fantasy Football Millionaire [$1M to 1st], Kraft has a $4,800 salary while Pitts checks in at $4,400. Based on their recent output, I’d pay the extra and roll with Kraft.
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