Atlanta Falcons TE Kyle Pitts has spent the past two seasons disappointing fantasy football managers. Now, he finds himself in the best situation of his career. Is this the year Pitts finally pays off? Is he worth targeting in Best Ball drafts?
Kyle Pitts’ 2024 Fantasy Outlook
It feels so long ago that Pitts quietly put together one of the greatest rookie TE seasons of all time. In 2021, Pitts caught 68 passes for 1,026 yards. His 10.4 fantasy points per game were wholly unimpressive, but that was solely due to his anomalously low one touchdown. Yes, Pitts caught just one touchdown … despite totaling over 1,000 yards.
Naturally, Pitts was expected to ascend further in 2022. Instead, he was completely unusable in fantasy, averaging 7.6 fantasy points per game. Last year wasn’t much better, with Pitts averaging a paltry 8.1 fantasy points per game. Yet, here we are again, projecting Pitts to have that breakout fantasy season.
Rare Kyle Pitts TD 😳#DirtyBirds | #NFL pic.twitter.com/YQ1j4p4F6G
— Pro Football Network (@PFN365) December 10, 2023
There are some pretty significant changes this time, though. For starters, it’s hard to truly quantify the degree of upgrade it is going from Desmond Ridder/Taylor Heinicke to Kirk Cousins. That, alone, would be enough to be a little excited about Pitts.
Second, we have the coaching change. Arthur Smith’s Falcons ran the ball 51% of the time in a neutral game script last season. Somehow, they even ran the ball 42% of the time in a negative game script. Smith didn’t really care about the score — the Falcons were going to run the ball no matter what. Shockingly, it didn’t work.
Replacing Smith as head coach is Raheem Morris. But more important is the offensive coordinator, Zac Robinson, who comes from the Sean McVay coaching tree. Robinson is likely to funnel this offense through his top playmakers, meaning Drake London, Bijan Robinson, and Pitts are seeing the overwhelming majority of touches. That’s another check in Pitts’ favor.
Finally, there’s the issue of Pitts’ talent. There’s no denying Pitts did not look like a quality NFL tight end last season. There’s also no denying he looked like a future elite tight end as a rookie. So, what happened? How did Pitts suddenly become bad at football? Well, I don’t think he did.
Pitts’ 2022 season ended prematurely due to a knee injury. After the 2023 season, reports surfaced that Pitts hadn’t fully recovered by the time the season started. After watching Pitts play in 2023, that’s a far better explanation for his poor route running and lack of explosiveness than a 23-year-old mega talent suddenly forgetting how to play football. That’s one more check in Pitts’ favor for 2024.
Should You Draft Pitts in 2024 Best Ball Leagues?
Unsurprisingly, Pitts is not exactly being priced based on the guy he’s been the past two years. Going as the overall TE5, serious progression is baked into his price.
I completely buy Pitts having the best season of his career this year. However, for Pitts to be worth his cost in fantasy drafts, he needs to provide fantasy managers with a sizable edge over the guys going behind him.
Unfortunately, I am not fully on board with Pitts as a clearly superior option to guys like Evan Engram, David Njoku, or even Brock Bowers (landing spot pending).
There’s nothing wrong with taking Pitts at cost. Plus, he’s very stackable with not just Cousins but London as well. You can create a pretty Falcons-heavy roster and benefit greatly if they have a great year. From that perspective, Pitts is fine to take. But overall, I am probably passing on Pitts in favor of the other, cheaper guys I mentioned.
KEEP READING: Best Ball Fantasy TE Rankings 2024