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    Juwan Johnson Fantasy Projections: Should You Draft Johnson in Fantasy This Year?

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    Juwan Johnson had a nose for the end zone and was quite productive last season. Is he now worthy of being your fantasy team's TE1?

    New Orleans Saints tight end Juwan Johnson was one of last year’s nicest surprises. With the team fully committing to him as their starter, can he take another step forward this season? What is Johnson’s 2023 fantasy football projection?

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    Juwan Johnson’s 2023 Fantasy Projection

    The Saints signed Johnson as a UDFA in 2020. He barely played as a rookie, got a little more action as a sophomore, and fully developed into a starting tight end in this third season.

    Last year, Johnson averaged 8.4 PPR fantasy points per game, finishing as the TE8. But he was really a lot better than that.

    For the first six weeks, Johnson was not on the fantasy radar. He never scored higher than 8.1 fantasy points. He broke loose for 20.2 fantasy points in Week 7, which piqued the interest of fantasy managers, only to go right back to 3.4 in Week 8.

    It was in Week 9 that Johnson really established himself as an every-week starter. From Weeks 9-17, Johnson hit double-digits in five of seven games, including a stellar 22.7-point effort in Week 15.

    From Weeks 7-17, Johnson averaged 11.2 ppg. He was the overall TE7 over that span.

    Johnson commanded a very respectable 14.1% target share, but it only led to 65 total targets, as the Saints averaged the seventh-fewest pass attempts per game.

    Despite catching just 42 passes, Johnson scored a whopping seven touchdowns. He had a nose for the end zone. Although his touchdown total far exceeded his expected TD rate, it wasn’t flukey — he was deliberately targeted near the end zone.

    Johnson saw 11 red-zone targets, which was 12th at the position — pretty good for a guy running a route on a mere 70% of his team’s pass plays.

    While Taysom Hill still exists, Adam Trautman is gone, and the Saints gave Johnson a two-year, $12 million extension. He is their guy this season.

    Should You Draft Juwan Johnson This Year?

    It’s usually a bad idea to rely on unsustainable touchdown rates, but Johnson’s TD rate may very well be sustainable. That’s his game for fantasy — touchdowns. Pretty much every non-elite tight end is touchdown or bust. Johnson is not the only one with a seemingly outlier touchdown rate.

    The Saints should also be better offensively, upgrading from the duo of Jameis Winston and Andy Dalton to Derek Carr. And Johnson still has room for improvement in his route participation rate and total routes run.

    While I’ve mostly painted an optimistic picture of Johnson, he’s not without concerns. This offense projects to have several guys ahead of him in the target hierarchy. If everyone is healthy, he will be behind Chris Olave, Michael Thomas, and Alvin Kamara. He may even be behind Rashid Shaheed.

    There’s also the matter of the Saints signing Foster Moreau. While Moreau is not a threat to unseat Johnson for the starting role, he is going to see the field, which will take snaps away from Johnson, lowering Johnson’s ceiling.

    Johnson’s ADP sits at TE23, No. 186 overall. He goes late enough at the position where there’s no guarantee he gets taken in every draft. That means if you punt the position, you can feel reasonably confident Johnson will be there as a last resort in the final couple of rounds.

    I have Johnson ranked as my TE15, well ahead of consensus. If he’s the top remaining tight end on my board, and I still need one at the very end of my drafts, he is one of my preferred choices. But Johnson is still not someone fantasy managers need to necessarily plan to draft.

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