Tight End Target Hunt: Blake Jarwin is a Fantasy Value

I'm the guy who barges into complex fantasy football back and forths to remind everyone that—well, actually—opportunity is all the matters. People like me. I have many friends. More friends than you've ever seen. Bigly friends.

So naturally, this series is going to be about volume of opportunity that hasn't been incorporated into a player's average draft position. Over the next couple weeks, I'll write about late-round tight ends most likely to see the sort of opportunity that could translate to every-week usefulness in 10- and 12- team leagues.

The tight ends highlighted in this space will certainly prove valuable as streaming options in leagues where the waiver wire doesn't resemble grocery store shelves during a pandemic. But I'm writing about these tight ends because I think there's a fairly straightforward path to them becoming plug-and-play options for those who don't go all-in on Travis Kelce, George Kittle, or Mark Andrews.

I’m not quite sure why Blake Jarwin is eligible for this little series on late-round tight ends who could see solid volume in 2020, but he’s going in the 14th round of 12-team drafts, so he is. Who am I to argue with consensus?

Well, I’m going to take exception with the consensus on Jarwin because I’m paid to do so—and because Jarwin clearly profiles as the sort of late-round tight end who could (should) be a plug and play option for fantasy managers in 2020.

You may remember Jarwin as the guy who had a blowup game in the final week of the 2018 season only to take his place behind the statue of Jason Witten in 2019. (Witten must be the smartest, savviest guy to ever play the game; there’s no other explanation as to why he never lost his starting gig during his 30-year run with the Cowboys. Inept coaching couldn’t possibly be the reason).

Jarwin is expected to start for Dallas this season under Mike McCarthy 2.0, the analytics robot returned from the coaching grave to take over an offense that can, as the kids say, cook. The 6’5”, 260-pound third-year tight end will probably run a lot of pass routes in an offense run by Dak Prescott, who 4for4’s John Paulsen projects for the second-most passing yardage and the 10th-most passing touchdowns in 2020. We’re going to want Dak’s pass catchers on our various redraft squads.

Dak Prescott's Tight End Usage

Why Jarwin is being drafted after Eric Ebron and Jack Doyle is a mystery without any clues. In fact, I’m tilting just thinking about it.

But he is, so we must adjust. Let’s take a quick look at how Witten has been used in three seasons with Prescott at the helm.

After a return from the Monday Night Football booth, Witten got a solid 14.5% target share in one of the NFL’s most productive offenses. In fact—as you can see—his pass routes per game ticked up compared to his 2016 season with Prescott, when Witten saw nearly 20% of the team’s targets. Of course, this was in Jason Garrett’s offense—we can’t see this as anything resembling a guarantee that Jarwin will absorb this usage. But it’s clear that Prescott was comfortable checking it down to Witten at a consistent rate. Prescott in 2019 seemed keen on slinging it to the tight end spot, no matter who was on the receiving end, as Witten and Jarwin combined for a 21.5% target share last season.

With Garrett gone and Analytics Cyborg McCarthy in his place, I thought it’d be useful to examine how the former Green Bay head coach deployed another pass-catching tight end: Jermichael Finley.

Tight Ends Under Mike McCarthy

The senior citizens reading this will remember Finley as a key cog in the Packers’ offense before Aaron Rodgers was bad and the Packers’ offense sucked. He was a seam-busting tight end who humiliated linebackers and safeties in coverage. He created nightmares for opposing defenses. And best of all, he ran a good number of routes and saw a nice target share in McCarthy’s offense.

It’s not hard to see the upside here: Finley was used primarily as a pass-catcher in McCarthy’s prolific Green Bay offenses, running the number of routes we like to see and commanding good target shares year in and year out (his 2012 drop in target share can be at least partly explained by Rodgers’ injury that year).

McCarthy’s usage of the tight end in the passing game didn’t end when Finley went down to injury in 2009. Donald Lee, a journeyman tight end and waiver wire mainstay back in the old days, took in 9.8% of the team’s targets that season—meaning Filey and Lee combined for 23% of Rodgers’ targets.

Blake Jarwin's Breakout Potential

JJ Zachariason, my lovely Living The Stream cohost and Animal Crossing enthusiast, recently conducted a study revealing four keys to spotting a breakout tight end: he should be a guy entering his second or third year (Jarwin is going into his third season), he must be attached to a productive quarterback (see Dak Prescott’s projections), he should be athletic (Jarwin doesn’t quite check this box but has a 61st percentile speed score and a 70th percentile burst score), and shouldn’t be a player who comes out of nowhere (Jarwin has averaged 17.3 fantasy points in four games where he saw six or more targets, aided by his three-touchdown outing in Week 17 of the 2018 season).

Jarwin, as you can see, fits the breakout tight end process. Hardly anyone will satisfy all four qualities perfectly—Jarwin is no different. For the low, low price of a 14th round pick, you can have a tight end who, at the very worst, could benefit from a bunch of yards and touchdowns the Cowboys are set to score in 2020.

The Bottom Line

• Mike McCarthy has a history of using athletic tight ends in the passing game.
• Dak Prescott, who John Paulsen projects to have the second-most passing yards this season, has often targeted the tight end position.
• Jarwin checks almost every box for a breakout tight end.