Trey McBride, George Kittle, and Three Tight Ends Not Named Brock Bowers to Target

Unless someone is being a contrarian for the sake of being a contrarian, Brock Bowers is at the top of everyone’s fantasy tight end rankings.

But where do you look once Bowers is gone? Do you attack the position early? Do you wait to target a late-round sleeper?

Both strategies can work out great – and you can do both if you thread the needle right. But Shawn Childs already made a great case for a late-round sleeper, so let’s focus on the best non-Brock Bowers tight ends to target earlier in our 2025 fantasy football drafts (and maybe I’ll throw a little curveball at the end to see if you can hit it).

TE Trey McBride, Arizona Cardinals

One could make the case for McBride as TE1 without breaking into a maniacal laugh, so this is the easy write up. McBride only caught two touchdowns last year (did someone say upside?), but he also caught 111 balls for 1,146 receiving yards on his way toward finishing at TE2. He won’t see much competition for targets on the Cardinals besides Marvin Harrison Jr in 2025, so there’s really no one new to worry about this year as compared to last year. Barring anything bad happening, McBride is the no-brainer TE2 and has a tiny bit of TE1 upside.

TE George Kittle, San Francisco 49ers

Everyone’s favorite tight end is coming off arguably his best season in six years, so he’s obviously showing no signs of slowing down at 31 years old. There honestly aren’t that many bad things to say about the veteran as he’ll likely see more targets this year with the 49ers lack of receiving depth. If you take away the fact that Kittle will turn 32 in October, there would probably be more people talking about him as TE1. However, the age factor has to put Kittle below Bowers and McBride if we use that as a tiebreaker among the Big Three.

TE Sam LaPorta, Detroit Lions

LaPorta didn’t put up the sophomore year that everyone was expecting, but he still put up 60 receptions for 724 receiving yards and seven touchdowns. While he may not ever see the usage he saw his rookie year (his targets dropped from 120 in 2023 to 83 in 2024), LaPorta is still the third option in the Lions offense behind Amon-Ra St. Brown and Jameson Williams so I’m more than happy coming out of my drafts with him as the TE4.

TE Travis Kelce, Kansas City Chiefs

Getting into wedding shape will either put Kelce on track for a career year or it will distract him so much that he puts up career lows. And there’s no in between. Kidding…I think. Bad jokes aside, Kelce had good reception and target numbers last season but saw his yardage and touchdown totals shrink for the second straight year. And most worrisome, Kelce’s yards per catch dipped below 10 (to 8.5) for the first time in a decade. While I think Kelce might be close-to-cooked at 35 years old, I also think he will see enough targets with Rashee Rice suspended for six games to play his way into a top-5 fantasy tight end finish.

TE Tyler Warren, Indianapolis Colts

Only like 20 percent of me thinks Warren will finish as TE6 behind Bowers and the list above, but it’s a fun 20 percent! While someone like T.J. Hockenson or Mark Andrews probably belong here, I’m going to go with the rookie out of Penn State stepping into the TE1 spot for the Colts and absolutely eating with Daniel Jones throwing him outlet passes for 17 weeks. The Colts have a lot of decent receivers, but none of them command the ball enough to box Warren out of the picture. There’s a very realistic chance he’ll see 100-plus targets this year, and if he does, there’s also a very realistic chance he’ll finish somewhere in the TE5–8 range.