Where does Kyle Pitts rank among recent draft busts?

[PossibleCabbage]

Ranking "who is the biggest draft bust" is weird since we get a bunch of guys who get picked in the first round and don't even play out their rookie deal, whereas Pitts is at least a usable NFL player who will get a second contract.

The fault is just in the team that spends a first round pick on a tight end, this just rarely works out the way the team drafting imagines it will.

[NYRaider]

On 9/17/2024 at 11:17 AM, CP3MVP said:

“Best tight end prospect ever”

“generational talent”

 

Hes  done nothing in 4 years 

He had one of the most productive rookie seasons in NFL history. Got hurt in his second year and clearly wasn't 100% in his third year. Also tough to ball out with Mariota/Ridder in terrible passing offenses.

[naptownskinsfan]

On 9/23/2024 at 3:23 PM, PossibleCabbage said:

Ranking "who is the biggest draft bust" is weird since we get a bunch of guys who get picked in the first round and don't even play out their rookie deal, whereas Pitts is at least a usable NFL player who will get a second contract.

The fault is just in the team that spends a first round pick on a tight end, this just rarely works out the way the team drafting imagines it will.

It’s the fact that it’s #4 overall.  If they drafted him in the middle to the end of the first round, I don’t think anyone is that concerned about calling him a draft bust.  Positioning, and yes, hype, has a lot to do with it.  He’s been a very productive player who will absolutely get a second contract.

[PossibleCabbage]

4 hours ago, naptownskinsfan said:

It’s the fact that it’s #4 overall.  If they drafted him in the middle to the end of the first round, I don’t think anyone is that concerned about calling him a draft bust.  Positioning, and yes, hype, has a lot to do with it.  He’s been a very productive player who will absolutely get a second contract.

It's just weird to me that Pitts is seen by some as a bigger bust than like "Trey Lance" or "Zach Wilson" when he has contributed significantly more to "winning football" than the QBs drafted immediately before him.  Like sure the upside of a top 5 pick on a QB is a lot higher than the upside of a top 5 pick on a TE, but people take bad QBs high all the time and we don't beat ourselves up about it.  I think the Pitts issue is a lesser version of "you take an OT high and he turns out to be a pretty decent guard".

You don't really want to get into the opportunity cost game when looking back a la "we could have had X instead of Y" since you can do that all the way down the draft and it doesn't really help you avoid making mistakes in the future.  Like Pitts, the prospect, was the answer to "what would a TE worthy of a top 5 pick look like" and it turns out that you still don't want to be the team doing that.

[Mr Bad Example]

4 hours ago, naptownskinsfan said:

It’s the fact that it’s #4 overall.  If they drafted him in the middle to the end of the first round, I don’t think anyone is that concerned about calling him a draft bust.  Positioning, and yes, hype, has a lot to do with it.  He’s been a very productive player who will absolutely get a second contract.

Barring injury, Pitts will play in the league for a decade. 

[HoboRocket]

On 9/23/2024 at 2:23 PM, PossibleCabbage said:

Ranking "who is the biggest draft bust" is weird since we get a bunch of guys who get picked in the first round and don't even play out their rookie deal, whereas Pitts is at least a usable NFL player who will get a second contract.

The fault is just in the team that spends a first round pick on a tight end, this just rarely works out the way the team drafting imagines it will.

TEs drafted in the top 50 over the last 10 years:

• Devin Funchess (2015 2.41) [converted to WR in the NFL]

• Hunter Henry (2016 2.35)

• OJ Howard (2017 1.19)

• Evan Engram (2017 1.23)

• David Njoku (2017 1.29)

• Gerald Everett (2017 2.44)

• Adam Shaheen (2017 2.45)

• Hayden Hurst (2018 1.25)

• Mike Gesicki (2018 2.42)

• Dallas Goedert (2018 2.49)

• TJ Hockenson (2019 1.9)

• Noah Fant (2019 1.20)

• Irv Smith Jr (2019 2.50)

• Cole Kmet (2020 2.42)

• Kyle Pitts (2021 1.4)

• Dalton Kincaid (2023 1.25)

• Sam LaPorta (2023 2.34)

• Michael Mayer (2023 2.35)

• Luke Musgrave (2023 2.42)

• Brock Bowers (2024 1.13)

 

There have been exactly 20 TEs drafted with a top 50 pick in the last 10 years - an average of 2 a year. Out of those players, Evan Engram is the only one to have reached even 4,000 career receiving yards. Hunter Henry PROBABLY does it this week, becoming just the second tight end drafted with a top 50 pick in the last decade to hit 4,000. Dallas Goedert is likely a few games away as well. 

 

It's not likely that anyone else hits that milestone this season. Kyle Pitts has been better than a lot of tight ends on that list, but he hasn't even hit a 40 yards per game average since his rookie season. I DO think he's a lot better than his numbers, but drafting tight ends high is not typically a winning strategy, as can be seem with the list above. 

 

I mean, Engram has probably been the best kd the bunch and was seen as a bust in New York considering that he was advertised as a #1 receiving threat and dealt with injuries and ineffectiveness for the most part, aside from his rookie year. 

 

Pitts probably DOES have a top-3 to 5 best season of the bunch, but yeah, for someone who you have to protect as a blocker and drafted #4 overall, I think it's fair to say he's been a huge disappointment. 

[naptownskinsfan]

2 hours ago, PossibleCabbage said:

It's just weird to me that Pitts is seen by some as a bigger bust than like "Trey Lance" or "Zach Wilson" when he has contributed significantly more to "winning football" than the QBs drafted immediately before him.  Like sure the upside of a top 5 pick on a QB is a lot higher than the upside of a top 5 pick on a TE, but people take bad QBs high all the time and we don't beat ourselves up about it.  I think the Pitts issue is a lesser version of "you take an OT high and he turns out to be a pretty decent guard".

You don't really want to get into the opportunity cost game when looking back a la "we could have had X instead of Y" since you can do that all the way down the draft and it doesn't really help you avoid making mistakes in the future.  Like Pitts, the prospect, was the answer to "what would a TE worthy of a top 5 pick look like" and it turns out that you still don't want to be the team doing that.

I mean, I know that there wasn’t the blowback on Brandon Scherff with the Commanders as the OT turned guard, partially because the team had Trent Williams and Morgan Moses plugged in during his rookie season, but that’s also been considered a very ‘meh’ draft, especially for the original teams who drafted those players.  

But yeah, I definitely can’t get behind him being a worst bust than Wilson.  Lance……he hasn’t been given the chance, and at this point, I think it just is that his tools aren’t going to translate because someone would’ve given him that chance by now and given what the 49ers gave up for him, it’s a colossal disappointment and a bust for them.  

[PossibleCabbage]

4 hours ago, Mr Bad Example said:

Barring injury, Pitts will play in the league for a decade. 

I think "grab the 1st round TE after the team that drafted him gave up on him" is not a bad strategy in general.  Since the TE will almost never give the team that drafted him more than a premium position player who hit, but if that guy goes in the first round he is still "very good at football."  It might be a better strategy to sign non-premiums in free agency than to draft them in the first round, just in general. Like we saw this with RBs in this free agency year, Saquon for what the Eagles are paying him is a much better deal than "spending a top 5 pick on him."