Bust TE Candidates for Fantasy Football in 2023

Tyler Loechner

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We’re running through our 2023 fantasy sleepers and busts series with a look at 2023 WR busts. Check out more in the series here:

Looking for a tight end to avoid in the earlier rounds? Here are four potential bust candidates for the 2023 fantasy season.

Note: These four TEs are currently being drafted inside the top 12 at their position. It wouldn’t be fair to call a late-round TE pick a bust candidate, as that’s obvious to begin with.

2023 Fantasy Football TE Bust Candidates

Darren Waller, New York Giants

Darren Waller has missed 13 games over the last two seasons and now finds himself in a new home with the New York Giants. He hasn’t been game-breaking since 2020, and he’s only been a high-level fantasy TE in two of his seven years in the league.

Currently the TE7, Waller fortunately does not cost a premium pick anymore, but he’s in this no-man’s land between the “good” and the “rest.” I think he’s much closer to the “rest.”

Many people say the Giants WR/TE room is wide open for targets, but I’m not convinced it is. Saquon Barkley, Isaiah Hodgins, Darius Slayton, Sterling Shepard and Wan’Dale Robinson all return, as does fellow TE Daniel Bellinger. The team also added Parris Campbell and drafted rookie WR Jalin Hyatt. None of those players is elite by any stretch, and it’s not unreasonable to think Waller will be among the team leaders in targets, but it’s quite a deep cast.

Dalton Kincaid, Buffalo Bills

The rookie first-round pick for the Bills in 2023 is already being drafted as a tail-end TE1. Part of it makes sense — the team no longer has Jamison Crowder, Cole Beasley or Isaiah McKenzie — but they do have Khalil Shakir to fill that slot WR role.

Oh yeah, and incumbent starting TE Dawson Knox.

Knox finished as the PPR TE11 and TE14 in 2021 and 2022, respectively, and now we expect the new TE to put up the same numbers … while Knox is still there? Something isn’t adding up.

Dalton Kincaid is a talented player, and this is a legitimately good landing spot. But unless Knox is traded — or Kincaid completely keeps Knox off the field — I just don’t see how this ADP pays off.

Mark Andrews, Baltimore Ravens

It’s not that Mark Andrews will be a fantasy bust in a literal sense, but that there’s a good chance he doesn’t pay off his TE2 price-tag in 2023.

Pressing “draft” on his name at the moment is a little bit unnerving. The good news is that Baltimore brought back Lamar Jackson and appears to be going much more pass-happy by hiring Todd Monken as their new offensive coordinator. The bad news (for Andrews) is that he’s no longer the only show in town.

Rashod Bateman returns in 2023. The Ravens spent a first-round pick on Zay Flowers. They also added Odell Beckham. It may not be elite, but that’s a lot better than the “Mark Andrews, Devin Duvernay and Carl Your Neighbor” corps the Ravens have rolled with the last few years.

To be clear, Andrews will be a fine fantasy player in 2023. But he’s being drafted as if he’s still the only target hog in Baltimore. He’s not.

Kyle Pitts, Atlanta Falcons

You can’t write this article and not include Kyle Pitts. I didn’t want to include him, because I think he’s simultaneously a breakout candidate and a bust candidate, but he’s still being drafted in the top five among TEs. For a TE that has produced only two weekly finishes within the top five dating back to Week 8 of 2021, you can’t feel great about clicking his name right now.

That 1,000-yard rookie season didn’t not happen, and the talent is abundantly obvious, but the three career TDs and flop of a 2022 season still taste sour. There’s very little about his injury-shortened 2022 season to write home about: He had two (of 10) games as a top-12 fantasy TE, but six games with fewer than five PPR points. That’s … bad.

The funny thing is that I actually don’t hate Pitts at his current ADP (because I’m a sucker for athletic talent). It’s much easier to afford him than it was last year. But if we’re talking bust candidates, Pitts just has to be mentioned, because he showed just last year that he can be a colossal fantasy bust.