TE Breakout Candidates for 2025 🏈

Identifying and rostering the breakout tight ends in fantasy football is crucial in building a team with legitimate championship aspirations. Last season, players like Brock Bowers, Jonnu Smith, and Trey McBride found themselves on a vast majority of title-contending rosters.

With that in mind, here are four candidates Walter has identified as potential breakout candidates in 2025.

🏈 4 TEs with Fantasy Football BREAKOUT Potential

1. Brenton Strange (TE - Jaguars)

Brenton Strange is in a very intriguing spot in 2025. He is going to be essentially free in drafts, and the WalterPicks projections team has him projected to be the third option on an expected pass-heavy offense.

Strange's ADP right now is TE19, meaning he is going undrafted in a vast majority of redraft leagues. Given his potential opportunity and Walter's projected target share for him (14.0%), Strange is an excellent breakout candidate. Walter anticipates him being a very popular waiver wire add early in the season.

Walter's Rank: TE16
Walter's Projected Ceiling: TE6

2. Isaiah Likely (TE - Ravens)

Isaiah Likely has shown flashes throughout his career, and Walter projects him to have an excellent breakout opportunity this season. Mark Andrews is aging, and trade rumors about him ran rampant throughout the entire offseason. Likely is not only an important tight end handcuff, but he is also someone with a legitimate chance of becoming a fantasy star.

As of now, our projections have Likely with only a one percent less target share than Andrews, meaning Walter is anticipating a nearly even split in production. However, there's a major ADP discrepancy between the two tight ends. Andrews is currently going as TE8, while Likely is going as TE16. Given this gap, Likely is an excellent late-round pick or post-draft pickup. Dare I say Likely's breakout is... likely? (I’m sorry)

Walter's Rank: TE18
Walter's Projected Ceiling: TE6

3. Colston Loveland (TE - Bears)

Colston Loveland has all the physical tools to become an elite NFL tight end, and the only obstacle to his breakout is the number of mouths to feed in Chicago. Walter has him projected to have the third-highest target share on this offense, which would be more than enough for Loveland to emerge as a viable breakout candidate in Year 1.

He's currently going as TE13 but ranks as Walter's TE10, creating a nice value gap. In a competitive division, where Chicago will be forced to score lots of points in order to keep up, Loveland is going to have a massive weekly ceiling. That ceiling is a key ingredient in becoming a tight end breakout.

Walter's Rank: TE10
Walter's Projected Ceiling: TE4

4. Cade Otton (TE - Buccaneers)

Cade Otton was 12th in PPR fantasy points per game last season, and he quietly emerged as one of Baker Mayfield's favorite targets as the year progressed. Currently going as TE24 in drafts, Otton is being significantly undervalued.

From Weeks 3-10 last season, Otton recorded five or more receptions in six of those eight games. That volume at his current cost represents excellent value. With that workload and anticipated positive touchdown regression after scoring just four times in 2024, he offers both reliability and legitimate breakout potential.

Walter's Rank: TE21
Walter's Projected Ceiling: TE6

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