Travis Kelce Fantasy Football Outlook 2022 (Time to Reclaim TE1 Status)

For the first time since 2016, a tight end not named Travis Kelce finished as the TE1 in fantasy football last season across PPR formats. That honor was instead given to Mark Andrews, but Kelce didn't finish far behind, some 35 points in one fewer game played.

Kelce should have no issues reclaiming his throne as TE1 this season, especially given the loss of Tyreek Hill on the Chiefs' pass-catching corps. His average draft position (ADP) has him going either 14th or 15th overall, and he's a borderline Round 1 talent in every single league.

Travis Kelce Fantasy Football Outlook

When looking at Kelce's stats, it's better to view him as a wide receiver than amongst the tight ends. Although Andrews enjoyed a breakout campaign, no other tight end came close to replicating their numbers. Dalton Schultz finished third amongst the position with 77 receptions, a full 15 behind Kelce. Kyle Pitts finished third with 1,026 yards, a full 100 yards fewer than Kelce.

Amongst all pass-catchers, Kelce finished 14th in receiving yards, 13th in receptions, T-9th in touchdowns. That's all while missing a game with COVID.

The most exciting part of Kelce's 2022 outlook is the loss of Hill. Hill turned into Patrick Mahomes' favorite target last year (he played in all 17 games), racking up 111 receptions on 159 targets for 1,239 yards. That's a lot of production up for grabs. Newcomers JuJu Smith-Schuster and Marquez Valdes-Scantling will hope to bridge the gap, but it's hard to replicate the All-Pro talents in your first season of a new offense.

Don't be surprised when Mahomes uses Kelce as his No. 1 target again in 2022. He led the team in targets every yard from 2016-20.

Travis Kelce Projections

Projections from the NFL odds on FanDuel Sportsbook are also nice and high on Kelce. He's seventh to lead the NFL in receiving, and T-5th to lead the league in receptions. Considering he's averaged 8.5 targets per game since 2016, he'll be on pace to average 145.1 targets. At last year's pace of a 68.7% catch rate and 12.2 yards per reception, 145 targets projects him to get about 100 receptions and 1,220 receiving yards.

Is Travis Kelce a Good Fantasy Football Pick?

So with all said and done, is Kelce a good fantasy pick? Absolutely. He's the best tight end in football, and ranks No. 1 in The Duel's PPR fantasy football rankings.

It's merely a question of if you should take him in the first 12 picks of your fantasy draft. Only eight wide receivers finished with more PPR points last year, and three back in 2020.

Oh, and if you drafted Kelce with your first-round pick then you might want to check out the best Travis Kelce fantasy football team names for your squad, or Kansas City Chiefs themed names as well.

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Adam Taylor McKillop is not a FanDuel employee. In addition to providing DFS gameplay advice, Adam Taylor also participates in DFS contests on FanDuel using his personal account, username atmckillop. While the strategies and player selections recommended in his articles are his personal views, he may deploy different strategies and player selections when entering contests with his personal account. The views expressed in their articles are the author's alone and do not necessarily reflect the views of FanDuel.