Sorry I was talking more in a general sense. When I evaluate trades I can't/don't really account for an owner's tendencies and am typically just approaching it from a general standpoint. Similar to sometimes you see people overpaying for picks and mentioning that they tend to draft better than average, but I don't really account for that when offering my feelings on which side of the trade came out ahead.
If you feel you're able to consistently bat well above average on those mid/late round TE breakouts then more power to ya, and I appreciate you sharing your trio for this year because I picked Herndon and Howard over Andrews and Engram in most of my drafts last year
It's all good, I enjoy our civil discussions.
I'm not trying to come across as a TE guru. I probably failed in what I was trying to get across is I don't have a huge sleeper/breakout TE list this year or most years. Usually a few guys, fair to say most of the time it's second year TE's or TE's that were buried like Thomas. Gesicki had a solid year. A lot of people are high on Jonnu Smith. You won't hear me calling them breakout players and I actually own(ed) them. So just trying to point out when I label Ian Thomas as breakout TE I'm not just throwing a bunch of TE's up against the wall.
As for Ian Thomas he entered the league extremely raw. Two years of major college football and one of those years he caught a whopping 3 passes. If you recall Olsen went down in week one of his rookie year. He got thrust into the lineup but he did not do much, which is pretty understandable considering he's was a super raw rookie TE forced to start in week 2 of his career. Olsen went down again in week 13 early in the game and I just never got out of my head how impressive he did in that 5 game stretch, especially again considering he was a super raw rookie. For better or worse that's when Cam's shoulder was causing him issues and he could not throw deep so maybe had to rely on Ian more in short passing game but in TE premium scoring he went for 12.1, 21.2, 4.4, 16.8 and 22.6. Again that was pretty impressive to me, maybe a bit of confirmation bias on my part because I liked him coming into the league as parts of his game reminded me of Gates but that's great rookie TE production albeit for a 5 game stretch. Fast forward to this year Olsen is healthy and they seem to value Manhertz more as the blocking TE so he does nothing. Then Olsen goes down again and in the two games without Olsen he goes for 19.2 and 6.3.
He's had 9 games in his career without Olsen playing at all. 9 games is not much in general and his production as a whole in those 9 games was average but considering 6 of those games 9 games he was a rookie, and again a very raw one, his production was not bad. Actually better in FFPC scoring then Fant or Hockenson last year. This reeks of playing with stats to prove a point, which I'm not but just how I look at it but 3 of those 9 games with Olsen was his 2nd-5th games of his career when I'm sure he was lost AF. When he got a chance to start later in his rookie year he looked like a different player and again a sample size of 6 is pretty damn paltry but in the 6 starts he had since week 5 of his rookie year he's put up a solid 14+ PPG in FFPC scoring and again for better or worse those 6 starts where with injured shoulder Cam who could barely throw and Kyle Allen.
Who knows who the QB will be next year but does not seem like over long term it would not be worse then what he's played with. Who knows exactly what kind of system Brady will run but it looks to me like it's pretty TE friendly. His short time in the NFL he was with Saints who run one of friendliest TE systems in the league and Thad Moss went from 6 to 47 catches under Brady last year.
One other thing that really caught my attention this off-season. Eric Beinemy said when he interviewed for the HC job one of the things he discussed was his vision for certain players and how he planned to use them and he only mentioned 2-3 players when he said this and Ian Thomas was one of them.
Sorry to go long on Ian Thomas people, but just trying to point out I got specific reasons why I like him as a breakout candidate and not just throwing a bunch of TE's up against a wall hoping one sticks.
But no, I was not surprised by either of those names. They’re on my list, too.
