I just checked my past blogs and did not do one for the TE’s in either 2021 or 2022 so I just have two year’s research on how many of the top true frosh TE’s played.
This is one list which I expect the number of true Frosh TE’s to climb this year and in future years. With most teams now using that third LB spot or SLB and turning it into a NB or a safety defenses are getting smaller and speedier at this spot and have the personnel for that type of defense. If I was a head coach, I would use more two TE and three TE sets to give my offense a size advantage to exploit that. Some recent successful teams have done that. Remember Stanford when they were successful under David Shaw? They would line up 3 TE’s and punish teams. They got away from that style in recent years and their record dropped. Georgia used 12 personnel (1 RB, 2 TE) and have won back-to-back national titles.
There are some coaches who I talked to that wanted to run a two TE offense but did not even have a TE on the roster when they took over. I would think all of the above will contribute to more and more true frosh TE’s playing early.
Here are the top 50 TE’s from 2022 and how many played and their stats.
Eight True Frosh TE’s earned a start in 2022 and 18 true frosh TE’s had a reception last year. Mason Taylor of LSU led with 38 grabs and 414 yards and started all 14 games, but he was the only full time starter. RJ Maryland of SMU had 28 receptions and 296 yards in 6 starts and 13 games. Colston Loveland of Michigan had 235 yards on 16 receptions. Jaleel Skinner of Miami had 129 yards. Oscar Delp earned time as a #3 TE on a national champ.
Last year the true Frosh TE’s had a much bigger impact than the true frosh WR’s. Remember most teams play “11” personnel which is one RB, one TE and three WR’s. With 3 WR’s on the field for every TE you may be surprised that last year the top 50 TE’s had 2159 yards which was very close to the output of the top 50 WR’s (3248).
In the magazine I had already projected Luke Hasz (PS#6) of Arkansas as a starter so I called for the group to to top 2000 yards.
Benjamin Brahmer of Iowa State led the way with 352 yards topping Duce Robinson of USC by 1 yard. Luke Hasz of Arkansas probably would have led the way but was out for the season after six starts and 253 (15.8).
In 2022 the top 50 true frosh TE’s had 150 receptions, 1657 yards, 11.0 and 16 td’s
In 2023 the top 50 true frosh TE’s had 163 receptions, 2159 yards, 13.2 and 18 td’s.
Now here is this year’s Top 50 True Frosh TE’s.
Last year the top 50 true Frosh TE’s had 66.5% of the receiving yards that the top 50 true frosh WR’s had despite only 1 TD playing for every 3 WR’s on the field (33%). This year I will call for that number to drop to more of an expected level, say 40% but the WR’s will have much more production.
This year’s Phil Steele College Football Preview is 352 pages and we went to the press later than usual on June 7th so we were able to capture all the transfer portal moves (transfer portal closed April 30). It has the most up to date rosters, three to four times the amount of information of any other College Football Preview. Don’t waste your gas driving around looking for the magazine, it is EXCLUSIVELY at Barnes and Nobles and Books-a-Million this year. You can also order online at philsteele.com and when you order on line you get the hard copy but also the digital copy for FREE and the digital copy is updated thru September. Check back every day for a new blog right here
