Let's rank the ten best tight ends ever
Let's rank the ten best tight ends ever
Who's No. 1? We don't do power rankings at Go Long... unless it's "National Tight Ends Day." Rob Gronkowski, Tony Gonzalez, John Mackey are all put into historical context right here.
Power rankings are for the birds. Lists mostly stink. But I’ll be damned if we let “National Tight Ends Day” pass us by without supplying the definitive, cold-hard, full-proof All-Time Tight End Top 10 at Go Long.
We must make an exception. Let’s all embrace debate.
It can feel impossible to compare eras. Back in the 60s, the NFL’s rulebook was thin as a brochure. That made for the toughest of tough men on the gridiron. Then again, it’s comical to compare the physical stature of players then vs. those today. We’ll give it a whirl here because that’s also part of the fun. We’re not even talking about tight ends without the emergence of Mike Ditka and John Mackey, and the players today have elevated this glorious position into a new stratosphere to save the game itself and teach us countless life lessons.
A huge thank you to everyone adding The Blood and Guts: How Tight Ends Save Football to your library. Hardcover, Kindle and Audiobook options are all available.
The hope is for this to appeal to your inner football soul.
Everything we love about the sport lives through the tight end.
OK, with a deep breath, here are the 10 greatest in league history…
10. George Kittle: I certainly understand any and all outcry for Jason Witten, Dave Casper and Travis Kelce. Loved this line from ex-Raiders great Lester Hayes in B & G: “You know what I believe? Travis Kelce is Dave's son! He made that boy! Check to see if Travis Kelce's mama dated Dave.” The similarities in their games are spooky. Witten, meanwhile, was numbingly productive his entire career. And I sure hope people realize just how special Jimmy Graham was (and could’ve been) reading the book. Jahri Evans and Gregg Williams both believe that if Graham sticks with Drew Brees his entire career, he would’ve been the greatest tight end ever.
But we’re going with Kittle, the San Francisco 49ers’ tatted battering ram, at No. 10. Kittle is the best of this era. An era featuring the biggest, strongest, fastest athletes across the board. Ever. The fact that he can move human beings against their will in 2022 is noteworthy and why Kittle is as close to Gronkowski as we’ve seen and — most likely — will see for years. Kittle obviously does damage as a receiver. His 1,377 receiving yards in ’18 rank second all-time and he’s been able to put up strong numbers despite average quarterback play his entire career. Nobody so closely resembles Mike Ditka in the open field. And nobody possesses his blocking ability. We dig into the origins of this with a full breakdown of Kittle’s first-ever pancake at Iowa. The first time Kittle flattened a defensive end on his ass, he wanted more. Needed more. And he became a weapon in the 49ers’ ground game. The next time you think Kittle might’ve had an average four-catch, 44-yard day at the office, take a gander at the team’s rushing total. There’s a good chance he was spearheading that 250-yard day on the ground because, within Kyle Shanahan’s scheme, Kittle is a threat to tee off on all 11 defensive players.
The cherry on top? In pass protection, he’s also often dealing with the most fearsome pass rushers of any era. These are ripped 255-pound specimens that run in the 4.5’s. When he retires, Kittle will be even higher on this list.
9. John Mackey: He made opponents look foolish. Mackey was absolutely “Superman,” as friend and teammate Bill Curry described. Six of his nine touchdowns in 1966 went for 50 yards or more, which shows just how unfair the Baltimore Colt was to tackle in the open field. Barreling through tacklers like a bowling ball, he was a man amongst boys. Anyone writing Mackey off as a dinosaur should replay his 64-yard masterpiece vs. the Detroit Lions. A play that Curry described as “physically impossible.” There was a mystique to the man leading those mighty Baltimore Colts teams.
When he spoke, teammates listened. They just might’ve snuck cicadas into his practice pants once.
8. Antonio Gates: The story of how Gates even got his NFL shot is wild. It took the belief of a man named Tim Brewster. A tight end coach who… OK, OK… mayyy have fibbed to the San Diego Chargers’ front office about Gates’ 40 time. Even after an impressive first training camp, Gates was nearly cut loose by Marty Schottenheimer. The head coach thought the Chargers would be able to slip him through waivers, right to the practice squad. Thankfully, Schottenheimer was talked out of this mistake— Gates had shown too much on his preseason film. The result? A mere 955 receptions for 11,841 yards with 116 touchdowns, the most for any tight end in NFL history. Gates and Tony Gonzalez forced the NFL to open up its mind.
7. Jackie Smith: The St. Louis Cardinals had their share of badasses through the 70s. Right guard Conrad Dobler was infamously named the league’s “dirtiest player” by Sports Illustrated. Left guard Bob Young competed in the World’s Strongest Man Competition. But take it from longtime Cardinal Tim Kearney: The one player nobody messed with was Jackie Smith. Not only was Smith the first tight end to truly make plays downfield — his yards per catch (16.5) remains No. 1 all-time amongst tight ends — his downright toughness gets lost in history. From knocking players’ teeth out to sprinting out onto the field in street clothes to defend Terry Metcalf, you’ll enjoy the untold Smith stories. This is a tight end who was always more than those 5.5 seconds in a Super Bowl. Hopefully “Blood and Guts” helps shed a worthy light on a Hall of Famer nobody knows anything about.
6. Ozzie Newsome: This initially sounded too insane to be true. From Game 48 to Game 208, this Cleveland Browns legend never dropped a pass. Not in a game, not in practice. Teammates swore it was the case. And Newsome — as modest as anyone comes in the NFL — could not recall one drop. The more you learn about Newsome’s upbringing in the segregated south and how exactly he built the Baltimore Ravens from scratch, the more this becomes believable, too. His hands were glue. But, for Newsome, it was all about his eyes. His laser-beam focus to catch a pass knowing Pittsburgh Steelers bruisers Donnie Shell and Mike Wagner would crunch him. That focus on the field was an extension of his life. Newsome is strikingly calm in all chaos. It really doesn’t matter what madness is going on all around him. He’s completely unbothered. Newsome ventured into some of the most ruthless secondaries in NFL history with grace, with acrobatics the sport had never seen. Not that it matters in this Top 10, but he also set the gold standard for GMs everywhere.
5. Mike Ditka: The position does not exist without Iron Mike. Pre-1961, nobody in the sport even used the term “tight end.” There were split ends and ends — that’s it. Ditka had a tectonic impact on the sport. When Bears OC Luke Johnsos shifted the rookie just a few yards off the line and introduced the concept of a two-way release, the position was born. Of course, it was Ditka’s rebellious play style that captivated the nation most. He operated as an apex predator at the top of the food chain. It’s no coincidence that his career arc mirrored the rise of professional football itself. The mid-60s is right when the NFL nosed past Major League Baseball. But you know why Ditka is so high on this list? When his life was falling apart — when he was drinking nonstop, depressed, ready to quit on the sport and life — Ditka found a way to dust himself off the canvas. One phone call from Tom Landry changed everything. As you’ll read, Ditka helped define the tight end position in Dallas as much as Chicago. This resilience became embedded into the position he created.
The next six decades, countless tight ends found a way to stare themselves in that same mirror and turn their lives around.
If we’re creating a silhouette logo for the NFL, it’d be Mike Ditka.
4. Shannon Sharpe: By God, the man was diabolical. When linebacker Chad Brown stuffed Sharpe into the grass — when Brown was the victor on this play in a Broncos-Seahawks AFC West tilt — Sharpe still had the wherewithal from his backside to tell him he’d burn his reptile store down. (Yes, Sharpe knew Brown ran such a business in Denver.) And when the Broncos were icing a win over Kansas City in ‘98, Sharpe could sense that future Hall of Famer Derrick Thomas was about to crack. So, he calmly verbalized the phone number of Thomas’ girlfriend out loud one digit at a time. (Thomas lost his mind in epic fashion.) The Sharpe stories are epic and nonstop and split the stomachs of all those reliving them. He brought a completely new energy to the tight end position, in addition to shattering Ozzie Newsome’s records. His physique didn’t look real up close. Teammates were always blown away by Sharpe’s work ethic. And despite boasting an ego and swagger the position had never seen to this extreme, Sharpe never stopped evolving as a player. He listened to Mike Shanahan, agreed to practice more, block more and sacrifice personal stats on the game’s greatest stage. The result was two Super Bowl rings.
3. Kellen Winslow: Like many consumers of this sport in their mid-30s, I was quite ignorant when it came to the game’s most iconic moments from yesteryear. Take the “Epic in Miami.” The sight of Kellen Winslow getting carried off the field after the Jan. 2, 1982 win over the Miami Dolphins almost looked staged. Beyond theatrical. In taking this “Blood and Guts” project on, I wanted to learn as much about that night as possible and, boy, was I wrong. Players from both sides — to this day — are simply glad they survived that night and still cannot believe Winslow was able to make play… after play… after play… when his body was clearly breaking down. That 41-38 San Diego win catapulted the tight end position into a superhero realm. Above all, Winslow was the first tight end to become a true matchup nightmare. He lined up everywhere. Winslow was the ultimate chess piece in Don Coryell’s genius scheme, one that changed football forever. Injuries sabotaged Winslow’s career in the end. But his peak — ’80, ’81, ’82, ’83 — is honestly as good as it gets at tight end. Through those 57 games, Winslow totaled 319 receptions for 4,258 yards with 33 touchdowns.
2. Tony Gonzalez: Quick story from the Gonzalez chapter. At Cal, he was haunted by a ghost. Seriously. Once, in the middle of the night, he felt a ghost shake him back and forth. Only after the fact — the day he left campus for the NFL — did Gonzalez discover a woman had died in his apartment and her body was there for a full three weeks before he took on the lease. A kid who used to be terrified of bullies and heights and ghosts soon spent an entire career terrorizing NFL defenses. Gonzalez is the clear pivot point for the position itself. He forced the league to evolve, to chase athletic tight ends en masse. When Dick Vermeil and Trent Green brought “The Greatest Show on Turf” offense to KC, Gonzalez wasn’t even a featured piece of the offense — his historic numbers could’ve been even better. And then, of course, he clashed with the old-school Mike Mularkey in Atlanta. On a basketball court, 6-foot-5 power forwards are severely undersized. But on a football field? This exact body type can thrive at tight end. Gonzalez opened a door to a completely new type of athlete, to the point where all 32 teams were soon chasing their own versions. Still are, too.
Remarkably, Gonzalez played in 270 of a possible 272 games. His legacy will last forever. Donte Whitner’s comparison was perfect. Gonzalez was the NFL’s own Tim Duncan. You knew what was coming and could not stop it.
1. Rob Gronkowski: The timing of “Gronk” was everything. When he let out that rebel yell on draft day in NYC — helmet on — the NFL was entering dangerous territory as a business. Very soon, the overcorrection was officially on. Forever driven by the bottom line, forever scared that mothers nationwide may be worried about their kids playing an inherently violent sport, the suits at Park Avenue and all 32 owners became determined to siphon violence out of the sport. The rulebook was polluted with more nebulous, confusing, up-for-interpretation mumbo-jumbo and flags rained down like a Mardi Gras parade in a concerted effort to seek a middle ground that does not exist. “Safer,” of course, is a good thing. Nobody wants players maiming each other like it’s 1966. Yet trying to convince the world that football is “safe” is disingenuous. It’s not. And that’s OK. And in came one beer-chugging, football-spiking, forearm-shivering knight in shining armor. Instantly, we could not take our eyes off Gronk. Nobody in the history of the position was this dominant as a receiver and a blocker. He destroyed everything in his path. Hell, he destroyed opponents by accident. The timing was two-fold. Not only did Gronkowski’s play style help preserve the physicality of the sport, but the league sorely needed his authenticity. A decade into Bill Belichick’s reign, the league began to think one could only win with a soulless, heartless, robotic-like, day-to-day approach. Never mind the fact that all assistants under Belichick tend to flame out as head coaches. The fact that Gronkowski continued to live like there’s no tomorrow was so crucial in saving the sport’s essence: Football should be fun.
Gronkowski treated opponents like his brothers in a Mini Sticks clash in Western New York. Yes, all that partying actually helped his game, too.
Belichick let Gronk be Gronk.
This was truly a dominant figure in every sense.
Make sure to snare your copy of “The Blood and Guts: How Tight Ends Save Football.” Email me at golongtd@gmail.com if you’d like a signed bookplate. Thanks, all!
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Great list and great stuff, as always, Tyler. An under-the-radar name worth top-10 consideration is Keith Jackson, who was simply an outrageous athlete at the position for the Eagles, Dolphins and Packers. Highly productive too.
In the last 50 years, there are five players to make first-team All-Pro in each of their first three NFL seasons. Five. And Jackson is one of them, along with Earl Campbell, Barry Sanders, Lawrence Taylor and Quenton Nelson. That is some elite company.
Jackson was so good that, in his ninth and final season, he scored 10 TDs on only 40 receptions as Green Bay won the Super Bowl. Tremendous player everywhere he went.
Thanks, Tyler.
Randy (http://www.armchairqb.com)
P.S. I understand any outcry for Casper, who ran routes like a receiver but could block. He was actually an All-American offensive tackle at Notre Dame who converted to tight end, instead of the other way around.