Tight end is a difficult position for fantasy football managers to stream. The average NFL TE1 has about four receptions and 40-ish yards per game. To find a great free agent option, we need to find an opportunity worth exploiting. Do they have a recent promotion in their role? Do they have strong red-zone stats? How is their matchup for the week ahead? The following three streamers come today with supporting evidence that labels them as capable additions to a roster.
Availability Percentages are from Sleeper.
Pat Freiermuth — 57% Available
Freiermuth is running routes on 87% of his snaps played in 2026. In fact, he is running a route on 65% of Steelers passing plays. He has yet to run at least 23 routes in any game, and he has had fewer than three targets in every game.
Best of all? Freiermuth has four touchdowns this season. All of those came in the red zone, where Freiermuth gets 30% of all targets from inside the 10-yard line.
The Saints oppose Freiermuth and the Steelers as the 7th-worst defense in Fantasy Points Allowed to Tight Ends. That is 7.0 receptions and 76 yards allowed per game. With Michael Pittman Jr. and Roman Wilson out, Freiermuth is essentially the No. 3 pass-catcher on a team that ranks 2nd in Pass Rate (66.2%).
Mason Taylor — 97% Available
Taylor has played three full games this season. In his most recent Week 6 game, Taylor caught 4 of 6 targets for 33 yards. There has been no game yet with fewer than three targets. He is averaging 21.0 routes run per game and, more importantly, Taylor ran 11 more routes than Kenyon Sadiq in Week 6 and 12 more in Week 5.
The matchup favors starting this less-popular player. The Dolphins rank 5th-worst in Fantasy Points Allowed to tight ends, with 7.4 receptions and 77 yards per game. Meanwhile, they have faced sub-50% pass rates from opposing offenses.
Tyler Higbee — 50% Available
Davante Adams is sidelined with an injury, leaving 9.8 targets per game on the table. Higbee obviously will not get a huge piece of that pie, but he will get a slice. Whatever that may be, it's a net positive for the Rams' tight end.
Higbee leads all Rams tight ends with 28 targets, 16 more than Colby Parkinson, 17 more than the injured Terrance Ferguson, and 19 more than Davis Allen.
In route rate, Higbee is running the third-most on the Rams at 25 per game, about 7 more than Parkinson and 16 more than Allen.
These numbers combine to give Higbee a TE10 projection this week. Higbee projects for 6.7 targets, 4.8 receptions, 44.8 yards, and an 18.6% chance of scoring this Sunday.
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