Mark Andrews fantasy owners have been disappointed with the Baltimore Ravens tight end so far this season. To put it lightly, he has not returned value on his average draft position, which has been the story with most Ravens players in fantasy this season.
The past is the past, but let’s put Andrews’ fantasy performance in relation to other tight ends, then discuss what we should expect going forward.
Mark Andrews’ Fantasy Season
Through Week 9, Andrews is the fantasy TE8 in PPR scoring. He was being drafted as the clear TE3, with an average draft position being mid-fourth round. So, while TE8 is clearly not living up to his draft value, it may not initially seem like huge disappointment. However, he has been.
Mark Andrews Fantasy Outlook ROS
I ran this Twitter poll earlier in the week, asking which player fantasy owners would rather have. While many knew who I was talking about, some of the name value was taken away. “Player A” in this case was Andrews, who has been terrible over this past three games. Many were surprised to know that “Player B” was Minnesota Vikings tight end Irv Smith Jr., who is still owned in only 5.0 percent of ESPN fantasy leagues. Yet, the majority of people would rather have him over Andrews (99.2%), based on production alone.
Yes, name value has a heavy impact on fantasy football decisions. Still, this large of a discrepancy is alarming. Do Andrews fantasy owners have a bit of Stockholm Syndrome with their horrendous fantasy investment? Possibly. Others are hoping there is some positive regression coming for Andrews, so let’s take a look at his schedule and see if that’s the case.
Andrews Fantasy Schedule
| WK | OPP | STRENGTH |
| 10 | @NE | -42.9% |
| 11 | TEN | 1.6% |
| 12 | @PIT | -41.6% |
| 13 | DAL | 9.3% |
| 14 | @CLE | -16.0% |
| 15 | JAX | 48.0% |
| 16 | NYG | -12.2% |
A negative strength indicates a tough matchup for TEs. For example, the Patriots are the toughest against TEs, and the negative matchup is displayed by -42.9%.
As you can see, only half of Andrews’ matchups are even positive. However, I think it’s nearly worthless to use strength of schedule for Andrews, since he is not used in the middle of the field. He is as touchdown-dependent as can be, and we should project his value by the amount of red zone drives the Ravens can expect to have against these opponents.
Ravens’ Red Zone Usage + Matchups
| WK | OPP | RZ Drives Allowed/GM |
| 10 | @NE | 3.1 |
| 11 | TEN | 3.6 |
| 12 | @PIT | 2.8 |
| 13 | DAL | 3.7 |
| 14 | @CLE | 4.4 |
| 15 | JAX | 4.1 |
| 16 | NYG | 4.0 |
Grab some coffee and perk up, because there’s going to be a lot of numbers and math coming…
The Ravens have 27 red zone drives through eight games. These 27 drives have resulted in 17 touchdowns. Of these 17 touchdowns, Andrews has been responsible for three, meaning he gets 17.6% of the team’s red zone touchdowns. Side note — his other two touchdowns have come from 22 and 25 yards out, so nearly red zone.
Baltimore has ran 71 plays in the red zone, with 27 being passes and 44 being called running plays. Andrews has seen 35% of the red zone targets, as well as 35% of the end zone targets. Using the Ravens’ play calling tendencies, that means we can assume there will be one pass for every red zone trip. This means that there needs to be three red zone drives for Andrews to see a target.
Check out our Week 10 Fantasy Football Rankings, including scoring settings for PPR and half PPR leagues! Ranking are updated throughout the week.
So, in games above where teams allow less than three red zone trips, I think you can safely bench Andrews. Could the team target him on the first play in the red zone? Of course, but we can only go off of what we have seen from the Ravens.
In matchups like Cleveland, we could see five red zone trips with over one passing play per trip, on average, due to the weak secondary. This would be a plus matchup for Andrews, like we saw with his first game against them this season, in which he scored twice.
What should I do as an Andrews fantasy owner?
That’s the million dollar question, isn’t it? If you have the roster flexibility to roster multiple tight ends, then I think you can safely keep Andrews and play him in the matchups where the Ravens should be in a position to score often.
You should not trust Andrews as your every week starter. It is important to take name value away and not be stubborn, simply because you invested a lot to get him. Sometimes investments do not work out, and that’s fine, but you need to be flexible in order to be the best fantasy football owner.
And do not listen to the fantasy “experts” that continue to rank Andrews as a top-tier play, simply because they also are too stubborn to admit their preseason ranking was wrong. Admitting you were wrong does not damage credibility. In fact, it should do the opposite.
Now, if you only have the roster flexibility to roster one tight end, then I believe you should trade Andrews away. While I believe his actual value is little enough where you could drop him, clearly his name value still holds weight. For this reason, shop him to the rest of your league, possibly as a package deal, and try to upgrade your team.
For the rest of the season, I would project Andrews to be somewhere around TE8-10 overall, with half of his weeks being outside the top-20. Only you can decide if the rest of your team is strong enough to balance out his inconsistent production.
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