As we gear up to the start of the NFL season, Football Absurdity is going to bring you a comprehensive breakdown of every notable player that will be available in fantasy football drafts. We are now four years into Hunter Henry’s career, and he’s still yet to play a whole season. Will year five be the trick? Can he finally play sixteen games, and fulfill the hope and faith people have for him as a top-ten fantasy football tight end?
Hunter Henry ADP and AAV:
Standard ADP: TE7, 73 overall
PPR ADP: TE9, 79 overall
Average Auction Value: $4
Hunter Henry Statistics:
| Year | 2019 | 2018 | 2017 |
| G | 12 | N/A | 14 |
| GS | 12 | N/A | 13 |
| Tgt | 76 | N/A | 62 |
| Rec | 55 | N/A | 45 |
| Yards | 652 | N/A | 579 |
| TD | 5 | N/A | 4 |
| Tgt/G | 6.3 | N/A | 4.4 |
| Rec/G | 4.58 | N/A | 3.21 |
| Rec% | 54.3 | N/A | 41.4 |
| Yds/Tgt | 8.58 | N/A | 9.34 |
| Yds/Rec | 8.579 | N/A | 9.339 |
| Year | 2019 | 2018 | 2017 |
| Std Pts | 95.2 | N/A | 81.9 |
| HPPR Pts | 130.2 | N/A | 123.4 |
| PPR Pts | 150.2 | N/A | 126.9 |
| Pts/G | 7.9 | N/A | 5.9 |
| HPPR Pts/G | 10.9 | N/A | 8.8 |
| PPR Pts/G | 12.5 | N/A | 9.1 |
| Pts/Tgt | 1.25 | N/A | 1.32 |
| Pts/Tgt (HPPR) | 1.71 | N/A | 1.99 |
| Pts/Tgt (HPPR) | 1.98 | N/A | 2.05 |
| Year | 2019 | 2018 | 2017 |
| Air Yards | 793 | N/A | 576 |
| aDOT | 10.4 | N/A | 9.3 |
| YAC | 164 | N/A | 221 |
| YAC/Tgt | 2.16 | N/A | 3.56 |
| YAC/Rec | 2.98 | N/A | 4.91 |
| YAC% | 25.2% | N/A | 38.2% |
| AYMS | 21% | N/A | 17% |
| Tgt MS | 17% | N/A | 14% |
Hunter Henry Overview:
A concussion, a knee strain, a kidney laceration, a grade three ACL tear, and a tibial plateau fracture in his left knee. These are the injuries that have cost Hunter Henry some or all of his seasons in the NFL so far. That is five injuries in four years, with the ACL tear ripping the entire 2018 regular season from Henry. Luckily, he missed just four weeks with the tibial plateau fracture, after some early reports had Henry missing most or all of the remaining season. Henry can’t seem to stay on the field to save his life, and he does it with fun and varied injuries. Why, then, do we continue to invest a top-ten tight end pick on Hunter Henry?
Well, on a per-target basis, Hunter Henry is really good. There are only five active tight ends with at least 12.5 yards per target on over 150 targets since Henry entered the league. He joins Rob Gronkowski, Jared Cook, George Kittle, and Travis Kelce to get the honor. Henry’s 71.2% catch rate is also elite, and above both Kelce and Kittle. He’s really good on a per-target basis! And, in the games he was healthy last season, he paced out to be top-five in tight end targets (101 targets per sixteen games). He gets a lot of targets!
That’s why people like Hunter Henry. He gets a lot of targets, and he’s one of the league’s most efficient players when he gets those targets. But therein lies the rub. Hunter Henry has missed 20 of his last 36 games and has trouble playing the whole season. That’s the entire playbook on Hunter Henry: you’re going to love him when he’s in your lineup, but being in your lineup week-in and week-out is the hard part.
Hunter Henry Draft Strategy:
Hunter Henry Auction Value: $7
Draft Ranking: Find out for your league settings in a Beersheet! (coming late June)
I’m out on Hunter Henry if I am being honest. He’s good, and will likely be worth the money, but he isn’t in the range of tight end that I want to invest in. There’s too much capital involved to get a guy who will likely miss a chunk of the season once again. Then, I have to invest in a backup tight end. Forget that. Henry never makes it onto my roster because he’s at the top of the group of guys (TE5 through TE15 or so) that literally any rankings order at season’s end would be believable. If you look at that group in that way, it doesn’t make much sense to invest highly at the top of that cast of characters. Henry is the highest of those tight ends, so he doesn’t really ever make it into my tight end slot.
Best Case Scenario:
Hunter Henry plays a full sixteen games and squeaks into the top-five at tight end.
Worst Case Scenario:
Hunter Henry plays a full five games and squeaks into the top-sixteen at tight end.
[Statistics are sourced from pro-football-reference.com and airyards.com]
