George Kittle

Kittle is rapidly building a case as one of the better fifth-round draft picks in NFL history, ripping off back-to-back 1,000-yard seasons at a position where only two or three players reach that mark each year. He couldn't quite match his tight end yardage record from 2018, but Kittle was the furthest thing from a slouch last season, ranking 12th among pass catchers in yards per game (75.2) and 14th in yards per target (9.8). His average target depth dropped from 7.3 yards to 5.7, and while there was a corresponding dip in yards per reception, Kittle's catch rate shot up to elite territory at 79.4 percent. He may not get the same downfield opportunities as Travis Kelce, but Kittle is even better than his TE counterpart at picking up yards after the catch, and the 26-year-old also had lower drop rates in both 2018 and 2019. Kittle's greatest weaknesses - at least from a fantasy standpoint - are actually strengths from the 49ers' perspective. He plays too hard, he blocks too much and sometimes he can be too invested in tasks that don't produce stats. Kittle has missed only three games in three seasons, but he's played through a torn shoulder labrum, fractured rib cartilage and a bone spur in his ankle. That probably makes Kelce the safer TE1 choice, but Kittle is the one with superhuman talent.

It wasn't just that Kittle had a career season, he had a season that was almost too good to be true. And it's hard to know how to react to that type of year. Kittle and Travis Kelce played ping-pong with the single-season yardage record for a tight end; when the smoke cleared, Kittle won. That's an incredible accomplishment for any player, but then underscore that Kittle did it playing most of his season with undrafted quarterback Nick Mullens (Kelce, meanwhile, worked with the NFL MVP). The 49ers also had pedestrian wideouts; every late-season opponent took to the field with the primary goal of stopping Kittle. And let's not forget Kittle was scarcely used at Iowa, catching just 48 passes in four college seasons. The 49ers need to prioritize Kittle more in the scoring area. He only had five touchdowns despite last year's banner season, and three came from long distance (43, 82, 85 yards). The other two spikes were from the 10- and 5-yard line. It wasn't for a lack of trying, as Kittle was fourth among tight ends in red-zone targets. A full season of Jimmy Garoppolo at quarterback could go a long way toward fixing this deficiency. Garoppolo, in a lot of ways, is the elephant in the San Francisco huddle. Can he be trusted to play a full season? Have we seen enough of him to definitively conclude he's a difference-maker? How you feel about Garoppolo goes a long way toward solving your Kittle stance in 2019.

Tight end is a hard position, especially for rookies. Kittle's first-year haul might not seem like much, but since the merger, only 16 rookie tight ends have produced more catches than Kittle's 43. His production got a modest bump when Jimmy Garoppolo took over: five games, 15-224-1, a catch rate of 78.9 percent. And now we get to dig into the growth seasons for a typical tight end. Kittle is a better athlete than blocker, and that's fine with us. At 6-4, 250, he blazed a 4.52 40 at the 2017 combine, also displaying explosiveness with strong marks in the vertical jump (35 inches) and broad jump (132 inches). Kittle tied for fifth among tight ends with 16 red-zone targets last year, but most of those were from quarterbacks far worse than Garoppolo (hence the modest TD total). The 49ers have a lot of receiving turf to be claimed, following a season in which no player had more than 59 receptions or four TD catches. Garoppolo, of course, didn't start the year with the team. Make sure Kittle is prominent on your list of potential breakout players. Heck, he could be a cheaper way to get Garoppolo and Kyle Shanahan exposure, if you miss on some of the buzzier targets. Kittle did suffer a separated shoulder in the first week of the preseason, but the 49ers expect him to be back for their regular-season opener.

Kittle could be in store for a bigger role than he thought his rookie year after the Niners sent incumbent No. 1 tight end Vance McDonald to the Steelers in an August trade. The fifth-round draft pick possesses surprising athleticism (4.52 speed) for a 6-4, 247-pound blocking tight end and could carve out a solid role as a check-down option for QB Brian Hoyer.