What You Need to Know:

• The 4th-round rookie was already running ahead of veteran teammates Ricky Seals-Jones and Jordan Akins in voluntary spring OTAs.
• After Bellinger caught 68 passes across 4 seasons at San Diego State (31 of them as a senior), Pro Football Focus said the Aztecs “woefully underutilized” him.
• Among 133 FBS TEs who drew at least 20 targets last year, Bellinger ranked 66th in total pass snaps played but just 105th in route rate (how often he ran a route among those snaps).
• Bellinger had 0 drops as a senior and just a 4.2% drop rate for his SDSU career.
• He impressed at the Combine, running a 4.63-second 40 that rates 86th percentile among NFL TEs.
• Bellinger also sports a 75th-percentile SPARQx score, 82nd-percentile burst score and 75th percentile catch radius.
• The departure of TE Evan Engram in free agency removed last year’s #2 in targets and the team leader in that category from 2020. Engram spent the past 5 years leading the position for the Giants.
• WR Sterling Shepard also might be out of the picture vs. last season, after suffering an Achilles’ tendon tear in mid-December.
• Giants beat writer Dan Duggan considers Daniel Bellinger the team's "clear TE1.” He’s seen a steady dose of snaps with the starters throughout camp, and given the minimal competition, this news isn’t shocking.

Draft Sharks Bottom Line:

We all know that relying on a rookie TE is rarely a good idea. And no one is suggesting you should depend on Bellinger for meaningful production. Even if he hits the season as the Giants’ lead TE, he’d likely sit no higher than 4th in target distribution behind at least Kenny Golladay, Kadarius Toney and Saquon Barkley (in some order) – with Wan’Dale Robinson also factoring in. But as a purely end-of-draft consideration, Bellinger sports only upside. And his path to leading the position is not that difficult, with only Ricky Seals-Jones and Jordan Akins as competition. RSJ has totaled 169 targets across 5 seasons with 4 teams. Akins topped out at 55 targets in 2019 and 27 catches in 2020. Each joined the Giants on a small, 1-year deal.