2024 Summary

Usage & Role

A couple of years ago, it looked like Kittle’s receiving role might be decreasing. Check out his target shares by year through 2022:

2017: 10.4%
2018: 26.5%
2019: 28.1%
2020: 25.7%
2021: 24.8%
2022: 18.9%

Those 2022 Niners added RB Christian McCaffrey mid-season to an offense with 26-year-old Deebo Samuel a year into a contract extension and 24-year-old Brandon Aiyuk coming off his best year to date. It made sense for that trio to hinder the impact of the TE heading into his age-30 campaign.

Now? That year looks like an outlier.

Kittle rebounded to 21% target share in 2023 and 22% in 2024.

Kittle’s Production Not Declining As He Ages

Kittle also delivered his best and third-best rates of yards per catch the past two years, producing his third and fourth 1,000-yard receiving seasons.

Kittle has also stayed better at scoring TDs over the past four years after starting slowly in that category …

First four seasons: 5.3% TD rate
Last four seasons: 11.3%

Let that be a general lesson that if there’s no clear reason a good player isn’t scoring more TDs, that aspect is likely to improve.

2024 a Fantasy Outlier?

Kittle scored the second-most total fantasy points and third-most points per game of his career last season. That’s unusual for a 31-year-old. But does it make his season an outlier, threatening to regress?

Let’s look at how Kittle has ranked in fantasy points per game through his career …

PPR:

2017: T-23rd
2018: third
2019: second
2020: third
2021: fourth
2022: second
2023: sixth
2024: first

Half-PPR:

2017: 26th
2018: third
2019: second
2020: third
2021: fourth
2022: second
2023: fifth
2024: first

Non-PPR:

2017: 27th
2018: second
2019: second
2020: third
2021: fourth
2022: second
2023: third
2024: first

So, last season was an outlier vs. the rest of Kittle’s career in that it’s the only time he has led the position in scoring. And it might prove to be an outlier in that it beat his previous three averages by at least 1.7 points.

But Kittle has been a near-perennial top-4 scorer at the position. So the 2024 result doesn’t look terribly out of line.

Efficiency Metrics

Kittle’s 14.2 yards per catch were the third-most of his career, though down 1.5 vs. the previous season. His catch rate hit a career-high 83%, but Kittle has exceeded 72% in five of the past six years.

He also delivered a career-high 73.4% receiving success rate, according to Pro Football Reference. His 2.62 yards per route were well up vs. the previous two years but also just the fourth-highest rate of his career.

Kittle has seen the two deepest aDOTs of his career the past two seasons, according to PFF, and been at 8.0+ for four straight seasons. That has clearly helped his yardage over at least the past two years and stands as just another indicator he hasn’t slowed down yet.

Offensive Context

Kittle’s numbers probably got a boost from last year’s injuries. McCaffrey lost the most time, appearing in just four games. That factor appeared to push more Brock Purdy pass attempts from behind the line of scrimmage to the short range (0-9 yards downfield):

Purdy threw 14.1% of his attempts behind the line in 2023; 9.7% in 2024.
He went from 41.8% short in 2023 to 46.4% last year.

Kittle trailed Jauan Jennings 44-39 in short-range receptions but beat his next teammate (Samuel) by 16 in that category.

Samuel also missed his customary two games for the season. And Aiyuk’s Week 7 knee tear vacated plenty of targets. Interestingly, Kittle’s target share actually declined from Week 8 on (19.8%) vs. the first seven weeks (25.5%).

Injury History

Of course, Kittle missed two games of his own. That makes five times in the past six seasons he has sat out 2+ games.

In 2024, it was separate hamstring injuries that kept him out of Week 3 and Week 11. The season before found Kittle sitting out only the regular-season finale, after the Niners had clinched their playoff seed. But he also played through a groin injury that required surgery after the season.

Kittle missed the first two games of 2022 with a groin injury. In 2021, a calf strain sidelined him for three contests. The year before that hit the TE with a two-game MCL sprain and a six-game absence for a small foot fracture.

In 2019, it was a two-game knee sprain. And his rookie year included one game down for an ankle sprain.

Kittle has also played through more than his share of “questionable” designations along the way.

2025 Expectations

Projected Role & Competition

If you draft Kittle, you do so knowing that there’s injury risk. But that’s easy to guard against – especially at a position that typically finds in-season replacement options on the waiver wire for most leagues.

There’s no questioning the strength of his role at this point, though, especially among this year’s 49ers.

Samuel’s gone to Washington. Aiyuk’s working his way back from a double-ligament tear in his right knee and isn’t expected to be ready for Week 1. That obviously casts some darkness on the WR’s outlook beyond the start of the season.

McCaffrey’s back and figures to divert more target share back to RB, but his presence also strengthens the offense overall. San Francisco finished fourth in yards without CMC last season but slipped to 13th in scoring after ranking third the year before.

Jauan Jennings and Ricky Pearsall look like the top wideouts to open the season, a factor that should boost Kittle’s upside vs. previous seasons – at least until/unless they prove capable of coming anywhere close to the Samuel-Aiyuk tandem.

And remember that Kittle’s 2024 target share sat higher through the first seven weeks, a span that included Samuel and Aiyuk playing most of the games.

Supporting Cast

Brock Purdy’s a plus in that he operates Kyle Shanahan’s system well, delivering accurate passes to shorter ranges to set up his teammates for yards after the catch. San Francisco gave him a large five-year extension this offseason to show its commitment.

The WR group gets shallow quickly behind the top three (which includes Aiyuk, for now). Demarcus Robinson arrived from L.A. via free agency, and 2024 fourth-round pick Jacob Cowing is competing for a role.

Coaching & Offensive Scheme

Shanahan’s first year in San Francisco was Kittle’s rookie season (2017), so the two likely know each other about as well as any coach-player combo in the league.

That relationship and experience has helped Shanahan to trust Kittle to play through injuries, even in situations that keep the TE from practicing all week.

Production & Efficiency Trends

Despite all the depth-chart altering injuries last season, the 49ers finished with a neutral pass rate near identical to their 2023 rate: 53.0% vs. 53.6%. And Kittle’s big production came despite decreased passing efficiency from Purdy.

What does that all mean? Kittle’s capable of recreating last year’s production even amid changes around him on offense.

More time with the newer receivers and McCaffrey’s return should improve the offense on whole. Better offense would mean more time on the field and more scoring opportunities.

And if the newer pass catchers don’t pan out, Kittle’s there for Purdy to lean on – with a record that has found him ranking no lower than sixth in points per game in any format since 2018.