One move that occurred this offseason that really flew under the radar was TE Greg Olsen going to the Seattle Seahawks.
To me at least, it felt like that location that just fits him and no one would give it a second thought. However, looking at it now I think there’s a real possibility he’ll thrive and produce well there.
Let’s take a look at some stats. Last year, Olsen played 14 games and in those he accumulated only 52 receptions for 597 yards and 2 TDs. These aren’t very good numbers but we have to look at his situation he was put in. If we look at the first two weeks of the season when the Panthers still had Cam Newton as QB he had 10 receptions for 146 yards. Cam got injured, and the following week Olsen had six receptions for 75 yards and two TDs. Unfortunately he had a major drop-off after that week and wasn’t able to put up numbers like previously did.
Once again, you have to look at his position. He had a rotation of Kyle Allen and Will Grier at the quarterback, a head coach that got fired, and a game plan that was completley centered around Christian McCaffrey. With all of that in mind think it’s obvious why he stopped performing at his usual level.
Now let’s look a his new team in Seattle. Looking at how the Seahawks use tight ends it’s somewhat surprising. Despite having a rotation of Jacob Hollister and Will Dissly they still targeted the TE position 93 times throughout the regular season. Hollister averaged 5.1 targets per game and Dissly averaged 4.5. That was 13th for a TE1 and 5th for a TE2.
Assuming Greg Olsen takes over as TE1 and plays to his potential I think we can expect good things and perhaps high fantasy relevance.
Photo credit: ABC Columbia
