Jonnu Smith

Where He's Expected to Land

Nova projects 116 total points, 6 PPR points per game, replacement-level or worse at the position. The per-game shape leans hard toward empty weeks: 61% bust (<10 pts), 36% solid, and just 3% boom (>20 pts). The season range runs from a 35-point floor to a 152-point ceiling, with an 8% shot at a tier-1 finish and 19% at tier-2-or-better. Nova's own "likely finish" window is enormous, TE15 to TE39, which is what happens when a model has to project a player without knowing his offense, his target competition, or in some sense his employer.

The Last Three Seasons

(PPR points calculated from official receiving stats: 1 pt/reception, 0.1 pt/yard, 6 pts/TD.)

That table is a cliff, not a trend. 2024 with Miami was a genuine career year, a Pro Bowl berth, 510 yards after the catch (4th-most among all NFL pass-catchers), and a role as Mike McDaniel's release-valve tight end. Pro Football Network's TE Impact Metric had him 6th at the position that season with an 84.4 score. Then Miami traded him to Pittsburgh in 2025 (in the deal that also sent Jalen Ramsey to the Steelers), he signed a two-year, $16M extension there, and the production cratered to his worst full season as a pro, that same Impact Metric dropped him to 62nd (68.2) in 2025. The yardage nearly matches his rookie-year floor.

What Changed for Him This Offseason

Pittsburgh released Smith on March 4, 2026, clearing $7M in cap space against $3.87M dead money, part of what SI's Steelers coverage called "roster reconstruction" under new head coach Mike McCarthy, who replaces Mike Tomlin this year. That part is straightforward. What isn't: more than four months later, with training camps about to open, Smith remains unsigned, a strange spot for a player who was catching touchdown passes in the Pro Bowl 18 months ago. Pro Football Network ran a "why is he still a free agent" explainer on July 9; Last Word on Sports was still pitching him as a Buccaneers fit on July 11, the same day this profile was written. Teams don't usually let a tight end with this catch radius sit this long unless the walk-year tape gave someone real pause.

What Changed Around Him

There's no "around him" to report yet, because there's no team. What we do have is the inside account of why Pittsburgh moved on. Steelers beat writer Mark Kaboly, on the "Kaboly + Mack" podcast (via SteelerNation.com, July 6, 2026), said incumbent TE Pat Freiermuth lost snaps to Smith for much of 2025 because of Smith's prior relationship with then-OC Arthur Smith, and that frustration "affected his play, then affected his targets." Kaboly's read: "I think it was an Arthur Smith thing at first that turned into potentially a Rodgers thing... I think the frustration caught up to him." That's a beat writer describing a messy roster situation that dragged both tight ends down, not a talent evaluation of Smith, but it's the closest thing to an explanation for a 4.25 PPG season from a player who posted 13.20 the year before.

What They're Saying

The volume of speculation is unusually high for a player nobody has signed. Pro Football Network's Priyanshu Choudhary (July 9, 2026) floated Denver, Tampa Bay, and Cincinnati, Denver needing a complement to a disappointing Evan Engram, Tampa Bay dead last in TE production behind Cade Otton, Cincinnati lacking a third weapon for Joe Burrow. The most repeated name is Carolina: ESPN (via Roundtable.io), Yahoo Sports, and AtoZ Sports have all separately tied Smith to the Panthers, AtoZ framing him as a fit for GM Dan Morgan's stated roster priorities. Nova can't weight any of this yet, it can't project a target share for an offense that hasn't signed him.

The Buzz

Fantasy and NFL media are actively arguing over where Smith lands, that's real buzz, but almost none of it is arguing that he'll be good once he gets there. The pitch, everywhere it's made, is "a low-cost complementary piece," not "a starter." That's the crowd already agreeing with Nova's Tier 7 grade before a single snap is taken; the model isn't the outlier here.

Swing Factors

• Landing spot, full stop (±100+ pts): signing into a target-starved room (Tampa Bay, Carolina) versus re-entering a crowded one is the difference between fantasy-relevant and unrostered.
• Scheme fit (±30 pts): several suitors (Tampa Bay's Zac Robinson, Denver's Sean Payton staff) lean on multiple-TE personnel, which plays to Smith's move-tight-end skill set.
• Red-zone role (±25 pts): he scored 8 TDs in his 2024 peak and 2 in his 2025 collapse, the swing between those two outcomes is almost entirely opportunity, not talent decay.
• Timing (−20 pts): every week he stays unsigned is a week of missed camp reps and scheme install, shrinking his 2026 ceiling even after he lands somewhere.
• Age 31 (−15 pts): on his fifth team in nine seasons, with a track record of scheme-dependent spikes rather than positional dominance.

If Everything Goes Right / If Everything Goes Wrong

If everything goes right: he signs somewhere with a real vacancy, a Tampa Bay or Carolina-type situation, inside the next few weeks, gets a full camp to install, and the touchdown role that produced 8 scores in 2024 resurfaces. That's Nova's 90th-percentile track: a ~194-point season, comfortably a streaming TE1 in the right matchups. Nova prices the tier-1 season at 8%, low, but not nothing for a player this recently productive.

If everything goes wrong: camp comes and goes without a deal, he signs late for veteran-minimum money into a backup role, or doesn't sign at all. He settles near the 45-point floor, unrostered in most leagues by Week 3. The 61% weekly bust rate isn't really a tail risk at this point; for a player without a team in mid-July, it's closer to the base case.

Nova's Edge

The honest edge here is refusing to manufacture a divergence story. The Tier 7 grade is driven by the production collapse in the table above and the absence of a clear 2026 role. Until there is a roster and target path, Smith is a name-value trap, not a draftable tight end.

The Bottom Line

There's no round or ADP price to give here, draft him nowhere in redraft leagues until he has a team. In dynasty and best-ball formats where you can roster speculatively, he's a very late-round dart on name recognition and 2024 tape, not a plan. The action is to watch camp-opening news: a Panthers, Buccaneers, or Broncos signing changes this profile materially and should trigger a re-grade; radio silence into August is itself the signal that the league has already made its evaluation. Graded in public: if Smith is still unsigned by the start of the regular season, call it, Nova's Tier 7 read was right, and so was the room that let him sit this long.