Pat Freiermuth

Where He's Expected to Land

Nova projects roughly 120 points across the season, 8 PPR points per game, landing him in a TE14-TE38 "likely finish" band. That's Tier 7 in PPR and Half-PPR (VORP -19.4 and -15.8), Tier 7 in Standard (-12.5), and Tier 7 in 2QB/Superflex. Translation: a streaming-caliber TE2, not a locked-in weekly starter, with a wide enough range that the median outcome undersells what's plausible.

The Last Three Seasons

A hamstring injury wiped out six weeks of 2023. He bounced back with a career-high 65 catches in 2024, good for TE9 in PPR scoring (170.3 points) despite averaging just 4.6 targets a game, proof he can produce on scraps. Then 2025 happened: 41 catches, 486 yards, and only 51-52% of Pittsburgh's offensive snaps, even though he still led every Steelers tight end in production. Durability was never the issue here. Usage was.

What Changed for Him This Offseason

Nothing about his own circumstances moved, same team, same number, no reported surgery or age-driven decline (he turns 28 on October 25, entering year six). The Steelers did restructure his contract on May 23, 2026, converting close to $6 million of his salary into a signing bonus. That trimmed his 2026 cap hit down from $11.2 million while pushing his 2027 and 2028 numbers up to $12.1 million and $10.5 million, respectively, according to PennLive's Nick Farabaugh (via Behind the Steel Curtain, May 23, 2026). It's cap plumbing to help absorb Aaron Rodgers' one-year, $22.5 million deal, not a signal about his role.

What Changed Around Him

This is where the profile actually lives. Mike Tomlin resigned after the 2025 season following a 24-point home playoff loss, and Mike McCarthy now runs the operation, calling plays himself. McCarthy's coaching history leans on tight ends, Jermichael Finley, Dalton Schultz, and Richard Rodgers all had productive runs under him, and he's reunited in Pittsburgh with Rodgers, whom he coached for over a decade in Green Bay.

The personnel picture cleared up, too. Jonnu Smith, whose 2025 role directly ate into Freiermuth's snaps, was released after a disappointing season; Connor Heyward also left in free agency. That leaves a two-man tight end room with Darnell Washington, who signed a four-year extension this offseason and is expected to keep expanding as a receiving threat. The Steelers also added veteran WR Michael Pittman Jr. and rookie WR Germie Bernard, giving Rodgers more places to go with the ball, a mixed bag for Freiermuth's target competition even as it should open up the middle of the field.

What They're Saying

Longtime Steelers insider Ray Fittipaldo, speaking on 93.7 The Fan (via SteelerNation, July 2, 2026), said the front office wasn't pleased with Freiermuth's 2025 role given the money already invested in him, and expects "both of those tight ends", Freiermuth and Washington, "playing a lot" in 2026, with the starting job "close." Radio host Mark Kaboly, on The Fan Morning Show (via SteelerNation, July 6, 2026), put a finer point on the 2025 breakdown: "I think he was obviously getting very frustrated," tracing the snap erosion to former OC Arthur Smith's ties to Jonnu Smith rather than anything Rodgers or Freiermuth did wrong.

Not everyone is sold the new regime fixes it. An anonymous AFC executive, polled for ESPN's 2026 tight end rankings and republished by Steelers Depot (July 10, 2026), placed Freiermuth in the honorable-mention tier below the league's top ten: "He doesn't belong in the top tier, but he's a playmaker." The exec added that Freiermuth "usually produces" when targeted but "doesn't seem to ever be a focal point for that offense", the exact pattern Nova's low VORP already reflects.

The Buzz

Fantasy circles are lukewarm bordering on skeptical. SI's Shawn Childs (May 15, 2026) forecasts a "backend TE2" season, roughly 50 catches, 500 yards, five touchdowns, at a "free" draft price. Dynasty writers have been split within the same news cycle: RotoBaller ran pieces asking whether managers should sell Freiermuth and whether his role could shrink again, even as Pittsburgh beat writers describe a front-office mandate to feature him more. That gap, pessimistic dynasty takes against optimistic local beat reporting, is worth tracking through camp.

Swing Factors

• McCarthy/Rodgers scheme fit (+50 pts): a playcaller with a track record of featuring tight ends, reunited with a QB he coached for over a decade.
• Two-TE room, not three (+30 pts): Jonnu Smith and Connor Heyward are gone; the remaining split is just Freiermuth and Washington.
• New WR competition (−20 pts): Michael Pittman Jr. and Germie Bernard add target competition even as they should loosen coverage underneath.
• Blocking limitations cap the floor: his run-blocking grades as merely average, capping his floor in run-heavy game scripts where a better blocker would stay on the field.

If Everything Goes Right / If Everything Goes Wrong

If everything goes right: McCarthy's history with tight ends translates immediately, Rodgers builds the rapport that never formed with Arthur Smith calling plays, and Freiermuth reclaims the 60%-plus snap share and third-down role he flashed in 2024. Nova's ceiling scenario, 204 points, a top-25 tight end season, sits at the honest edge of what a 9% P(tier-1) allows.

If everything goes wrong: Washington's four-year extension turns into a bigger workload at Freiermuth's expense, the WR additions siphon red-zone targets, and he settles into the same low-50s-percent snap share that produced 2025's 41-catch season. Nova's 60% weekly bust rate (sub-10 PPR points) and 2% boom rate already price that outcome as the likelier one, the floor of 47 points isn't a tail risk, it's close to the base case if nothing changes.

Nova's Edge

The number that does the real work here is the distribution split: a 60% weekly bust rate against just a 2% boom rate. That's a profile built almost entirely on touchdown spikes rather than target-share consistency, exactly what you'd expect from a tight end who's finished as high as TE9 and as low as irrelevant inside the same three-year window, all based on someone else's play sheet.

The Bottom Line

Treat Freiermuth as a streaming TE2, not a lineup lock, a fine TE2 stash in the last two or three rounds of a redraft, or a bye-week/matchup streamer if he slides past pick 130 in early best-ball drafts. The swing here isn't talent, it's opportunity: if McCarthy's tight-end history is real and Rodgers actually targets him like he did in 2024, the ceiling outcome (TE9-caliber) is fully in play. If Washington simply inherits the role Jonnu Smith vacated, Freiermuth's 2025 floor repeats. Nova's 9% tier-1 number is the honest read, good enough to speculate on late, not good enough to bank on.