Theo Johnson

Theo Johnson (TE, NYG) — 2026

Scoring note: The evaluator brief said to assume full PPR because league-settings.md had placeholders, but the settings file was confirmed 2026-07-08: half PPR (0.5/rec), 6-pt pass TD, no TE premium, 1 TE slot, 12 teams. This eval uses the confirmed half-PPR scoring (projection triple above). Full-PPR equivalents for cross-reference: floor ~62 / median ~91 / ceiling ~126. No TE premium + half PPR + 1 TE slot = punt-and-stream is the default league posture (te.md §7), which *lowers* the value of TE bench stashes like this one.

Verdict

HOLD (medium confidence) at a mock-undrafted price. Johnson is a real NFL player in a good spot on paper — year-3, age 25, RAS 9.93, a proven 89% pass-snap role in 2025, and a Harbaugh/Roman/Nagy offense that will live in 12 personnel — but Isaiah Likely's 3-yr/$40M ($26M guaranteed) signing takes the receiving-TE role, and the decisive evidence is that we already watched Johnson's contingency world: with the full TE1 role in 2025 he produced 7.0 half-PPR PPG (TE18), *below* this league's streaming baseline (~9 PPG). Routes are closing, not opening, so the year-3 breakout screen fails on its most important prong, and his median 2026 outcome (~4.9 half-PPR PPG) sits below even the punt tier. The market prices him at zero and zero is approximately right — profile, tier, and price agree, which is the definition of HOLD. He belongs on the in-season watch list keyed to Likely's health, not on a 12-team draft board; in 14-team+/2-TE formats he's a defensible final-round dart.

Projection & comps

Bottom-up (half PPR), from team profile volume (~62.5 plays/gm, ~55% dropback → ~585 dropbacks; data/team-profiles/NYG.md, built 2026-07-07):

• TD anchor: 13 RZ targets (6 catches, 4 TD) in 2025 (SI Giants, July 2026) — his 5 TDs were roughly in line with the RZ usage, not a spike to fade; but Dart's 9 rush TDs (nflverse 2025) are a permanent goal-line tax, so xTD is capped ~4-5 even in the ceiling case.
• Sanity check: his ceiling (~106) ≈ his actual 2025 (105.3 half-PPR, TE18) — i.e., the 80th-percentile 2026 is a *repeat* of the full-role season he just had, on fewer targets in a better offense. No external projections found in data/projections/ (directory absent as of 2026-07-08).
• Comp seasons (successful-TE2/Y archetype — note survivorship; the failure branch is Michael Mayer 2024, ~38 half-PPR): Isaiah Likely 2024 BAL (~127 half — the ceiling comp), Mark Andrews 2025 (107), Noah Gray 2024 KC (~94), Pat Freiermuth 2025 (93), Cole Kmet 2021 under Nagy (~91, the "volume without TDs" shape). Median 78 sits deliberately below the successful-comp band because the 2026 target tree (Likely + Nabers + Slayton + Mooney + RB outlets) is deeper than any of those comps faced.
• Games risk: medium — 12 games as a rookie (2024 season ended after Week 13; reported foot injury, specifics UNVERIFIED), 15 in 2025 (missed Wks 17-18 to illness only — nflverse injuries.csv).

Usage profile (te.md §2 table)

All 2025 numbers REG season, nflverse tables pulled 2026-07-07 unless noted. Route-level data is not in the cached tables, so RP/TPRR/YPRR use an on-field-during-charted-throw-plays proxy computed from participation.csv (pass-block share unknown; true TPRR/YPRR run slightly higher than the proxy).

Pedigree (prospect-pedigree.md): 2024 R4 pick 107 (giants.com; Wikipedia infobox says 108 — discrepancy noted) = day-3 capital → "punt-price darts only." RAS 9.93, 9th of 1,199 TEs since 1987 (ras.football via X, Apr 2024) — elite tester, the man-mismatch prior is real. College: 77-938-12 career at Penn State, 34-341-7 final season — below the ≥15% receiving-dominance bar (exact share UNVERIFIED; shared a room that also produced Tyler Warren). Year-3 breakout screen: FAILS — capital (R4 < day-2), TPRR (0.164 < 0.18), and routes opening (reversed: a $40M TE1 arrived). Age 25 = entering the 25-29 peak window; the athletic prior is the one elite thing in the profile.

Archetype: 2025 = borderline Receiving Y. 2026 projected = Y/red-zone specialist next to a detached TE1 — TD-or-bust weekly shape (te.md §8).

Context (from data/team-profiles/NYG.md, built 2026-07-07)

• Everything is new: Harbaugh HC, Nagy OC/play-caller (presumed-confirmed), Greg Roman run game, stability LOW. 2025 usage patterns are void for projection.
• Offense quality: 7.5 win total (BetMGM, 2026-05-20), ~30 pass att/gm projected — a run-lean, RPO/PA offense with Dart's legs taxing goal-line TDs. Not bottom-8, but low pass volume is a direct multiplier cut for a TS-limited TE.
• Target hierarchy: Nabers (health-contested — 2nd cleanup surgery, PUP expected) → Likely (TE1, ~3rd-highest-paid TE) → Slayton → Mooney/Austin (slot) → Skattebo/Tracy outlets → Johnson 6th. Wan'Dale's 140 vacated slot targets were re-claimed with heavy capital, not left open.
• The 12-personnel silver lining: Harbaugh's teams lean 12-personnel heavily; Likely profiles as a big slot (70%+ slot in BAL), Johnson as the Y — complementary, so his *snap* share should stay large ("expect... Theo Johnson earning a large percentage of snaps" — Big Blue View NFC East TE grades, July 2026). But te.md §5 is explicit: high 12-rate guarantees snaps, often as a blocker — with Roman running the run game and Ricard/Manhertz aboard, Johnson's blocking share rises. Snaps ≠ routes ≠ targets, and two TEs from one team are almost never both rosterable (te.md §6).
• Spring buzz is real and fairly stated: Johnson was "one of Jaxson Dart's most-targeted options through OTAs and mandatory minicamp," stock up all spring, with repeated red-zone connections (SI Giants mailbag + giants.com OTA reports, May-June 2026). That is the market's bull case — and it's a padless-spring signal sitting below usage and situation in the evidence hierarchy (scoring-framework §3). Likely's $26M guaranteed is the harder evidence about who the staff plans to feed.

Positional scarcity placement (te.md §7)

Below the punt tier — off the draft board in this league. Median ~4.9 half-PPR PPG vs a streamer baseline of ~9 (2025 TE12 = 8.5 half-PPR PPG + 0.5-1.0 streaming bonus; weekly.csv-derived receiving table) = a negative ~4 PPG edge. Even his ceiling season (~6.6 PPG) only reaches the streamer line. No TE premium and half PPR keep the punt/stream posture the league default and remove any reception-volume rescue. He is not a pay-up asset, not a dead-zone trap (nobody's paying), and not even a standard punt-tier pick in 12-team — he's the tier below: a named contingency on the waiver watch list. Contrast: Likely at FFC ADP 138.7 (TE15, ffc-ppr 2026-07-07) is the NYG TE the market drafts.

Tripwires (re-run this eval if any fire)

• Likely misses significant time (injury/trade) in camp or in-season → Johnson back to an every-down role; upgrade to streamer/TARGET range immediately.
• Nabers opens the season on PUP → target tree thins; combined with #1 this is a genuine top-12-weeks window.
• Camp/preseason reports Johnson running even-or-ahead of Likely in 11-personnel routes/targets (not just 12-personnel snaps) → the depth chart label is wrong; upgrade.
• Pass-block/chip rate visibly up in preseason, or Manhertz/Ricard packages push his pass-snap rate under ~50% → he's being converted to a blocking Y; downgrade to AVOID (roster-clog).
• ADP moves inside ~TE20 / pick 160 on the summer breakout articles → flip to FADE at that cost; the price would be paying for a role Likely's contract contradicts.