Publishing rankings Wednesday for games that in some cases don't play until Monday is such a double-edged sword. On the one hand, getting the rankings out Wednesday means people can prepare earlier, make a framework, that sort of thing.
On the other hand, though ... so much guesswork.
I was working on my rankings of the Week 12 tight ends Monday night, and had a thought:
So I'm just going to rank two tight ends this week. Just publish a column that says "Gronk and Graham and go away."
— Daniel Kelley (@danieltkelley) November 18, 2014
Tuesday night, fellow ranker Dan Ciarrocchi was working on his own, and he had a thought as well:
Working on my Week 12 Tight End ranks and may as well have submitted a picture of Gronk and Graham standing above a pile of hot, wet garbage
— Dan Ciarrocchi (@TheSackSBN) November 19, 2014
It's not that every tight end after Rob Gronkowski and Jimmy Graham is bad for fantasy. Greg Olsen is on bye (as is Heath Miller, for whatever that's worth), and Julius Thomas and Dwayne Allen have both been fairly productive this season. But this early in the week, we haven't any kind of realistic guess as to Thomas' and Allen's status for Week 12 thanks to the injuries both tight ends suffered in Week 11.
And it doesn't end there. Will Delanie Walker return from injury in Week 12? What about Jordan Cameron? Marcedes Lewis? How did Kyle Rudolph feel after his Week 11 return? Is Jordan Reed's hamstring OK?
I talked about the insane difficulty of the tight end position in Tuesday's Ticker, but it bears repeating: Only two tight ends - Gronkowski and Olsen - have gone the whole season without presenting their owners with headaches. The position is crazy.
This is true of every position, every week, of course. But Week 12 among tight ends is perhaps the most complicated week of rankings we've ever seen.
So when you read our rankings this week, that's why there's a range of fifth to unranked for Thomas. Allen, Cameron and Reed are in the low double-digits, or they're unranked. These are helpful and good. Yay for us. But I will bet all sorts of dollars that things will change.
That doesn't mean ignore what comes next. It just means this is the first step of a full week of preparation. That's always true, really.
Oh well. On to Week 12:
Tight end rankings, Week 12
(DK: Daniel Kelley; DC: Dan Ciarrocchi; JD: John Daigle; SK: Scott Kaliska)
| Rank | Consensus | Team | Opponent | DK | DC | JD | SK |
| 1 | Rob Gronkowski | NE | DET | 1 | 1 | 2 | 1 |
| 2 | Jimmy Graham | NO | BAL | 2 | 2 | 1 | 2 |
| 3 | Antonio Gates | SD | STL | 4 | 3 | 9 | 5 |
| 4 | Coby Fleener | IND | JAC | 6 | 7 | 4 | 4 |
| 5 | Larry Donnell | NYG | DAL | 7 | 6 | 5 | 6 |
| 6 | Martellus Bennett | CHI | TAM | 10 | 4 | 10 | 3 |
| 7 | Travis Kelce | KAN | 2OAK | 8 | 5 | 7 | 7 |
| 8 | Jason Witten | DAL | @NYG | 3 | 8 | 18 | 8 |
| 9 | Jacob Tamme | DEN | MIA | 12 | 17 | 3 | 15 |
| 10 | Owen Daniels | BAL | @NO | 9 | 14 | 11 | 14 |
| 11 | Mychal Rivera | OAK | KAN | 23 | 10 | 8 | 8 |
| 12 | Julius Thomas | DEN | MIA | 5 | 9 | -- | 11 |
| 13 | Charles Clay | MIA | @DEN | 16 | 11 | 15 | 10 |
| 14 | Austin Seferian-Jenkins | TAM | @CHI | 21 | 18 | 6 | 13 |
| 15 | Delanie Walker | TEN | @PHI | 17 | 16 | 13 | 12 |
| 16 | Dwayne Allen | IND | JAC | 11 | 12 | -- | 20 |
| 17 | Jordan Reed | WAS | @SF | 15 | 15 | -- | 16 |
| 18 | Kyle Rudolph | MIN | GB | 24 | 13 | 21 | 17 |
| 19 | Jared Cook | STL | @SD | 20 | 19 | 17 | 19 |
| 20 | Vernon Davis | SF | WAS | -- | 22 | 19 | 18 |
| 21 | Jordan Cameron | CLE | @ATL | 14 | -- | -- | 21 |
| 22 | Jermaine Gresham | CIN | @HOU | -- | 24 | 12 | -- |
| 23 | Jace Amaro | NYJ | @BUF | -- | 23 | 14 | -- |
| 24 | Jim Dray | CLE | @ATL | -- | 21 | 16 | -- |
| 25 | Scott Chandler | BUF | NYJ | 18 | 25 | 22 | 24 |
| -- | Zach Ertz | PHI | TEN | 22 | 20 | 24 | 23 |
| -- | Tim Wright | NE | DET | 13 | -- | -- | 25 |
| -- | John Carlson | ARI | @SEA | 19 | -- | 20 | -- |
| -- | Marcedes Lewis | JAC | @IND | 25 | -- | -- | 22 |
| -- | Garrett Graham | HOU | CIN | -- | -- | 23 | -- |
| -- | Niles Paul | WAS | @SF | -- | -- | 25 | -- |
★★★