Juwan Johnson 2026 Season Preview — what repeats, what doesn't | Muffed

Only two tight ends in football gained more receiving yards last season than Juwan Johnson. He goes off boards seventeenth at the position, pick one-forty — and the offseason New Orleans spent buying pass-catchers is the market's whole argument. The tape says one thing, the depth chart memo says another, and this episode is about which one repeats.

The season, a career year in year six: all seventeen games, seventy-seven catches on a hundred two targets for eight hundred eighty-nine yards and three touchdowns. Eight-point-three Half-PPR points a game, sixteenth among tight ends per game, tenth in total points. Third at the position in receiving yards — only Trey McBride and Kyle Pitts had more — and fifth in catches. He drew eighteen-point-one percent of the Saints' targets and caught seventy-five percent of them, on a six-and-eleven team that spent its year auditioning quarterbacks. One flag for later: three touchdowns on a hundred two targets is a cold rate, and cold rates correct too.

The career took the long road here: an undrafted receiver in twenty-twenty, converted to tight end, then one-two, three-six, seven-one, six-one, six-five — and the leap to eight-three. The volume grew a full step last year: from around four targets a game his whole career to six.

Now the tight end pattern, read both directions for once. Targets are identity — point-eight year over year in the current era, n of two hundred thirty-eight — which cuts for him: a six-target-a-game season is now the most recent evidence of who he is. But the library also knows where those targets came from: a depleted room. The honest question isn't whether his volume sticks — it's whether it was ever his, or just unclaimed.

[[SITUATION]]

Because New Orleans spent the offseason claiming it. Jordyn Tyson at pick eight. Tight end Noah Fant, two years, in March. A third-round tight end, Oscar Delp — drafted primarily to block, per Kellen Moore's own draft comments. Travis Etienne's checkdowns. And Chris Olave, extension-hunting by camp. The counterweight, per nola.com's June reporting: Moore wants more twelve-personnel — the Saints ran it on eleven percent of snaps last year, near the league floor by their own accounting — so two tight ends on the field is the stated plan, not a contradiction. Johnson himself, at OTAs: the additions give the offense, quote, a lot of flexibility. The quarterback matters most: Tyler Shough, the committed year-two starter, threw him five hundred twenty-one of the eight hundred eighty-nine yards in his nine late-season starts, per Louisiana Sports — chemistry the front office restructured his deal around in March, keeping him signed through twenty-twenty-seven.

The price: TE17 at pick one-forty for the sixteenth tight end by rate and tenth by total — the market prices the new mouths, not the incumbent's scoreboard. [pause] Our verdict: no call — the friendly kind. The rate stats sit at the price, the totals sit a tier above it, and we can't verify in July how a hundred two targets divide among four new claimants. Caveat, both ways: if the twelve-personnel plan is real, the room got bigger without his slice shrinking — and if Tyson is what eighth picks usually are, last year's share was the high-water mark and TE17 is exactly right.

Watch September targets against the six-a-game baseline, and his red-zone share — three touchdowns on this volume is the stat most likely to move, in either direction. The Shough connection is the tell: if the first-read looks survive the new toys, the career year wasn't a vacancy — it was a job. [[CLOSE]] If he's on your roster, this show covers all of it — every player, every week, all season.