Fantasy Football: One Potential Cut Candidate for Every AFC Team

Pittsburgh Steelers - Vance McDonald

Cap Savings: $3.645 million

Dead Money: $2.18 million

The future seemed to be bright for Vance McDonald heading into the 2018 season, especially after a 16-target, 10-reception day in the Pittsburgh Steelers playoff loss to the Jacksonville Jaguars in the 2017 postseason.

His season wasn’t awful, with McDonald logging 50 receptions (on 72 targets) for 610 yards and 4 touchdowns. But these are not exactly mind-blowing numbers. McDonald averaged 3.3 receptions and 40.7 yards per game. On a per-play basis, McDonald was moderately efficient. One of 19 tight ends to see at least 50 targets, McDonald was 7th in Target NEP per target with 0.42 and 8th in Reception NEP per target with 0.70.

He wasn't bad by any means, but 11 tight ends saw more targets than him as he split time with Jesse James. Antonio Brown and JuJu Smith-Schuster commanded a lion’s share of the targets, not to mention that McDonald was less efficient than James, who caught 33 of his 39 targets and finished with 0.60 Target NEP per target and 0.85 Reception NEP per target.

McDonald doesn’t justify commanding the 13th richest tight end contract in the NFL, and he may be asked to take a pay cut. However, if the Steelers do end up dealing Brown, they may want to keep McDonald around since he's shown big-play ability.