The best tight ends in Washington history

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July 7, 2025

by Steve Thomas

Welcome back to yet another column in my recent series on the best players in Redskins Washington Football Team Commanders Washington franchise history at different positions.  Thusfar, I’ve covered the following:

The point of this series – which I’ve intentionally taken on during the slowest time of the NFL season – is to see which players are the historically biggest producers in team history, but also how they stack up against the best in NFL history.  Since I’ve already covered the rest of the ball-carrying positions, I thought I’d tackle right ends next.  The truth is that while Washington has had a handful of standout tight ends, they haven’t had many that are at or even anywhere near the top of the NFL’s food chain.  Regardless, we’ll explore the list today.

One caveat here is that while the receiving statistics are an integral part of the tight end position, they can’t quantify a player’s blocking ability, or even give any insight into that particular skill.  Since the basis for this series of columns is essentially statistical excellence, I’m going to leave blocking out of this analysis.  Just understand that what’s left is only a part of the job of a tight end, particularly one who plays mostly in the inline position.  My lists here really only evaluate pass-catching tight ends.

The other point of note here is that tight ends have become much more of a factor in NFL offenses over the years; consequently, many of the great tight ends of prior generations don’t register on things like lists of top statistical performance.  Keep that in mind as we proceed.

As a bonus, I’m also going to address the question of whether the Redskins’ Jerry Smith belongs in the Hall of Fame.

Receptions

The following chart shows the top 10 career receptions by tight ends in Washington history:

Name Years # catches
Chris Cooley 2004 – 2012 429
Jerry Smith 1965 – 1977 376
Jordan Reed 2013 – 2018 329
Don Warren 1979 – 1992 244
Logan Thomas 2020 – 2023 184
Fred Davis 2008 – 2013 162
Jamie Asher 1995 – 1998 133
Clint Didier 1982 – 1987 129
Stephen Alexander 1998 – 2001 122
Vernon Davis 2016 – 2019 122

As the list shows, it’s Cooley, Smth, and Reed, then everyone else.  The fact that the likes of Fred Davis and Jamie Asher are in the top 10 should tell you everything you need to know about the status of Washington’s tight ends over the decades.  It’s a pretty barren group, folks.

Tony Gonzalez had 1325 receptions both the Falcons and Chiefs from 1997 – 2013, which is the most in NFL history, followed by Jason Witten, who had 1228 for the Cowboys and Raiders from 2003 – 2020.  Coming in third is the Chiefs’ Travis Kelce, who has 1004 receptions and counting from 2013 – 2024, followed by the Chargers’ Antonio Gates, who had 955 receptions from 2003 – 2018, and Shannon Sharpe, who had 815 receptions for the Ravens and Broncos from 1990 – 2003.  Cooley’s 429 receptions is ranked 36th in NFL history.

Receiving yards

The following table shows Washington’s top 10 tight ends as measured by receiving yards:

Name Years Rec yards
Jerry Smith 1965 – 1977 4870
Chris Cooley 2004 – 2012 4711
Jordan Reed 2013 – 2018 3371
Don Warren 1979 – 1992 2536
Fred Davis 2008 – 2013 2043
Clint Didier 1982 – 1987 1815
Vernon Davis 2016 – 2019 1721
Logan Thomas 2020 – 2023 1685
Jean Fugett 1976 – 1979 1460
Jamie Asher 1995 – 1998 1421

Obviously, these numbers aren’t great – bear in mind, these are career receiving yards.  To put this into context, Logan Paulsen is #15 on Washington’s list with just 801 yards.

The #1 tight end in NFL history as measured by receiving yards is Gonzalez, who had 15,127 yards, followed by Witten, who had 13,046 yards from 2003 – 2020, then Kelce, with 12,151, Gates, with 11,84, and Sharpe, with 10,060.

Yards per reception

The following chart shows the Washington tight ends with over 50 career receptions who had the highest average yards per reception:

Name Years # Rec YPR
Terry Orr 1986 – 1993 52 18.1
Bill Anderson 1961 – 1962 63 16.2
Jean Fugett 1976 – 1979 98 14.9
Vernon Davis 2016 – 2019 122 14.1
Clint Didier 1982 – 1987 129 14.1
Preston Carpenter 1964 – 1966 57 13.9
Pat Richter 1963 – 1969 80 13.3
Jerry Smith 1965 – 1977 376 13.0
Fred Davis 2008 – 2013 162 12.6
Niles Paul 2014 – 2017 52 11.6

Chris Cooley averaged 11.0 yards per reception throughout his career in Washington, which was ranked 11th.  Terry Orr’s 18.1 average is an outstanding number, ranked 4th in NFL history for tight ends and better than most wide receivers.

The rest of the NFL’s top 5 for tight ends with 50 or more receptions are, in order, (1) Jacque MacKinnon, who had 103 receptions with the Raiders and Chargers from 1961 – 1970 and averaged 19.3 yards per reception, (2) Billy Cannon, who had 104 receptions for the Chiefs and Raiders from 1965 – 1970 and averaged 18.6 yards per reception, (3) Morris Straud, who had 54 receptions for the Chiefs from 1969 – 1974 and averaged 18.1 yards per reception, (4) Orr, and (5) Rich Caster, who had 248 receptions for the 4 different teams, including Washington, from 1970 – 1982 and averaged 17.3 yards per reception.  Interestingly, the highest ranked tight end of the modern era is Rob Gronkowski, who is ranked all the way down at 33 with 15.0 yards per reception in 621 receptions from 2010 – 2021.  This is doubtlessly due to the changing nature of offensive and defensive strategies as the game has evolved.

Terry Orr is one of the few Washington players who has been ranked in the top 10 of any of the lists I’ve published over the last several weeks.

Touchdowns

The following chart shows the Washington tight ends with the most career receiving touchdowns for Washington:

Name Years # TDs
Jerry Smith 1965 – 1977 54
Chris Cooley 2004 – 2012 33
Jordan Reed 2013 – 2018 24
Jean Fugett 1976 – 1979 21
Clint Didier 1982 – 1987 19
Logan Thomas 2020 – 2023 14
Fred Davis 2008 – 2013 13
Pat Richter 1963 – 1969 12
Terry Orr 1986 – 1993 10
Stephen Alexander 1998 – 2001 9

By this measure, it’s clearly Jerry Smith and then everyone else.  It’s pretty telling that this list goes down to a player who only had 9 touchdowns.  As far as the NFL at large goes, the Chargers Antonio Gates is #1 with 116 touchdowns from 2003 – 2018, followed by Tony Gonzalez with 111 from 1997 – 2013, Rob Gronkowsi with 92 from 2010 – 2021, Jimmy Graham with 89 from 2010 – 2023, and Travis Kelce, with 77 from 2013 – 2024.  Smith’s 54 touchdowns is tied for 11th.

The Jerry Smith debate

The fact of the matter is that Washington hasn’t had a ton of tight ends who were elite by statistical standards as compared to the NFL’s best.  Jerry Smith, however, was arguably one of them.  He came out as homosexual after he retired, and speculation has persisted for decades that he has been kept out of the Hall of Fame for that reason.  It’s possible, and there’s no evidence either in support of or against that view.  What I can say is that currently, just 10 tight ends have been enshrined in the Hall of Fame, including Antonio Gates, who will be enshrined this year.  This is the list of the 10, including their year of enshrinement, years played, number of catches, receiving yards, and touchdowns, sorted by year of enshrinement, followed by all of Smith’s stats:

Name Years # catches Yards # TDs
Mike Ditka (1988) 1961 – 1972 427 5812 43
John Mackey (1992) 1963 – 1972 331 5236 38
Jackie Smith (1994) 1963 – 1978 480 7918 40
Kellen Winslow (1995) 1979 – 1987 541 6741 45
Ozzie Newsome (1999) 1978 – 1990 662 7980 47
Dave Casper (2002) 1974 – 1984 378 5216 52
Charlie Sanders (2007) 1968 – 1977 336 4817 31
Shannon Sharpe (2011) 1990 – 2003 815 10060 62
Tony Gonzalez (2019) 1997 – 2013 1325 15127 111
Antonio Gates (2025) 2003 – 2018 955 11841 116
Jerry Smith 1965 – 1977 421 5496 60

Comparing Smith to the enshrinees of his era, i.e. Ditka, Mackey, Jackie Smith, and Charlie Sanders, his stats are in the ballpark of all of them; in fact, his numbers are better than all of statistics for both Mackey and Casper, and he had more touchdowns than both Ditka and Jackie Smith.  Throwing the late 1970s – 1980s era players into it brings both Kellen Winslow and Ozzie Newsome into the debate; however, both of them have significantly better stats than Jerry Smith.  In my view, comparing the statistics of tight ends from the 1960s through the early 1980s with those of more recent players is not a fair evaluation given the changing nature of NFL offenses.

The following chart shows the number of Pro Bowl selections, First and Second-Team All Pro selections, and Super Bowls for each player:

Name # PBs # AP # SB
Mike Ditka (1988) 5 5 1
John Mackey (1992) 5 3 1
Jackie Smith (1994) 5 4 0
Kellen Winslow (1995) 5 4 0
Ozzie Newsome (1999) 3 6 0
Dave Casper (2002) 5 4 1
Charlie Sanders (2007) 7 3 0
Shannon Sharpe (2011) 8 7 3
Tony Gonzalez (2019) 14 10 0
Antonio Gates (2025) 8 5 0
Jerry Smith 2 2 0

Jerry Smith doesn’t measure up by these standards.  He has the lowest number of both Pro Bowl and All Pro selections.

I’m too young to have lived through his era of football, but certainly, Mike Ditka had a higher profile than Smith since Ditka was the head coach of 1985 Chicago Bears.  However, the other players of Smith’s era – Mackey, Smith, and Casper – probably don’t.  Therefore, I don’t believe his public profile had anything to do with it.

After looking at this, did Jerry Smith belong in the Hall of Fame?  Statistically, yes; however, his Pro Bowl and All-Pro selections don’t measure up.  It’s a question of opinion, and we’ll probably never know whether Smith’s sexual orientation hurt him in the eyes of the voting panel.  In my view, I could take it or leave it either way – he’s probably an oversight, but a minor one at best for an institution which has many oversights.  Smith is still eligible for selection through the Senior Committee.

What are your thoughts?  Let me know in the comment section.