Lamar Jackson to Mark Andrews: The most important QB-TE combination in the NFL

Every great quarterback needs a great pass-catcher, even when that QB runs as much as Lamar Jackson. For Jackson, his most important passing-game relationship is with Baltimore’s budding star at tight end, Mark Andrews.

In his third year out of Oklahoma, Andrews might not be as familiar a name to NFL fans as Travis Kelce, George Kittle, Zach Ertz or Rob Gronkowski. But starting with a “Monday Night Football” showdown against Kelce, the third-year Ravens tight end will begin to show a national audience that he deserves to be in the same conversation as the best tight ends in football.

Even more so, Andrews might already have claim to a different title. While those other top tight ends reside with great wide receivers or in run-heavy offenses, Andrews is the most important piece of Jackson’s passing, making Lamar Jackson to Mark Andrews the most important quarterback-tight end combination in the NFL.

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How good is Mark Andrews?

Andrews was the rare college tight end who put up big numbers. In his junior season at Oklahoma in 2017, Andrews caught 62 passes for 958 yards. That won him the John Mackey Award as the best tight end in the country. But he fell to the third round of the 2018 NFL Draft because of concerns over his non-receiving skillset. The Ravens even picked a different tight end, Hayden Hurst out of South Carolina, in the first round before doubling down at the position with Andrews in the third. 

In 2018, Andrews’ rookie year, the Ravens still depended on Joe Flacco at quarterback for more than half the season before Jackson took over. At that point, Baltimore ran most of its offense through Jackson and the ground game, so Andrews finished with 34 catches and three touchdowns. As Jackson broke out in 2019, so did Andrews, catching 64 passes for 852 yards and 10 touchdowns. That endeared him to fantasy owners, but with the broader NFL discussion focusing mostly on Jackson, Andrews didn’t get his full due.

It didn’t help that Andrews failed to show up in two of Baltimore’s highest-profile 2019 games. Against the Chiefs in Week 3, Andrews caught three passes for 15 yards. Then when the Ravens were knocked out of the playoffs by the Titans, Andrews again lacked big plays, finishing with four catches for 39 yards. He didn’t score in either of those losses. 

Andrews has picked up his production right where he left off (aside from those losses) in 2020: He caught six passes for 58 yards and a touchdown in Week 1. That was followed by 29 receiving yards on one catch in Week 2, but that came while Baltimore focused on running the ball down Houston’s throat.

Why Lamar Jackson needs Mark Andrews

To make the case that Andrews is more important to Jackson than Travis Kelce is to Patrick Mahomes, or George Kittle to Jimmy Garoppolo, we need to look at those situations. In Kansas City, it’s pretty simple: Tyreek Hill is a better wideout for Mahomes than anyone Jackson has in Baltimore (no offense, Marquise Brown). And San Francisco is one of the most run-heavy teams in football, relying on its running backs for yardage whether Kittle is at tight end or whether it’s Jordan Reed or Ross Dwelley, as it’s been the past two weeks in two 49ers victories. 

It was Brown who got the early headlines in 2019 thanks to his two long touchdowns in Week 1, but he didn’t live up to that hype the rest of the season. It was Andrews who Jackson relied on consistently in the red zone and to move the chains. Andrews led the Ravens in receiving by more than 200 yards a season ago. Jackson targeted him 14 times in the red zone — each of the seven times those passes were completed, Andrews finished the play in the end zone with a touchdown. 

Think back to Vernon Davis in San Francisco under offensive coordinator Greg Roman, who currently fills that same role with the Ravens. Davis finished second on the 49ers in receiving yards from Alex Smith in 2011 and Colin Kaepernick in 2013. Throwing to the tight end is a key component to Roman’s offense, especially when options are incorporated for the quarterback — it’s often the early-releasing tight end over the middle as the best player to throw to on run-pass options. When that tight end is as athletic as Davis or Andrews, who ran a 4.67-second 40-yard dash at the NFL Combine, there’s huge potential for chunk yardage and touchdowns.

How Mark Andrews can reach Travis Kelce’s level

Andrews and Kelce will be the unsung story of a Week 3 2020 game that will be all about Jackson vs. Mahomes. Kelce has been a top-two tight end in football for the past five years — he’s broken the 1,000-yard receiving mark in each of the past four seasons and already has 140 yards through two games this year. As long as Andrews plays in a Jackson-led offense, his raw totals may not approach those heights because of the frequency with which Jackson himself runs.

At least in 2019, Andrews was already the bigger-play threat, averaging 0.6 yards per catch more than Kelce (and Andrews’ yards per catch has increased from 13.3 to 14.5 in the small sample size of 2020). Kelce reels in a higher percentage of his targets, although some of that can be chalked up to the difference in arm talent between Jackson and Mahomes. Andrews still had a better yardage per route run than Kelce in 2019, second only to Kittle, according to Pro Football Focus.

Baltimore takes Andrews off the field on about a third of its plays as the Ravens often prefer Nick Boyle in run-blocking situations, which isn’t a move the Chiefs make with Kelce on running downs. But if anything, that might just be good for Andrews’ long-term health, and not as much a condemnation of his blocking chops. 

The reality is that on a per-play basis, Andrews might already be as good as Kelce. Put him in Kansas City’s offense and he’d rival Kelce’s massive numbers. And because the Ravens don’t have a dynamic outside target like Hill, Andrews is that much more important to Jackson and one of football’s most potent offenses.