3 tight ends NY Jets could claim to upgrade over Ruckert

The New York Jets’ initial 53-man roster is set.

As expected, it features three tight ends: Mason Taylor, Jeremy Ruckert, and Stone Smartt.

While Taylor is a promising young starter, the depth behind him is among the worst in the NFL. Ruckert has struggled to both block and catch at the NFL level, issues that carried into the 2025 preseason. Smartt (226 pounds) is more of a quasi-wide receiver than a true tight end.

New York needs help at this position, both in terms of receiving and blocking. The Jets project to run the ball heavily and utilize a bevy of 12 personnel (2 TE) packages. Going into the year with Ruckert and Smartt as their second and third tight ends would make life very difficult for offensive coordinator Tanner Engstrand.

Luckily, the Jets have many opportunities to find upgrades over Ruckert and Smartt on the waiver wire.

Here are three tight ends who the Jets should explore claiming after they were waived on cutdown day.

Jelani Woods (Colts)

The Colts chose Jelani Woods in the third round of the 2022 draft. Injuries have derailed his career since then.

In his rookie year, Woods caught 25 passes for 312 yards and three touchdowns in 15 games. He was on a promising trajectory late in the year, finishing with 18 receptions for 233 yards over his final six games (38.8 yards per game).

Woods has yet to receive a chance to build on that finish. He missed the entire 2023 season due to multiple hamstring injuries and also missed the entire 2024 season with a toe injury.

Woods played well in the 2025 preseason, catching seven passes for 75 yards. Pro Football Focus graded him as the top receiver among tight ends in the preseason (min. 5 targets), thanks to the fact that he displayed impressive contested-catch and YAC ability across his small sample of chances.

Coming out of Virginia, Woods was an athletic specimen. He ran a 4.61 in the forty and boasted mammoth 34.5-inch arms.

The 6-foot-7, 253-pound Woods has never been known for his blocking, but he would offer a higher pass-catching ceiling than Ruckert, while his frame makes him a more viable in-line blocker than Smartt.

Keleki Latu (Bills)

An undrafted rookie from Washington, Keleki Latu flashed as a blocker for Buffalo this preseason. His 86.2 run-blocking grade at Pro Football Focus ranked second among tight ends (min. 20 run-blocking snaps).

Latu is on a promising trajectory as a blocker. After struggling early in his career for both Cal and Nevada, Latu took a leap after joining Washington in 2024, rating as PFF’s fifth-best run-blocking tight end in the Big Ten (73.8 grade). He also caught 40 passes for 371 yards and a touchdown without any drops, the most receptions without a drop among Big Ten tight ends.

On his NFL.com scouting report, Latu’s willingness, technique, and positioning as a blocker were praised, but he was knocked for his need to add more strength.

Latu was listed at only 234 pounds at the combine, which his scouting report noted was already a 20-pound jump since he was a freshman. Notably, Latu is now listed at 244 pounds by the Bills’ website, which shows he is making the strides he needs to. It translated to his preseason blocking production.

Progressively getting stronger and improving as a blocker, Latu would fit well in a Jets tight end room desperate for blocking help. Plucking him from a division rival only adds to the appeal.

Greg Dulcich (Giants)

If the Jets are purely interested in pass-catching ability, Greg Dulcich is an appealing option.

Dulcich was chosen by the Broncos in the third round of the 2022 draft. He had a promising rookie year, racking up 33 receptions for 411 yards and two touchdowns in just 10 games (41.1 yards per game).

Dulcich was limited to just two games in 2023 due to a hamstring injury. While he was available in 2024, he was a healthy scratch for most of the season, finishing with just five catches in nine games.

After latching onto the Giants, Dulcich stood out in this year’s preseason, catching seven passes for 53 yards and three touchdowns.

Dulcich will not help the Jets’ blocking issues. He was knocked for his blocking as a prospect coming out of UCLA, and that has translated to the NFL, as Dulcich has consistently earned poor run-blocking grades in both the regular season and preseason.

However, the 6-foot-4, 245-pound Dulcich is a solid athlete (8.23 Relative Athletic Score) who can make some plays as an F tight end, which Ruckert has not proven he is capable of. You can do much better than Dulcich in the Y role, but he is more viable there than Smartt.

Dulcich has his warts, but he racked up more receiving yards in his 2022 rookie year than either Ruckert (264) or Smartt (380) have in their entire careers. If the Jets are willing to live with porous blocking to bolster their receiving chops at tight end, Dulcich is a solid choice.

After all, it’s not as if it gets much worse than Ruckert and Smartt in the blocking department, anyway, so boosting the unit’s receiving ability with a player who struggles to block would still be a net positive.