Griffin Wong analyzes his favorite long-shot candidate — Buffalo Bills TE Jackson Hawes — to be the King of the End Zone on Saturday.
The NFL is officially down to four teams in each conference, with the divisional round looming. The eight teams remaining, by and large, aren’t the major characters of the last decade: besides the Los Angeles Rams (2023) and the New England Patriots (2019), none of the remaining teams has won a Super Bowl title in the past decade, and the Houston Texans and Buffalo Bills haven’t won it at all.
The last three weeks of the season will be action-packed, and there’s still a lot to play for. Of course, on the field, the players are vying for a Super Bowl crown, but off the field, DraftKings users can compete in lucrative promotions.
For this afternoon’s two-game slate, DraftKings is bringing back its King of the End Zone promotion. As part of KotEZ, if you place a $5 singles bet on a player in the touchdown scorer market and opt into the contest, you will be eligible to win a share of $2 million in bonus bets if your selected player scores the longest touchdown of the day, regardless of whether or not the bet hits.
With the four teams set to take the field today — the Bills, the Denver Broncos, the San Francisco 49ers, and the Seattle Seahawks — all operating high-scoring offenses, there should be plenty of touchdowns to go around and, thus, plenty of options for the King of the End Zone promotion. These range from favorites like Christian McCaffrey, who has the shortest odds to score, to longer shots. I’ll detail one of the latter.
King of the End Zone — What You Need to Know
The two images below break down everything you need to know about the King of the End Zone contest:
The promotion is fairly simple: as long as you opt in and place a Singles bet with a stake of at least $5 on a TD Scorer prop bet from your cash or DK Dollars balance prior to the scheduled kickoff time between the 49ers and the Seahawks and don’t cash it out, your bet is eligible to receive a share of the prize pool. Passing touchdowns will not count; if you choose any team’s quarterback, he’ll need to run it in himself. Either team’s D/ST, though not an individual player, is eligible to become the King of the End Zone. Your bet doesn’t have to hit; even if you choose a player to score the first TD and it misses but that player scores the longest touchdown of the day, you’ll still receive your share of the bonus pool within 24 hours of the Seattle game’s conclusion.
Best Bills Tight End for King of the End Zone
Jackson Hawes Anytime TD Scorer (+950)
Hawes is definitely a real long shot, given that he ranks just eighth on the team in receptions (averaging fewer than one per game) and ninth in targets and receiving yards. However, with Buffalo’s receiving corps taking back-to-back hits in the Wild Card Round with Gabe Davis and Tyrell Shavers both suffering torn ACL’s, it’s anyone’s guess what the Bills’ offense will look like this afternoon. It’s clear that Josh Allen trusts him in crunch time: despite his low overall target share, he ranks fifth on the team in touchdowns. His first career catch came late in the fourth quarter of Buffalo’s epic Week 1 win over the Baltimore Ravens, and it nearly went for a 30-yard score.
Though Nate Wiggins dragged him down at the one-yard line that time, he managed a 26-yard score against the Miami Dolphins in Week 9, which would’ve been the longest touchdown in six of Buffalo’s games, including each of the three most recent ones. Plus, he had some success finding the end zone in college, leading Yale in 2022 with four scores. He’s a highly efficient pass-catcher, with a 78.9% success rate that led all players with at least one target per game, and he ranks third among 75 qualified tight ends by Pro Football Focus’ overall grades. He’s also been the best tackle-breaker among the Bills’ three tight ends, shedding two tackles on his 16 catches.
Denver’s elite defense won’t make things easy for any target, but that could actually work in Hawes’ favor. The Broncos have been incredible against opposing wide receivers, allowing the 14th-fewest receiving yards and the fewest touchdowns to the position, but tight ends have managed to accumulate the ninth-most yards and a solid six scores. Plus, given Denver’s blitz-heavy scheme, Hawes’ elite blocking — especially vis-a-vis Dalton Kincaid’s — could put him on the field for a greater proportion of snaps than usual. It’s not hard to imagine him winning his matchup before leaking out for a dump-off and bullying one of the Broncos’ smaller safeties in open space. Plus, Denver operates in man coverage at the league’s second-highest rate, and Hawes has the third-highest receiving grades against man coverage of any tight end league-wide.
