Dalton
Keene.
Dalton
Keene.
Virginia Tech· 6'4"· 253 lb· 4.71s 40
"A Virginia Tech chess piece who lined up everywhere and blocked like he meant it, drafted by New England as half of a two-pick attempt to replace Rob Gronkowski."Pre-draft read
Keene is a positionless offensive piece more than a conventional tight end. Virginia Tech lined him up inline, at fullback, in the slot and out wide, and handed him the ball eleven times as a junior. At 6-4 and 251 pounds he blocks like a tight end who wants the job, attacking linebackers in the hole and sustaining on the move.
As a receiver he is a short-to-intermediate target rather than a seam threat, strong through contact after the catch and able to convert on third down. What he lacks is separation speed and a refined route tree: he wins on scheme and physicality, not by beating coverage in space. The signature is versatility, the H-back who lets an offense keep personnel on the field and change what it is without substituting.
A multiple personnel offense that uses an H-back to disguise formations, motioning him from the backfield to the wing to the slot while leaning on play-action.
Year 1 second tight end and special-teams contributor, with a ceiling as a starting move tight end in a run-first play-action offense.
A spread passing offense that asks its tight end to win vertically down the seam and carry a 70-target receiving load.
Virginia Tech TE Dalton Keene Highlight Reel - 2019 Season
Full junior-season cutup showing the alignment variety and the run-game blocking.
VT Dalton Keene Catches 3 Touchdowns vs. Miami
His career game as a receiver, three scores against Miami in 2019.
Dalton Keene College Highlights | New England Patriots
Post-draft college reel framing what New England expected from the H-back role.
A Colorado kid out of Chatfield High in Littleton, Keene played immediately at Virginia Tech, appearing in thirteen games with twelve starts as a true freshman in 2017 and catching 10 passes for 167 yards. He doubled the workload as a sophomore with 28 catches for 341 yards and three touchdowns, earning honorable mention All-ACC, with a 67-yard touchdown at Duke and a game-winning one-yard grab at North Carolina.
The junior year was his most complete. He caught 21 passes for 240 yards and five touchdowns, including a three-touchdown game at Miami, and added eleven carries for 33 yards as the Hokies used him as a runner. He finished with 59 receptions for 748 yards and eight touchdowns across 38 games, modest counting numbers that never told the story of how his offense actually used him.
He declared after his junior season and the evaluation split on what he actually was. The blocking, the toughness and the positional flexibility were legitimate NFL traits, but no team projected him as a volume pass-catcher, and his production came in an offense that threw little. Bill Belichick, who has always coveted moveable pieces at the position, took him at 101, ten picks after Devin Asiasi, spending twice to rebuild a tight end room after Rob Gronkowski left.
- 01
Positional versatility
Lined up inline, at fullback, in the slot and out wide, and carried the ball, letting an offense shift identity without substituting.
- 02
Willing blocker
Attacks linebackers in the hole and sustains on the move, the tight-end trait teams trust immediately on run downs.
- 03
Yards after contact
Strong through tackles once he has the ball, converting short throws into first downs rather than going down on contact.
- 04
Early starter
Twelve starts as a true freshman in the ACC, with 38 games and 36 starts across three seasons before declaring.
- 05
Red-zone production
Eight career touchdowns on only 59 catches, including a three-score game at Miami as a junior.
- 01
No separation speed
Wins on scheme and physicality rather than beating man coverage, which caps his role in a passing game.
- 02
Raw route tree
Ran a narrow set of routes at Virginia Tech and had never been asked to win on the option or the seam consistently.
- 03
Modest production
748 receiving yards across three college seasons, too little volume to project as a starting receiving tight end.
- 04
Declared early
Left after his junior year with technique still unfinished, betting on traits at a position that usually takes three NFL seasons.
Relative Athletic Score (Kent Lee Platte) benchmarks combine/pro-day numbers against every measured prospect at the position since 1987. 10.00 is elite; 5.00 is average.
— — — positional median (p50)
- 40 yd
- 4.71sp50
- Vertical
- 34inp50
- Broad jump
- 125inp50
- Three-cone
- 7.07sp50
- Shuttle
- 4.19sp50
- Bench
- 21repp50
| Yr | Team | G | Rec | Yds | TD |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 2017 | Virginia Tech | 13 | 10 | 167 | 0 |
| 2018 | Virginia Tech | 12 | 28 | 341 | 3 |
| 2019 | Virginia Tech | 13 | 21 | 240 | 5 |
| Career | — | 38 | 59 | 748 | 8 |
Receiving lines from Sports-Reference with bowl games included; the three seasons sum exactly to the 38-game, 59-catch, 748-yard, eight-touchdown career total. Start counts come from The Football Database, which lists 36 starts across the three seasons with a slightly different 2017 game split; the per-season figures here follow Sports-Reference for games and the school release for starts. He also carried the ball eleven times for 33 yards as a junior, rushing production not captured in the tight end keys.
A dash means the figure is not published by a source we trust — never a zero we invented.
A blocking-first second tight end who lasts years in the league catching twenty passes a season.
The ceiling: a positionless offensive weapon whose value comes from letting a coordinator disguise personnel every snap.
A tight end who bounces between practice squads and rosters without ever establishing a defined role.
Everything above is the pre-draft evaluation. This section is what actually happened — updated year over year.
New England drafted him to be a piece and then lost him to the training room. Keene played six games as a rookie in 2020 and caught three passes for sixteen yards, the only production of his professional career. He missed all of 2021 on injured reserve, and the Patriots released him in August 2022, two years and three catches after spending a third-round pick on him.
Philadelphia waived him before camp, Houston signed him in 2023 and shuttled him between the practice squad and the active roster, elevating him for one game against Cincinnati in Week 10 with no targets. He signed a reserve/future deal with the Texans in January 2024 and has not appeared in a regular-season game since. The career line is seven games and three receptions for sixteen yards. In hindsight the pick belongs to an unusual pair: New England took Asiasi at 91 and Keene at 101 to replace Gronkowski, and neither ever caught on. The versatility that made him interesting needed snaps to be useful, and the injuries never let him accumulate any.