The Brees & Payton Era- Modern Era Icon
- Franchise Legend
Jimmy Graham
- Position
- TETight End
- Number
- #80
- Saints years
- 2010–2014
- NFL career
- 2010–2021
- Era
- The Brees & Payton Era
- Franchise
- New Orleans Saints
Honors
- First-team All-Pro
- 3x Pro Bowl as a Saint
- Saints single-season receiving touchdown record
Also played for Seattle Seahawks (2015–2017), Green Bay Packers / Chicago Bears (2018–2021).
Why he’s a legend
The legacy
Jimmy Graham played four years of basketball at Miami and one season of football before the Saints took him in the third round in 2010. Within two years he was the most difficult matchup in the NFL: too fast for linebackers, too tall for safeties, and the primary red-zone target on a team that scored more than anyone. His 16 receiving touchdowns in 2013 are the Saints single-season record.
Why he matters
- Saints single-season record for receiving touchdowns, with 16 in 2013.
- First-team All-Pro in 2013 and three Pro Bowl selections as a Saint.
- He is the franchise’s most productive tight end by a wide margin, in an offense that had never used the position that way.
- A third-round pick with one season of college football — one of the most extreme development stories in modern NFL history.
- His usage helped define the modern "move" tight end that the rest of the league then copied.
Defining moment
Sixteen touchdowns
2013 season
Graham caught 16 touchdown passes in 2013, the most any Saint has caught in a season, and was named first-team All-Pro. The Saints won eleven games and their first playoff game on the road in franchise history that January.
Career statistics
Current through the 2021 season
With the Saints
- Seasons
- 5
- Single-Season TD Record
- 16 (2013)
- Pro Bowls as a Saint
- 3
- Draft
- 2010, 95th overall
Where he ranks
- #1Saints Single-Season Receiving Touchdowns16 (2013)Saints all-time
Honors & accolades
League awards & All-Pro
- First-team All-Pro2013
Selections & records
- 3x Pro Bowl as a Saint2011, 2013, 2014
- Saints single-season receiving touchdown record16 in 2013
Career timeline
12 seasons in the NFL, 5 of them in New Orleans.
- 2010New Orleans SaintsDrafted in the third round out of Miami, after one season of college football
- 2011New Orleans SaintsFirst Pro Bowl; the Saints set an NFL record for total offense
- 2012New Orleans Saints
- 2013New Orleans SaintsFirst-team All-Pro; franchise-record 16 receiving touchdowns
- 2014New Orleans Saints
- 2015Seattle SeahawksTraded to Seattle
- 2016Seattle Seahawks
- 2017Seattle Seahawks
- 2018Green Bay Packers / Chicago Bears
- 2019Green Bay Packers / Chicago Bears
- 2020Green Bay Packers / Chicago Bears
- 2021Green Bay Packers / Chicago Bears
Era context
What the league looked like while Jimmy Graham played it. Raw totals across eras are not like-for-like.
The Brees & Payton Era
2006–2020
A quarterback nobody else wanted, a coach nobody had hired, and a Super Bowl.
- The most pass-friendly rules environment in NFL history to that point; raw passing totals from these years dwarf every earlier era.
- Sixteen-game seasons throughout, with a 12-team playoff field from 2020.
- The franchise won seven division titles in this span, including four consecutive from 2017 to 2020.
Data & sources
Statistics on this profile are current through the 2021 season.
- A verified season-by-season line for his five Saints seasons is not compiled in this profile, so no season table is shown.
