Coming off of an unimaginable first 4 video games of his rookie season, Emeka Egbuka was establishing himself as a rising star. He had 18 catches for 282 yards and 4 touchdowns. However Mike Evans missed week 4 and wouldn’t actually return till week 15. Egbuka was transitioning from extra pure positions of the F and Z positions to tackle the first X position in Evans’ absence. Watching these first 4 video games I used to be left with a number of questions.
Would his play within the intermediate a part of the sector enhance? For the entire success he had in weeks 1-4, most of that manufacturing got here on the quick and deep parts of the sector. However in school he was an intermediate weapon. My idea was that Egbuka was nonetheless getting used to the physicality of the NFL sport and after adjusting to it this a part of his sport would enhance.
Might he discover a method to beat press? Quinyon Mitchell and Sauce Gardner gave him some bother with jams. Would extra groups attempt to use that to blunt his manufacturing? And will he develop an answer for it?
Would his contested catch charge enhance? A part of the center of subject success he had in school was his skill to make troublesome catch-on-collision grabs. However to begin his NFL profession his efforts on this space had been struggling.
Bucs WR Emeka Egbuka – Picture by: USA At the moment
What Continued From Q1
The muse of his sport didn’t transfer. His finest trait popping out of the primary quarter was his really feel for locating room in zone protection, and that held up as essentially the most dependable factor he does. Towards Seattle he manipulated a Cowl 3 rotation to settle an out-and-up into the security’s blind spot for twenty-four yards. Towards each Detroit and New Orleans he discovered the mushy spot in zone for chunk features, together with a 24-yard catch-and-run with the Saints the place he was knocked off his launch, regained his steadiness, and nonetheless positioned the void. When he sees zone, he wins. That continued from weeks 1-4.
The deep ball additionally stayed a catch level and prognosis talent relatively than a pure velocity weapon. The mechanism that produced his early touchdowns was the identical one behind his 50-plus-yard reception towards Seattle. He wins downfield with approach, leverage and palms, not by operating away from individuals.
His versatility continued to point out up, each as a movable piece and as a decoy. The Bucs repeatedly used his routes to maneuver protection for different individuals. Towards Seattle his clear-outs sprang two separate 27-yard catch-and-runs for teammates. His play was serving to the offense past his personal stat-line.
And the central weak spot from Q1 continued too. Separation towards press man was the most important concern popping out of the primary 4 video games, and nothing within the second quarter eased it. When a bodily nook bought his palms on Egbuka on the line, he struggled to detach, the identical downside Mitchell and Gardner uncovered early. If something, it grew to become the defining concern of the stretch, with Detroit and New Orleans leaning into press man towards him.
Bucs WR Emeka Egbuka – Picture by: Cliff Welch/PR
What Modified From Q1
The largest change is the reply to my first query. The intermediate sport got here again. After catching simply one in all six targets between 10 and 20 yards in Q1, with that lone reception approaching a damaged play, he caught seven of 15 such targets in Q2 on a string of designed ideas. A 19-yard curl settled between zone ranges towards Seattle. A 13-yard crosser discovered a void in the course of the sector for 25. An 11-yard dig towards Detroit’s Cowl 3 opened clear for a catch-and-run. The lifeless zone grew to become the a part of the sector they fed him most. My idea that this may include time seems proper, although the mechanism was extra about scheme and zone prognosis than the bodily adjustment I had anticipated.
A very powerful change is one which was not on my Q1 record, as a result of it didn’t exist but. A niche opened between how open he bought and what his manufacturing confirmed, and that hole is the unusual coronary heart of his second quarter. By separation he was extra open in Q2 than in Q1. His common rose and he posted the 2 highest single-game separation marks of his season. By manufacturing he was worse. His catch charge fell, his deep manufacturing dried up after Seattle, and his touchdowns practically disappeared. A participant doesn’t get extra open and fewer productive on the identical time except one thing between the route and the result’s breaking.
Three issues modified. Defenses began taking him away with man protection and further consideration, with New Orleans bracketing him with a double and as soon as a 3rd defender. The standard of targets eroded, most manifestly towards Detroit, the place 5 of his incompletions got here on routes he had gained or come open on, together with a hung deep ball that ought to have been a landing. And he compounded each with drops, two towards San Francisco on adjustment catches and one clear drop towards New Orleans on a route he had already gained.
Bucs WR Emeka Egbuka – Picture by: USA At the moment
The physicality concern from Q1 additionally modified, and never for the higher. In Q1 I framed it as a welcome-to-the-NFL adjustment I anticipated him to grasp. In Q2 it hardened into one thing nearer to a trait. Bodily corners didn’t simply disrupt his timing, they moved him. New Orleans’ Alontae Taylor jammed and rerouted him, and on two separate reps contact practically put him on the bottom.
New and Present Questions Headed Into The Second Half of the Season
Egbuka’s manufacturing began to gradual, largely because of additional consideration from defenses.
Weeks 1-4 per sport manufacturing – 7.75 targets, 4.5 receptions, 70.5 yards, 1 TD
Weeks 5-8 per sport manufacturing – 7.5 targets, 4.0 receptions, 70. 0 receptions, 0.25 TD
A few of my questions have solutions. The intermediate sport is again. The deep ball is an actual talent, not variance, even when the manufacturing cooled. However the second quarter raised more durable questions for the again half, which is the place his documented collapse really occurred.
First, the prevailing query that now issues most. Can he beat press man with any consistency, or solely flash it? That is now not a curiosity; it’s the single greatest think about his sport. The defenses that gave him bother all performed man, and I anticipate extra of it down the stretch. Throughout Weeks 10-14 I wish to know whether or not the jam charge will increase and may he develop any sort of counters?
Second, an present query with a brand new wrinkle. Does the ending enhance? The contested-catch query from Q1 has merged with a brand new drop downside. His palms look glorious on balls in his body and shaky when he has to regulate to an off-target throw, with a clear drop blended in. For a participant whose manufacturing already rides on a slim set of wins, leaving performs on the sector is pricey.
Third, the brand new one. Is the manufacturing hole a quarterback and offense downside that persists, or does it shut? If he retains getting open and the throws hold lacking, the story of his cliff shouldn’t be that he fell off. Is the connection broke? I wish to chart how typically he’s open and never focused, and the way typically the throw is the factor that fails.
And one piece of context shifts beneath all of it. He has one other quarter of the season with out Evans that forces him into the X position extra. However in weeks 15-18 Evans returns. How does that change Egbuka’s utilization, utilization charge and manufacturing?
