Best Hands: Cade Otton?
December 5th, 2023
Bounced back.
Joe will not out the multi-year NFL credentialed reporter, but a powerful yet accurate observation was made midway through Bucs training camp this summer.
After a practice and following many interviews, this reporter came into the media workroom, sat down and said, “Man, this team puts the ball on the ground a lot.”
Said reporter was accurate. And what unnerved Joe was from Joe’s own observations, there was a clear culprit for dropped balls. That was second-year tight end Cade Otton.
(Backup tight end Payne Durham and currently unemployed receiver Kaylon Geiger weren’t far behind).
Joe doesn’t remember a practice where Otton didn’t drop a pass.
So imagine Joe’s surprise when looking at NextGen Stats and saw that among the leaders in catch percentage, there was none other than Otton. What a turnaround!
Otton is 10th in the NFL in catch percentage of targets, grabbing 76 percent of the passes aimed his way. If you had told Joe after training camp that Otton would have caught over 75 percent of his targets into early December, Joe would have been shocked.
Good job by Otton working his way through the dropsies, though Joe realizes drops aren’t directly tied to catch percentage.
Also interesting is in the top-10 players with highest catch percentage, seven are tight ends. Is this because tight ends generally catch shorter passes, which are often easier catches?
December 5th, 2023 at 3:08 pm
Yeah, hes not good yet- but hes getting there.
I think we’ll be set with Otton and Durham.
They need lots of reps and game snaps- but they’ll get there.
December 5th, 2023 at 3:11 pm
Wonder how much it had to do with losing the gloves
December 5th, 2023 at 3:12 pm
Interesting too that it says Otton is 13th in seperation, and the 8th best at TE. Maybe he’s better than we think he is and he’s being held back by QB play.
Evans is 5th in targeted air yards per play. Laughably former Buc J. Watson is 2nd. For the Baker Bois who claim that Baker is just as good as Mahomes because they have similar stats – just look at those two WR names again and get back to me. LOL!
Also note that Godwin and Evans are both in the top 20 in terms of cushion given by defenses.
December 5th, 2023 at 3:14 pm
In other news, Antoine Winfield is the Bucs Payton Man of the Year nominee.
Way to go, ‘Toine!
December 5th, 2023 at 3:28 pm
Keep it up Mr Otten!
December 5th, 2023 at 3:37 pm
2nd year Tight end playing 99% of the snaps.. we rely on this guy alot, give him props
December 5th, 2023 at 3:41 pm
I appreciate his improvement in chipping and getting in the way of defenders more. Hes getting better at doing the dirty work, and he is taking care of his opportunities when he gets them.
December 5th, 2023 at 3:41 pm
Bull Durahm
December 5th, 2023 at 3:42 pm
I consider Baker above average and am glad to have him as QB. Every time someone makes a catch it’s because he threw them a catchable ball, don’t forget.
December 5th, 2023 at 3:46 pm
Heck of a time to have this article considering Otton didn’t get a target/catch last Sunday. That’s one way to keep that rate up.
December 5th, 2023 at 4:12 pm
Otton has a rough off season and training camp but he has slowly risen as a reliable player during the season.
December 5th, 2023 at 4:25 pm
We need to give Durham more snaps, like otton but not sold on him being a te1 but then again the OC could be the problem.
December 5th, 2023 at 4:29 pm
I like Cade Otton, his blocking is better, and you can trust those hands…..
December 5th, 2023 at 4:45 pm
Brock Bowers
December 5th, 2023 at 5:09 pm
We have so much potential on offense but Baker Mayfield and Dave Canales sorry “19 points a game” as are holding us back. Otton can catch and is 6’5 so he can easily be a mismatch against safeties and linebackers. Mike Evans, Chris Godwin, and Rachaad White are superstars. All our offense is missing is good run blocking. We should be scoring 24-30 points a game like the rest of the top 10 offenses but Dave Canales can’t figure out how to scheme an offense around out best players to where if a defense chooses to take away one of our superstars then our other superstar will be open and Baker Mayfield pedestrian as can’t score more than 2 touchdowns a game because he can’t throw deep balls smh
December 5th, 2023 at 5:44 pm
Is Brock Bowers any good? All I’ve seen him do is get hurt this year.
December 5th, 2023 at 5:48 pm
Zero targets to Otton vs Carolina…..zero targets to any TE……something is very wrong with our offense.
December 5th, 2023 at 6:56 pm
Just saying Baker has not been very impressive. The short throws to Otton and the occasional big play to Mike Evans are about it.
December 5th, 2023 at 8:25 pm
Otton is a stud. Listen TB12 trusted him all year when he was a rookie. If you mess up with TB12 you usually don’t get a 2nd chance. Is he gronk or even baby gronk not even close but that’s what’s wrong with these fans they are expecting gronk like production and that just ain’t happening.
December 5th, 2023 at 9:40 pm
I think when I looked him up earlier his Yards before Catch is an even 4. Should be a high percentage throw and catch. Might be the optimum distance for Mayfield as far as consistently.
He threw a ton of short passes to Chubbs at CLV also. Lot of YAC.
YAC are great on short passes until they are taken away and then it makes it tough moving the chains.
December 5th, 2023 at 9:48 pm
lol! Dude has stone hands. He’s a nice backup tight end. That’s it.
December 5th, 2023 at 10:03 pm
Just imagine if he knew what gloves are.
December 5th, 2023 at 10:07 pm
Jack Clark and Wild Bill: You obviously haven’t see a lot of video on Baker. Take a look on YouTube because he can make EVERY THROW. Do I Think that he’s been off on some of his long throws, yes I do. And that’s strange because I’ve seen him make MANY throws while with the Browns, Panthers and Rams.
December 5th, 2023 at 10:30 pm
This team has some good pieces but needs 2-3 years of good drafts and FA to get back on top respectability.
KEEPERS OFFENSE
OL: Wirfs, Mauch, Goedeke
WR: Evans, Godwin, Palmer
RB: 0
TE: Otton
NEEDED: QB, C, OG, RB, TE
KEEPERS DEFENSE
DL: Vea, Kancey
OLB: Yaya
MLB: LVD
CB: CDIII, Zyon
S: Winfield
NEEDED: DL, OLBx2, LVD, DB, S
December 6th, 2023 at 12:43 pm
He has become a much better receiving threat. If we didn’t waste so many plays on runs to nowehere, he’d probably be having a big year.
The problem is his blocking in the run game is still awful.