Mike Evans is gone from Tampa Bay, but Emeka Egbuka isn’t treating their lone season together like a footnote.
As the Buccaneers head into their first year without Evans since drafting him in 2014, Egbuka looked back on what it meant to share a receiver room with one of the franchise’s defining players. Underdog NFL shared his comments on social media, and the message was simple: the rookie-to-veteran handoff in Tampa Bay left a real mark.
"When you think of Tampa Bay, you think of Mike Evans," Egbuka said. "I'm thankful to have had the year that I had with him."
Egbuka got that chance after Tampa Bay took him in the first round of the 2025 NFL Draft, giving him a front-row seat to learn from a player who had already built a long run of production and recognition with the Buccaneers. For one season, the rookie was around Evans every day, and that experience clearly stuck.
Now the room looks different. Evans is off to the San Francisco 49ers, and Egbuka is moving into his second season after a rookie year that produced 938 receiving yards and six touchdowns. Tampa Bay isn’t trying to hand him the impossible task of replacing Evans outright, either.
Chris Godwin Jr., Jalen McMillan, Ted Hurst III, and Tez Johnson all give the Bucs options around him, but Egbuka still has a chance to grow into a bigger role and become one of the offense’s key faces. One season with Evans was all he got, but it was enough for Egbuka to recognize exactly what that time meant.
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