High ranking unpopular.
Apparently, across NFL fandom, it’s not wise to be a Cade Otton fan.
Gregg Rosenthal of the podcast “NFL Daily” is finding that out. In his recent Top-101 free agents rankings, which was updated Tuesday at NFL.com, Rosenthal has Bucs tight end Otton as the best tight end entering free agency next week.
And that’s not a very popular choice among NFL fans, as Rosenthal explained while appearing on the “Ross Tucker Podcast.”
(Tucker’s series of football podcasts may be the best collection of pure football chatter available on any podcast platform.)
“I did get a lot of feedback that having Cade Otton over Kyle Pitts — who’s going to get tagged anyways — and Isaiah Likely. They were all in my top 20. But basically, having Otton that high was maybe the most consistent pushback that I got.”
So why is Rosenthal so high on Otton? Basically, Rosenthal believes Otton is a solid, dependable tight end who is scheme-diverse.
Here is what Rosenthal typed about Otton in his rankings:
Welcome to Cade Otton Island, where you can run any offense you want while never giving an inch in the run game. In our growing two-tight end world, every NFL team needs an Otton.
Rosenthal added to his Otton breakdown briefly for Tucker.
“But man, I think he’s a really good player that allows you to do everything that you want as an offense,” Rosenthal said.
As Joe has typed, Joe is torn on Otton. He’s not overly physical but he’s a willing blocker. He doesn’t really stretch the field but he can on occasion. He doesn’t have the best of hands, but he’s usually reliable (but those ghastly turnovers, yikes!).
Joe guesses Otton is the vanilla ice cream of tight ends. Ice cream is always good and vanilla is better than no ice cream and it gets the job done. But one can improve on vanilla.
Otton is solid, not great, not really physical and not flashy. Maybe the Bucs look at him and the rest of the weapons on the team and think they don’t need a dynamic tight end — when they have Mike Evans, Chris Godwin, Emeka Egbuka, Jalen McMillan, Tez Johnson and Bucky Irving.
Provided the Bucs can re-sign Evans.
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