The Rise of Emeka Egbuka
Nigerian roots. Christian rap. Cutthroat Buckeye days. The Tampa Bay Buccaneers rookie is a contrast to his entire generation. Say hello to the future of the wide receiver position.
TAMPA — The device in his pocket is utilitarian, no source of entertainment. Emeka Egbuka has exactly zero social-media apps on his cell phone.
Zilch.
He’s 23 years old. His star is rising. From Tampa to Timbuktu — in any social setting — you’re bound to see faces transfixed by screens. Deleting Instagram, X, Facebook, TikTok is akin to cutting off one’s oxygen supply in 2025. Egbuka shrugs.
Oh, he was once addicted to TikTok back in college. So, he ditched the crack app. Oh, he’s got an Instagram with 289K+ followers. But this account, created for NIL purposes, only exists on an iPad. The longest he’ll scroll is 10 minutes. This dopamine hit is not nearly as potent. Quickly, he realized the concept of FOMO is a figment of our imagination. “I’m like, ‘OK, nothing’s even really new,’” Egbuka says. “Nothing’s even really going on.” He turns it off, then goes back to interacting with the real world.
Here, the Tampa Bay Buccaneers wide receiver unlocks his phone and unveils proof of an uncluttered life.
On this screen, there are no boxes containing another dozen boxes. He doesn’t need to categorize his apps because there’s hardly any apps at all. There’s one for Adidas because he’s an Adidas sponsor. There’s Teamworks, the Bucs’ app that schedules his day. Netflix. Waze. Spotify. But even then, he’s much different than his peers. Egbuka doesn’t listen to anything mainstream. Rather, gospel music, instrumentals and his go-to musician is a Christian rapper named Kijan Boone.
OK, there is one guilty pleasure on his phone.
A chess app.
The soft-spoken, highly spiritual weapon seated here at Bucs HQ on a sultry Florida day is a 6-foot-1, 202-pound counterpunch to the culture. Egbuka sincerely believes the way he lives his life should define him. He refuses to be consumed by statistics… by fame… by anything that’ll “come and go” and eliminates all distractions.
“You see all the candy that’s for the taking. It can look enticing,” Egbuka says, pausing.
“It doesn’t feed me anything good.”
All century, this position has been dominated by aliens. NFL teams are justifiably enamored by the physical marvel. Chuck the ball deep to Moss or Megatron or T.O. or Julio and they’ll do the rest. Beyond the gold jackets, excelling as a pure WR1 has historically demanded baseline height, weight and speed requirements in NFL front offices. This season has signified a monumental shift toward a different demon: the undersized route runner. Jaxon Smith-Njigba, Puka Nacua and Amon-Ra St. Brown are the crème de la crème archetypes.
Egbuka, a rookie, is next.
Egbuka represents this new gold standard.
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It’s only fitting that a player spearheading this movement is also unlike anyone his age.
There have always been sporadic receivers who break the stereotypical mold of their diva profession. Emeka Egbuka, however, is a contrast to his entire generation. Tampa Bay’s rookie sensation was a child prodigy in Steilacoom, Wash. (pop: 6,700). At age 8, he was recognized as the best 8-year-old baseball player in the country as the MLB’s Pitch, Hit & Run champ. At age 14, as a football recruit, he was declared the No. 1 athlete in his class. Yet, Egbuka is forever the son of a Nigerian immigrant. What happened inside a classroom meant more than any acrobatics on a field, even as he caught more passes for more yards than anyone in Ohio State Buckeyes history.
He’s got a photographic memory. Show him something once, and it sticks for life.
He can pick up any sport with ease. Egbuka took up golf for the first time in his life during college and developed a single handicap in no time.
Time saved from scrolling is spent reading. Brandon Sanderson’s fantasy novels are his favorite.
Central to his rise is one simple code.
“The stuff that comes easy in life isn’t really worth anything,” Egbuka says. “All the good things in life take hard work. They take effort. And it makes it more satisfying in the end when you’re able to reach your goals despite all the trials and tribulations and adversity that you face.”
This is only the beginning.
The future of the craft resides at 1 Buccaneer Place.
‘Everything you could want’
One exec calling the shots around here acknowledges the absurdity of public statements on draft weekend. Rob McCartney laughs and admits GMs and coaches have no choice but to declare they got exactly who they wanted. “What else are you supposed to say?” the team’s assistant general manager says. “Well, we didn’t really want this guy!”
In this case, however, it’s 100 percent true.
Tampa Bay really, really coveted Emeka Egbuka with its 19th overall pick in the 2025 NFL Draft.
His tape sizzled all the way back to his sophomore season. In a 42-41 playoff loss to Georgia, Egbuka lit up a defense full of future NFL prospects for 112 yards and a TD. Ex-Bulldog and current-Buccaneer Tykee Smith recently brought that game up to McCartney. “Emeka killed us!” the safety said. McCartney admits any scouting staff can get caught up in the fact that Egbuka wasn’t particularly big or fast. As time passes, he explains, you start to wonder Is he a No. 1 receiver? and Can he be elite? Traditionally, these are not the physical traits an NFL offense builds its passing game around.
Under GM Jason Licht, the Bucs have made a conscious effort to fight such an impulse.
They refuse to overcomplicate prospects.
“He’s everything you could want,” McCartney says.
“He can play anywhere. Some of those guys don’t like playing inside. He loves it. And he can play outside. You run the offense and he’s able to win at every level. You can throw him screens. You can throw him balls in the middle of the field and he’s willing. And then as he’s shown here, which he didn’t really do a lot at Ohio State, there’s been deep balls on offense. There’s really nothing that he’s not capable of doing. He’s just not going to run 4.3.”
Egbuka’s perfectly fine time in the 40 (4.45) clouded real speed. Similar to what McCartney witnessed as a young scout with the Pittsburgh Steelers. Slow in shorts (4.55), Hines Ward was rarely caught from behind on the field. Egbuka was a similar gamer. Egbuka could get open and catch the ball with ease. That baseball background clearly helped him track the ball. And when McCartney heard about that handicap in golf, he couldn’t believe it.
Word is, Egbuka is down to a four handicap.
“I’m like ‘God, this fucking guy’s an asshole,” McCartney jokes. “He can do everything! He does everything well! We’ve got a lot of golfers in the front office. We’re all like 10, 11, 12, 13 handicaps and been playing for years. He just picked up golf and he’s good at it.”
True to form, Egbuka picked up a football and bombed a punt for the hell of it moments earlier at practice.
The conditions were perfect for this union. Back when nearly everyone was declaring the Buccaneers a comatose franchise post-Tom Brady, this scouting staff was hitting its stride.
Licht’s crew was figuring out what type of competitor they want filling out a roster.
One key philosophical shift has been how they approach interviews at the NFL Combine. Licht is putting more trust in his area scouts. If they dig up something concerning on a prospect, he believes ‘em. There’s no need to double and triple back. This frees up space for more pleasant 18-minute speed dates in Indianapolis. Instead of meeting with prospects riddled with red flags — to weed out guys — the Buccaneers now sit down with players with cleaner character who they believe will enhance their culture. “Guys,” McCartney adds, “that we think can take our program to the next level.”
The second Egbuka left the room, everyone looked at each other in awe. It didn’t matter that this team had one wideout (Mike Evans) stringing together 11 straight 1,000-yard seasons or another (Chris Godwin) about to sign a three-year, $66 million contract extension. Tampa Bay needed Egbuka.
All of his natural gifts were evident from Practice No. 1. Quarterback Baker Mayfield professed his trust in the rookie and he caught the game-winning touchdown pass in Game No. 1 against the Atlanta Falcons. It usually takes a veteran quarterback a full season to warm up to rookies because rookies are liable to break their routes off the wrong direction or at the wrong depth and one mistake can sabotage a game. Both Godwin and Evans went down with injuries, Egbuka was thrust into a No. 1 role, and Mayfield has not hesitated.
A one-handed catch over Sauce Gardner up the right sideline. A third-and-13 bomb at Seattle in which Egbuka froze cornerback Josh Jobe with a head bob toward the sideline, hit the gas and got behind the Seahawks’ secondary for a 57-yarder. A touchdown vs. New England in which Egbuka correctly read the coverage to flare into open acreage.
Egbuka is already treating NFL defenses exactly as he treated Big Ten defenses for four years.
None of this has been overwhelming because he’s always been in the spotlight.
Egbuka cracked the national baseball scene with that award at age 8 and threw out the ceremonial first pitch to Felix Hernandez at a Seattle Mariners game.
He’ll never forget when that first football offer came in, too.
Egbuka was in art class at Steilacoom High School. His teacher’s phone started ringing, she answered, she told Egbuka he was needed at the front office and that’s where he received the news: Florida State had offered him a full ride… as a 14-year-old freshman. Overwhelmed with joy, Egbuka started sprinting through the hallways and popping his head into random classrooms to tell his friends the news. He didn’t even go back to art class. “Bro!” he yelled. “I just got an offer from Florida State!”
For good reason. As a seventh-grader, he tore up the 7-on-7 circuit through tournaments in Vegas, California, Florida. As an eighth-grader, he was called up to the high school team and won the MVP award of the Pylon Tourney in Vegas. He’d win MVP two more times, too. One weekend, he caught nearly 30 touchdowns. By the time he graduated, he was the nation’s No. 1-ranked wide receiver.
Slick route running and Stickum hands make the highlight reel. Intelligence serves as the hard drive to his game.
“It all starts before I really step onto the field,” Egbuka says.
First, he cites that photographic memory. Every time the Bucs install plays, vivid images stick. All pictures remain fresh in his mind on Sunday. He dissects the coverage pre-snap, studies what type of leverage he’s getting from the corner — tweaking the nuance of his route — and then plays fast. There’s nothing fancy to his day-to-day routine. Honestly, Egbuka values his sleep. He’s in bed by 10 p.m. and up at 6 a.m., on the dot, to ensure a full eight hours. Back home, he might watch extra film for another 30 to 60 minutes but he treasures balance in life. He’ll watch a movie or read a Sanderson book. His favorite series is The Way of Kings, which he compares to Lord of the Rings. “High fantasy,” he says, “old magic.” He’s always game to read a new faith-based book, too.
The result of it all is a wide receiver built for the modern game.
We know what’s coming. Simply, look at one of his Buckeye teammates.
Smith-Njigba is averaging 115.7 receiving yards per game, which has him right on pace to break Calvin Johnson’s single-season receiving record. Seattle’s supersonic weapon has 210 more yards than the next best receiver (Ja’Marr Chase), the widest gap between the No. 1 and No. 2 leading receivers through Week 10 of a season since the 1970 merger. Coming in, there were real doubts. Even the scouts who viewed Smith-Njigba as the best in class were troubled by his lack of speed, size, explosion. They didn’t see a wow element to his game.
When Adonis-built DK Metcalf was shipped to Pittsburgh, it was fair to wonder if JSN would go MIA as a true No. 1.
Thing is, the difference between 6-foot-nothing and 6-foot-4 doesn’t matter when you’re twisting cornerbacks into pretzels with regularity. There aren’t many human beings on the planet who can stop and start like this. Out wide, in the slot, from the backfield. Doesn’t matter. Smith-Njigba is the new wide receiver king and his OSU clone, Egbuka, is right on track to join him amongst the league’s elites.
What we don’t see is why this rookie is built to last.
Growing up, Egbuka was the football equivalent to a child star. And if we’ve learned anything from those most extreme cases — the Macaulay Culkins, the Lindsay Lohans — it’s that too much fame, too soon can do psychological damage. That’s where Egbuka draws a distinction and opens up in our sitdown. He might’ve been sprinting through those halls, but Egbuka has always harbored much bigger plans than one scholarship offer.
“Your head can blow up,” he says. “For me? My goals were so far down the road.”
15-Year Plan
Emeka Egbuka was objectively exceptional at every sport growing up. And to Dad, the roots of that exceptionalism go back to his homeland. Henry Egbuka grew as a member of the Igbo tribe that lost in the Nigerian Civil War 1967- ‘70. All Igbo tribe members were then forced to somehow reassimilate back into society. “So growing up, you had be excellent to compete,” once explained Henry, who emigrated to the states at age 20.
Son doesn’t know much about that Civil War himself, but it makes sense. He’s living those virtues. Dad pushed him — nonstop — to be the best. Sports were secondary. Henry pushed Emeka 100x more in the classroom than he ever did as an athlete. To this day, he works for the Department of Defense as a civil engineer at Joint Base Lewis-McChord near their home. Henry had a hand in building all of the surrounding roads and bridges. Growing up, Emeka likens his father to a Human Chat GPT when it came to homework. Mathematical formulas were always at the tip of his tongue.
Through NIL deals and his NFL contract, Henry made a point to read all of the fine print to negotiate all minutiae. Without fail, he’d always find something to tweak. Yes, Henry is the type of Dad who’d absolutely read the full Terms of Conditions for any transaction. Meanwhile, the genes on Mom’s side were also quite rich, too. Rhona Ogilvie was a valedictorian.
When it was time for one of the nation’s finest talents to pick a school, Ohio State was the choice because Ohio State represented the most treacherous road.
The last thing Egbuka wanted was a guaranteed starting spot from a coach.
He knew this room would be full of prestigious names. Pressure he craved.
“I also looked at it as a 10-, 15-year goal,” Egbuka says. “I knew that I didn’t want Ohio State to be the end of my football career. What I did in college was not as important to me as what I wanted to do in the NFL. So I had to sit behind a couple guys, but if it was going to make me better in order to reach the bigger goals that I did have in the NFL, that was worth it. I didn’t want to be a one-hit wonder and have an amazing college career, but not actually have gotten better at football or anything.”
Nothing that comes easy is worth a damn to Egbuka.
An abnormal default setting in a society that supplies all daily needs — food, transportation, etc. — with one click of a button.
Reaching the NFL in three years was the goal — under one condition.
Henry Egbuka mandated that his son earn a degree before even thinking about going pro. Bare minimum, he’ll also need to get his masters at some point. Egbuka got to campus in January of 2021 and obtained a business degree by December 2023. Initially, a bunch of his roommates were also business majors. He went to class every day with fellow wideout Marvin Harrison Jr. The two were inseparable. “We went,” Egbuka says, “everywhere together.” Until suddenly, into their sophomore year, Harrison dropped his business major.
“He just stranded me,” Egbuka says, laughing, “and went to the easier courses.”
Egbuka knew Ohio State had a strong business school and wanted to stick it out. One semester, he loaded up with 18 credits. All were capstone courses.
Life on the field was even more strenuous.
Other schools could be cutthroat. Michael Pittman Jr. is a product of a USC Trojans wide receiver room that handed out a “Nice Guy Award,” the worst insult imaginable.
Those in Columbus would certainly argue that their world was next level.
Up on the board inside the Buckeyes wide receiver room, position coach Brian Hartline keeps track of everyone’s catch rate, drops and mental errors all spring ball and all preseason camp. It’s cumulative. If you catch one of four balls, it’ll say “25 percent” by your name for everyone to see. Numbers that tally up — for better, for worse — all year. And through the course of his career, Egbuka played with four future pros: Chris Olave (2022, 11th overall), Garrett Wilson (2022, 10th overall), Smith-Njigba (2023, 20th overall), and Harrison (2024, fourth overall).
With targets at a premium, practices always felt like games.
But the most intense setting of them all was the hardwood. After lifting weights, the receivers played ruthless games of pickup basketball. There were players on Ohio State who’d throw down posterizing windmill dunks. Alley-oops in-transition were common. “It was insane,” Egbuka says. Harrison, at 6-4, had a full repertoire of dunks. But the best of the best? Backup wideout Jayden Ballard, who’s currently a fifth-year senior at Wisconsin. (“I’ve seen him throw an alley-oop to himself, catch it behind the back, between the legs, all this type of stuff.”)
No, Egbuka couldn’t float above the rim like his friends. But there was a period of time his jumper was automatic. He’d cross halfcourt and defenders would argue over who had to guard him. (“None of ‘em wanted it!”) Mostly, he was a pass-first guard who was relentless on defense.
The trash talk. The intensity. All of it was off the charts… and totally in secret.
Coaches had zero clue they were going at it quite this hard. Once a few players started rolling their ankles, the Buckeyes strength coach shut the games down.
And the No. 1 reason Emeka Egbuka embraces the inherent hardships that come with the sport is his faith. A way of life that he calls “counter-cultural” to everything we’re inundated with in all media. He tries to keep Romans 12:2 at the top of mind: “Do not be conformed to this world, but be transformed by the renewing of your minds.” To Egbuka, this means not giving a damn what everyone else declares desirable — fame, fortunes, clout — to sincerely “renew” his mind each morning.
Like his Ohio State pal Treveyon Henderson, profiled here, Egbuka didn’t become this religious until college. The two teammates were part of a wave of Buckeyes who got into church. Senior wide receivers Kamryn Babb and Xavier Johnson asked Egbuka, then a freshman, if he wanted to go to church one day and his life changed forever. Today, both are his best friends. Egbuka wasn’t seeing demons atop his bedroom ceiling like Henderson but says he needed Jesus Christ in his own way.
All along, Egbuka planned to go pro after three years.
Those plans changed when he suffered a piercing high-ankle sprain against Maryland that ‘23 season. After initially trying to limp off, the pain was too much. Egbuka crumbled to the turf. A tightrope surgery expedited his recovery. He only missed three games. But as Harrison tore through defenses en route to the Fred Biletnikoff Award as the nation’s best receiver, Egbuka endured week-to-week pain.
It worked out. He stuck around one more season and led Ohio State to a national title in ‘24.
Off to Tampa Bay, he shared a room with Evans and Godwin and their combined 296 games of knowledge.
Technically, Egbuka was never the undisputed No. 1 guy in college. There was always another Buckeye to absorb coverage. Now, he’s being asked to shake free from the likes of Philadelphia’s Quinyon Mitchell and New England’s Christian Gonzalez. That’s life in the NFL. Adversity is a guarantee. So far, he’s been fortunate. Egbuka cites his three surgeries: shoulder, ankle and toe. There was also the time from age 6 to 12 that his Dad lived in Germany. It hurt not having him at those youth games.
His parents were also divorced. He’d switch houses each Monday.
Overall, however, he’s lived a blessed life.
Something’s bound to test his outlook on life. Something he hasn’t ever faced before.
“So I’m doing my best to build my foundation on the rock like it says in Luke 11,” Egbuka says. “And having that strong foundation and faith so that when these things do happen? Nothing can really shake me.”
‘Sky’s the limit’
After Emeka Egbuka was drafted, he flew into town and the first person he met on the team was Baker Mayfield. He grabbed lunch with the Bucs quarterback and his entire offensive line. Soon, Egbuka met Mayfield’s wife, his daughter and started hanging out at their house every Tuesday.
After all joints, all tendons are worked out by a body specialist the QB flies in, the two hang out to talk life.
That’s Mayfield. En masse, he’s described as a quarterback committed to forging true bonds with everyone in the building.
“From the head coach to all of the lunch ladies to the janitor,” Egbuka says. “He’s got inside jokes with everybody. He’s never too big. He never has that sense of ‘I’m Baker Mayfield.’ It’s ‘Bake.’ He’s our guy. It’s way easier to rally behind. No one wants to rally behind a guy who thinks he’s better than everyone.”
This draft pick confused many skeptics in the moment. Another wide receiver?! Where’s the defense?
Certainly not anymore. Decimated by injuries on offense, Mayfield has been leaning heavily on Egbuka. The rookie’s up to 677 yards and six touchdowns on 40 receptions, despite a Week 6 hamstring strain. The harsh realities that typically eat rookie receivers alive aren’t fazing Egbuka at all. Zay Jones, for one, once opened on how being prematurely forced into a No. 1 role spiraled him into depression.
Nothing’s been overly daunting for Egbuka. He got a kick out of one Lions coach apologizing to him for all the double coverage after a game. Whenever he does get Godwin back, more space should bust open in the secondary.
Until then, he’ll get swarmed. He’ll make plays. He’s gotten super close with another rookie: 235th overall pick Tez Johnson.
“Yes, there’s additional pressure,” Egbuka says. “Especially when two of your Hall of Fame wide receivers are out. Them having so much confidence in me allows me to go out there and bypass all of the pressure that comes my way. But I’m also taking my mindset about how I approach life onto the field. My value isn’t in the things I do on the field. Obviously I want to do well. It’s a game that I’m very passionate about and God has given me a passion for it. But he didn’t make me just a football player. That gives me the freedom to go out there and play without any tenseness.”
Up close, the team’s wide receivers coach can attest to this mindset. Bryan McClendon actually goes back to Egbuka’s high school days. He tried to recruit him to the University of Oregon. That early, the man impressed McClendon more than the player. “You knew,” he says, “the kid had the chance to be special just by his makeup.” The Ducks were geographically closer to Egbuka’s hometown, but McClendon admits they were late to the party. (Egbuka would instead break Oregon’s hearts through a title run.)
At the Combine, McClendon was again blown away by his maturity. And when Egbuka fell into Tampa Bay’s lap at No. 19? It felt like hitting the “lottery.” McClendon joked that Egbuka cannot tell him no now.
What stands out most to anyone who meets Egbuka is his ultra-, ultra-calm disposition. He speaks and plays and works with a tranquility that belies his age. McClendon believes Egbuka truly feels no pressure to perform because of that strong faith. He’ll listen to gospel music. He’ll play chess. He doesn’t ride the roller-coaster that whiplashes so many peers.
McClendon calls Egbuka “very, very balanced,” adding that his entire wide receiver room never thinks too far ahead. The focus is today. If it’s Thursday, they don’t worry about Sunday. An approach that calibrates perfectly with Egbuka’s ethos.
And yet, it’s impossible not to be ecstatic about this player’s future.
“The sky’s the limit for him because of how he is wired,” McClendon says. “He is going to get every inch of ability that he has in his body and maximize it. So he’s not going to do anything right now that’d hinder that. A lot of people do. The self-imploding that some people do. You don’t have to worry about that part with him. Outside of any kind of freak thing that happens…”
There’s no wood around, so McClendon balls up a fist and knocks on his head.
“...the sky’s the limit for him.”
People are noticing. On “The Arena,” former All-Pro cornerback Aqib Talib called Egbuka “Ja’marr Chase-like” and perfectly explained how Egbuka’s game speed kills defenses.
“Some guys,” Talib said, “when you throw that ball in the air, we could be running and it’s a little too far. But some people have those last three steps — ‘Mmm, mmm, mmm’ — to get to it. He can run that same high-4.4 over a long period of time. Some guys die out. Some guys take longer to get to that 4.4. Some guys can get to 4.4 and run that thing for 50 yards straight. His game speed is crazy. His ball skills. His routes. He knows how to move defenders. He knows how to control his body to catch these balls. Bro is special. I know special receivers when I see them. He is a special receiver.”
Before departing, that special receiver pulls out his cell phone one more time.
This thing is more DeWalt tape measure than extension of his hand, but Egbuka wants to find his most treasured playlists on Spotify. He’s got a worship playlist, a “Chill” playlist, one for Christian rap and, yeah, he’ll often listen to music with no lyrics at all to clear his mind. Soothing instrumentals bring Egbuka even more calm. “And I’m someone who really values my quiet time,” the rookie adds, “to be able to think.” If he’s got a long car drive, he’ll hit play on those songs and the “gears are turning.” He’s able to think, to relax.
Point out that Go Long HQ plays Bon Iver on repeat for the same reason, and Egbuka lights up. He listens to Bon Iver’s breakout 2007 album, “For Emma, Forever Ago” all the time. I mention that Bon Iver puts on a phenomenal show despite their relaxing sound, and Egbuka shares one more detail about his life. He’s only been to one concert his entire life. When he was 14, he saw Bruno Mars for his mother’s birthday.
He’s not against concerts. He simply has no idea who he’d even see.
“I don’t listen to rap. So it’s like I’m not going to go see Drake.”
Granted, he did use Instagram to strike up a relationship with Kijan Boone. They talk from time to time. Egbuka is always on the lookout for his latest Christian rap track. Because even this quiet old soul turns up when required. On gamedays, seated in his locker, he finds his “Kingdom Fire” playlist and inevitably lands on Boone’s “War Ready.”
His adrenaline starts to pump, he takes the field, and Emeka Egbuka is undaunted.
He lines up, studies the coverage, burns another cornerback, plucks the ball from the sky and expects to do the same exact thing the very next snap.
Excellent story, Tyler. As you know, I covered Emeka at Ohio State and I learned things I didn't know. But none of it surprises me.
What an incredible story. The Bucs were so smart to go against the grain and draft him even though receivers were already solid. Then the Bucs draft Tez Johnson in the 7th round.
Meanwhile Beane remains asleep at the wheel.