Jason Licht Reveals His Take on Emeka Egbuka's Rookie Season with Buccaneers

The Tampa Bay Buccaneers are looking for a wide receiver to step up in 2026 to be the team's WR1, and that player could be Emeka Egbuka.

The Bucs drafted Egbuka in the first round of the 2025 NFL Draft, and he showed some serious promise in the first half of the season. With some impressive circus catches and strong route-running discipline, Egbuka caught 34 passes for 562 yards and five touchdowns through Weeks 1-9 of the regular season and looked to be one of the NFL's budding stars.

That trend did not continue, though. Egbuka cooled down significantly from Weeks 10-18, catching just one touchdown pass on 29 receptions for 376 yards. The entire Bucs offense regressed as a whole, and Egbuka's play seemed to trend down right along with that.

General manager Jason Licht recently spoke with Ira Kaufman of JoeBucsFan, and one of the many things he was asked about was Egbuka's second-half slump.

Jason Licht Explains Emeka Egbuka's Quiet Second Half

Tampa Bay Buccaneers wide receiver Emeka Egbuka (2) prior to the game against the New Orleans Saints | Kim Klement Neitzel-Imagn Images

Licht told JoeBucsFan that Egbuka's inexperience, as well as the demand for him to play in different places on the field due to injuries, led to his dip in production during the second half of the season.

"First of all, rookies coming from championship-type programs that play deep into their season, then barely have enough time to train and come right into the fray here and that has something to do with it," Licht said, per JoeBucsFan. "Then people started paying more attention to Emeka and we had the injuries to Chris and Mike (Evans), where we were forced to play Emeka in multiple spots. As smart as he is, and he’s incredibly smart, to ask a rookie to move around like that, play the X, play the Z, it took a toll on him."

Egbuka did, in fact, come from a championship-caliber program in Ohio State, where he set the school record for receptions at 205 and boasted the second-most receiving yards in school history at 2,868. The Bucs' receiving corps also suffered some serious injuries last year, and Egbuka himself even played through a hamstring injury he suffered in Week 6 while trying to pick up the load for Evans and Godwin.

Even through all that, though, Egbuka will look to improve on his rookie season with a full offseason of preparation available to him. He'll likely play the Z position with Godwin and Jalen McMillan healthy and available to start the season, and that environment could see him take the jump he needs from Year 1 to Year 2.

Egbuka has already impressed at OTAs with some crazy catches, and he'll look to keep that momentum going during the last week starting on Tuesday. After that, the Bucs will begin mandatory minicamp on June 16 and then training camp later in July.

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