Lake McRee has a lot to prove with Pittsburgh Steelers
22 tight ends were picked in the 2026 NFL Draft. USC's Lake McRee was not one of them. That should motivate the Trojan in Pittsburgh
Lake McRee already has a lot to prove as an NFL rookie. He was an undrafted free agent. That alone should light a fire in a first-year pro.
However, what should also give the USC Trojan some motivational fuel is the prominence of tight ends in modern football and the recent NFL draft. Tom Fornelli of CBS Sports offers context: "This spring's NFL Draft saw 22 tight ends selected over the seven rounds, the most in any draft since 2002. Nine of them were taken in the first three rounds.
We've seen NFL teams with head coaches like Sean McVay (Los Angeles Rams) and Ben Johnson (Chicago Bears), both of whom are considered "offensive gurus," loading up on the position despite already having options because their offenses feature so much 12 and 13 personnel (two tight end and three tight end formations). "It's a logical step in offensive design. The sport is always evolving (or revolving), and over the last couple of decades, we saw the proliferation of spread offenses at the high school and college levels.
Those offenses made their way to the NFL. To counter, defenses began focusing on smaller players who were better suited to defend such attacks. The logical counter to this adjustment was to get bigger, thus we are seeing more tight ends.