After the Giants let the tight end walk in 2022 free agency, Engram signed with the Jaguars and is now playing the best football of his career.
Michael DiRocco is an NFL reporter at ESPN. DiRocco covers the Jacksonville Jaguars. He previously covered the University of Florida for over a decade for ESPN.com and Florida Times-Union. DiRocco graduated from Jacksonville University and is a multiple APSE award winner. You can follow DiRocco on Twitter at @ESPNdirocco.Everything Engram had worked on for more than a year with Lieberman -- the mechanics, the routes, the mindset, the mental toughness -- had finally come together that day.
"Evan is in a good place," Jaguars coach Doug Pederson said."There was a lot of outside criticism on him about the drops and different things, but he's a hard worker. He works on that and he works on his craft. He wants to be a pro. He knew he wasn't playing his best or at the level that Giants fans expected. Neither was the team: The Giants won 12 games from 2017-19.
"It was that year that really set my confidence in myself back," Engram said."There was a little hole I had to dig myself out of based off of the little things I was doing wrong. How could I improve? It was hard for me to watch those plays. Engram worked with his personal coach Drew Lieberman on fixing issues he had with dropping the football. They worked on fixing the way he brought his hands to the ball. to get out of bed. Not on this particular morning in March 2021, anyway. He was supposed to head to a local park in Atlanta to work out with a trainer and some other NFL receivers and quarterbacks, including Mohamed Sanu Sr. and
Lieberman played quarterback at Wesleyan University and coached quarterbacks and receivers in high school and college for a decade before branching out on his own and forming The Sideline Hustle in 2017. He and his team work with NFL, college, high school and overseas players. NFL receivers"I was really looking for a personal trainer, a kind of one-on-one hands-on guy that I could work with every single day on my craft," Engram said.
"This is her first game," he said."She's in the stands with my family. I've been telling her all offseason, 'Your man is a beast on the field.' Like, I'm hyping myself up. "And that meant a lot to me in that moment. ... She can care less about what I do on the football field." The Giants drafted Engram No. 23 overall in the 2017 NFL draft. After his rookie deal was up in 2022, the Giants did not offer him a second contract. offer Engram a contract after that 2021 season, so he became a free agent. He thought he'd have 10-12 teams calling his agent and he'd have his pick of lucrative contract offers. The Jaguars were one of four that contacted him.
"I was just so hungry," he said."I didn't care about anything negative that could happen." Engram caught four passes for 67 yards, averaging a season-best 16.8 yards per catch, in the Jaguars' 23-17 loss that ended with receivergetting tackled on the 1-yard line. The loss was disappointing but Engram walked off the field feeling he had hit a turning point in his career.
One of the first things Lawrence said he noticed about Engram when OTAs began in 2022 is that he's one of the first ones on the practice field and last ones off it. Every single day. By midseason he was staying after most of the other players went home and spending time with the quarterbacks watching tape, which has continued this season.
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