The Bucs have to turn the page this offseason and l0ok at their wide receiver room without Mike Evans involved. It would be easy for most team to act all doom and gloom about losing the face of the franchise, but Tampa Bay has a great deal of optimism with the rest of the receivers will pick up the slack with Evans no longer around.

Understanding that it’s going to take more than one player to make up for the production, the Bucs look at this as a new challenge for them to overcome.

“It’s not the fact that we didn’t lose a great one, because we did,” Todd Bowles said talking about Evans at the NFL Annual Meeting. “It’s the fact that we got to prove that we can still win without the great one.”

Bucs head coach Todd Bowles – Photo by: Scott Reynolds/PR

“You can’t replace it, you can’t replace a guy like that, that was as big on the field and off the field as ever. And Lavonte [David] as well, you can’t replace two legends like that. The best thing you can do is for other people to step up in their own way and show leadership and build leadership that way. They’ve taught these guys how to be professional. They taught these guys how to approach ball games. They’ve taught these guys what a pro looks like, so if guys can take and grasp that and then grow on their own, we’ll get better from that standpoint.” 

Bucs Have “Three Or Four Good Receivers” That Are Finally Healthy Together

Todd Bowles has a lot of confidence in the rest of the Bucs wide receivers. Why? Because for the first time in a long time, they’ve have everyone in that room healthy together.

“We still feel like we have three or four good receivers in our receivers room and they’re all coming back healthy this spring, so we feel like we can function that way,” Bowles said. 

Chris Godwin Jr. is probably the best example of this. It’s the second time in his career that he’s had to deal with a major season-ending injury. Godwin has always been a lead-by-example kind of player that always shows up for OTAs, which are voluntary, when other star players wouldn’t attend every practice.

Not having Godwin until after the first month of the 2025 season, followed by another fibula injury that occurred once he returned to action, had a profound impact on the offense. What we’ve also seen in Godwin’s career is his ability to bounce back, so Bowles sees no reason why he wouldn’t be able to do it again.

Bucs WR Chris Godwin Jr. – Photo by: Cliff Welch/PR

“I’m just happy he’s going to be healthy coming into spring,” Bowles said. “I don’t think he’s had a good spring the last two seasons he’s been trying to come back off of injury, so it’s important with him coming back healthy and J-Mac (Jalen McMillan) coming back healthy this spring, I think it starts us off on a good foot. I think you’ll see the Chris we’ve all seen before – getting a thousand yards.”

Godwin played in nine games last season in his return to action from a fractured ankle and caught 33 passes for 360 yards (10.9 avg.) and a pair of touchdowns. With Godwin earning $22 million per year over the next two seasons, the pressure is on for him to return to form as a 1,000-yard receiver in 2026.

McMillan, who Bowles referenced, could be the X-factor to all of this. It wasn’t too long ago when McMillan closed the regular season out as a rookie with five straight games recording a touchdown and scoring seven touchdowns during that streak. A terrifying neck injury suffered in a preseason game kept him out until December of last season, but he managed to play the last four games and really broke out in the penultimate game, recording seven catches for 114 yards and truly showing he was back to form.

While McMillan doesn’t have the size of Evans, he has the best ability to jump for the ball and make those deep ball contested catches. He’s certainly more aggressive, which makes him play bigger than what his actual size is.

Bucs WR Jalen McMillan – Photo by: IMAGN Images – Sam Navarro

“He’s a little bit different,” Bowles said. “He’s a route runner, he can do all the dirty work. But he can go down field and he can fight for the ball as well. He plays like he’s 6-foot-5, he doesn’t have a 6-foot-5 frame but he plays like he’s 6-foot-5. He has a very good catch radius, and with Chris coming back and him coming back, not just at the end of the season, along with Mek (Emeka Egbuka), we feel like we’ve got a good three.”

Egbuka, the team’s first-round pick in 2025, led the team with 63 catches for 938 yards (14.9 avg.) and six touchdowns during his rookie season.

Do Bucs Need More Size At Wide Receiver?

Where the Bucs will miss Mike Evans the most is in the red zone where the 6-foot-5 Evans scored several times on a patented fade reception in the end zone. That can’t be replicated by anyone on the roster, so look for different ways that the Bucs will attack the red zone this season.

“You can’t replace that play,” Bucs head coach Todd Bowles said. “Obviously we got to score a little differently. We don’t have a 6-foot-5 guy to throw it up to, so we’ve got to scheme it a little bit differently. But having a healthy Chris [Godwin Jr.] and a healthy J-Mac (Jalen McMillan) come back with a healthy Emeka [Egbuka]. We didn’t have all of our horses healthy last year, so we feel like we got a good nucleus and a good core. Obviously we’ve got to add some depth there, which will be smart to do, but we feel like we’ve got a good three right at the top.

“And with Tez [Johnson] getting some experience and Kam [Johnson] another year older, we feel like we have the makings of a good room.”

Bucs WR Emeka Egbuka – Cliff Welch/PR

Though the Bucs are smaller in stature in receiver as Godwin, McMillan and Egbuka are all 6-foot-1,, Bowles makes a point that not every team has gargantuan players. The Bucs could be open to adding a reciever with a big frame, but only if it makes sense. With Godwin, McMillan, Egbuka and Johnson, they have a good foundation to roll with heading into the 2026 season.

“Mike was an anomaly” Bowles said. “Obviously you can have it if you can get it, but every team doesn’t have a 6-foot-5 receiver. That’s not normal. But if you can get him and everything falls right, yes. But you don’t grab one that’s not capable of doing the things that he can do, or capable of holding his own. So if it’s there and it fits, that’s a great thing. But we’re perfectly fine with 6-foot-1, 6-foot-2 receivers.”