Brenton
Strange.
Brenton
Strange.
Penn State· 6'4"· 253 lb· 4.70s 40
"The rare evaluation where the blocking tape carried the grade and the catch total was the footnote: a Y tight end drafted for the downs nobody counts."Pre-draft read
Strange is an in-line Y tight end who spent most of his Penn State snaps with a hand in the dirt, and the identity starts with blocking. He fires off low, hits a moving target with his hands inside, and sustains through the whistle on down blocks and kick-outs, which is why the staff kept him attached on early downs.
The receiving side is functional rather than explosive. He is a build-up strider who separates late on seams and crossers, catches away from his frame, and turns short throws into extra yardage with contact balance rather than shake. He is no vertical mismatch, and the athletic ceiling is average here, but the signature is a blocker whose route tree stays real enough to keep the personnel grouping honest.
A run-first, gap-and-duo offense with heavy 12 personnel that uses him as an attached blocker first and a play-action outlet second.
Year 1: blocking TE2 who plays every early down. Ceiling: a full-time starting Y with 45-55 catches whose value peaks in the run game.
A spread passing offense that detaches its tight end into the slot and asks him to beat nickels and safeties one-on-one for a living.
His value is tied to the size of a team's 12-personnel package, not to its target volume.
Career Highlights: Penn State TE Brenton Strange | Penn State Football | 2023 NFL Draft
Career package: in-line blocking reps, seam catches and red-zone finishes.
Career Highlights - Penn State TE Brenton Strange - 2023 (part 2)
Second reel of senior-season catches and run-game work.
Brenton Strange Senior Mid-Season Highlights
Pre-college tape showing the frame and hands that made him a Penn State commit.
Strange is a traditional Y with a modern enough pass-game floor: a four-year Penn State player who earned his snaps by blocking and then grew into a rotational target on a run-first offense. Everything about the profile is about being trusted on all three downs rather than winning one of them spectacularly.
The production never told the story. He finished with 70 catches for 755 yards and 11 touchdowns across four seasons, with a career-best 32 for 362 and five scores as a senior, numbers that made evaluators watch the blocking tape to find the value. What they found was a tight end who could handle Big Ten edge defenders in the run game, work up to second-level linebackers, and take a hit over the middle without flinching. The flags were equally clear: he never separated cleanly against man coverage, the 4.70 forty in Indianapolis confirmed pedestrian long speed, and his target share was low enough that the receiving projection required faith.
Boards generally had him in the third-round range as a starter-quality Y with modest ceiling. Jacksonville taking him at 61 was an early call by consensus, but it was a bet on positional need and floor: a tight end who blocks like a sixth lineman and does not have to be hidden in the passing game.
- 01
Run-game reliability
Sustains down blocks and kick-outs with inside hands and low pads, which let Penn State run gap concepts off his edge without extra help.
- 02
Second-level work
Climbs to linebackers under control and stays attached on the move, a real skill for a tight end asked to fold and lead on counter.
- 03
Contact balance
Absorbs the first hit after the catch and keeps churning; most of his yardage came from finishing runs rather than from separation.
- 04
Hands away from the frame
Extends to catch and rarely traps balls against his body, which held up on the crossers and flat throws he saw most.
- 05
Three-down trust
Four seasons of in-line snaps in a pro-style run scheme, with the special teams and short-yardage roles that come with it.
- 01
Vertical speed
The 4.70 forty matched the tape; he does not stress safeties down the seam and will not win a foot race with a nickel.
- 02
Man-coverage separation
Rounds his breaks and builds speed slowly out of the stem, so his windows against tight coverage stay narrow.
- 03
Thin production base
70 career catches in four years gave scouts very little volume to project a starting receiving role from.
- 04
Contested-catch finishing
Not a reliable back-shoulder or red-zone box-out threat despite the frame; more a rhythm target than a jump-ball winner.
— — — positional median (p50)
- 40 yd
- 4.70sp50
- Vertical
- 36inp50
- Broad jump
- 124inp50
- Three-cone
- 7.25sp50
- Shuttle
- 4.46sp50
- Bench
- 23repp50
| Yr | Team | G | Rec | Yds | TD |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 2019 | Penn State | 1 | 1 | 4 | 1 |
| 2020 | Penn State | 9 | 17 | 164 | 2 |
| 2021 | Penn State | 13 | 20 | 225 | 3 |
| 2022 | Penn State | 13 | 32 | 362 | 5 |
| Career | — | 36 | 70 | 755 | 11 |
Receiving lines verified against Sports-Reference/StatMuse; the four season totals sum exactly to the 70-755-11 career line. Games played by season sum to 36; Jacksonville's official bio lists 37 games and 31 starts, a one-game discrepancy left unresolved rather than adjusted. Blocking snaps and starts by season are not tracked in public box scores and are therefore left out rather than estimated.
A dash means the figure is not published by a source we trust — never a zero we invented.
A steady in-line starter who catches 40-50 balls a year and earns a second contract on reliability.
The ceiling if the pass-game feel keeps growing: a legitimate blocker who becomes a top-10 producer inside the numbers.
The floor if the receiving role never arrives: a blocking specialist and TE2 with situational targets.
Everything above is the pre-draft evaluation. This section is what actually happened — updated year over year.
Strange played in 14 games for the Jacksonville Jaguars in his rookie season, primarily as a blocking tight end, catching 5 passes for 35 yards and 1 touchdown.
Jacksonville brought him along slowly. He was a blocking specialist and TE2 as a rookie in 2023, playing 14 games with only five catches for 35 yards and a touchdown. The 2024 season handed him the job when the veteran ahead of him left, and he answered with 40 receptions for 411 yards and two scores across 17 games. In 2025 he became the offense's clear starting tight end and posted career highs of 46 catches for 540 yards and three touchdowns in 12 games, missing five weeks to injury and still averaging 11.7 yards a reception, fourth among AFC tight ends. After his Week 12 return he racked up 26 catches for 336 yards and three touchdowns down the stretch and started a playoff loss in Buffalo.
The hindsight verdict is that the floor bet worked. He was never going to be a slot-flexed mismatch, and he still is not, but Jacksonville drafted him to be the tight end you never take off the field and got exactly that: 43 games, 26 starts, 91 catches for 986 yards through three seasons, and an extension signed in June 2026 before he could reach free agency. Pick 61 was a slight reach against consensus and it produced a long-term starter, which is a fine trade.
Data note: Receiving lines verified against Sports-Reference/StatMuse; the four season totals sum exactly to the 70-755-11 career line. Games played by season sum to 36; Jacksonville's official bio lists 37 games and 31 starts, a one-game discrepancy left unresolved rather than adjusted. Blocking snaps and starts by season are not tracked in public box scores and are therefore left out rather than estimated.