{"id":93451,"date":"2025-05-31T14:57:31","date_gmt":"2025-05-31T14:57:31","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/93451\/"},"modified":"2025-05-31T14:57:31","modified_gmt":"2025-05-31T14:57:31","slug":"buccaneers-rookie-dt-desmond-watson-aims-to-change-weight-narrative-earn-roster-spot","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/93451\/","title":{"rendered":"Buccaneers rookie DT Desmond Watson aims to change weight narrative, earn roster spot"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>By weighing in at 464 pounds at the 2025 NFL Scouting Combine, Watson instantly stood out among other prospects on a spreadsheet. He&#8217;s already lost 20-plus pounds since the combine and continues to evaluate how he feels as he and the Buccaneers determine his proper playing weight, explaining it as &#8220;a work in progress.&#8221;<\/p>\n<p>The Tampa-area product has described his brief time with the hometown Buccaneers as &#8220;a dream come true.&#8221; In terms of guidance, a better situation may not have existed anywhere else in the NFL for Watson, who will receive an opportunity to learn from <a class=\"nfl-o-cta--link nfl-o-cta--underline\" style=\"word-break: break-word\" href=\"https:\/\/www.nfl.com\/players\/vita-vea\/\" title=\"Vita Vea\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">Vita Vea<\/a>.<\/p>\n<p>&#8220;Being in position to have somebody you look up to and model your game after be a leader and vet at your position group, I feel like I&#8217;m blessed,&#8221; Watson said.<\/p>\n<p>In order to maximize such an opportunity, Watson will have to give the most effort possible even if it&#8217;s only to buy him more time. In this business, patience is a privilege not afforded to most players &#8212; especially not those who arrived as undrafted free agents.<\/p>\n<p>The pressure is on, but the Buccaneers are hoping Watson&#8217;s conditioning and nutrition efforts unlock a new level to his game.<\/p>\n<p>&#8220;He looked just as impressive before as he does now, so he&#8217;s a huge man. He&#8217;s got a lot of size,&#8221; head coach Todd Bowles said. &#8220;He has to make the team, first of all. Right now, we just have to see how long he can stay on the field and (we) put him on a program where we think he can make some progress. I think that&#8217;s the biggest thing for us to do, right now. We didn&#8217;t get him to say, &#8216;Hey, we have to put you on the field right now.&#8217; It&#8217;s, &#8216;Hey, we can try to put you on this program and see what we can come up with and see if we can get our endurance better,&#8217; and have him become a better player that way, then kind of see where he is.<\/p>\n<p>&#8220;To judge him right now is very early and we didn&#8217;t get him for the tush push, we got him because we really thought he could play. It&#8217;s just a matter of getting him to the point where he can play more than two or three plays a (drive).&#8221;<\/p>\n<p>Availability is one of the most important elements to carving out a career in the NFL. For Watson, the goal has been explicitly stated. He&#8217;ll have the summer to achieve it.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"By weighing in at 464 pounds at the 2025 NFL Scouting Combine, Watson instantly stood out among other&hellip;\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":93452,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":"","_share_on_mastodon":"0"},"categories":[2077],"tags":[1227,211,4434,7,88,6,609,4267,704,250,2597,2596],"class_list":{"0":"post-93451","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-tampa-bay-buccaneers","8":"tag-around-the-nfl","9":"tag-buccaneers","10":"tag-desmond-watson","11":"tag-football","12":"tag-news","13":"tag-nfl","14":"tag-no-minute","15":"tag-offseason-news","16":"tag-tampa-bay","17":"tag-tampa-bay-buccaneers","18":"tag-tampabay","19":"tag-tampabaybuccaneers"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/channels.im\/@nfl\/114603035565476498","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/93451","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=93451"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/93451\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/93452"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=93451"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=93451"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=93451"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}