Elijah
Higgins.
Elijah
Higgins.
Stanford· 6'3"· 235 lb· 4.54s 40
"He never separated a day in his life at Stanford, and it stopped mattering the moment Arizona put a hand in the dirt and let the frame, the hands and the blocking do the job the receiver label was hiding."Pre-draft read
Big-bodied Z/flanker at Stanford who won with mass and body control, not separation quickness. He aligned outside and in the slot on hitches, slants, digs and back-shoulder throws, and played like a power forward: stack the defender, widen the frame, high-point the ball, finish through contact. Strong hands and a wide catch radius made him the third-down and red-zone answer.
The secondary trait is blocking. He climbs to safeties and sustains on perimeter runs, which is exactly why the NFL saw a tight end conversion. He is a linear athlete who builds speed instead of flashing it, so the ceiling is volume and situational value, not vertical explosion. The signature is contested-catch consistency at 6-3, 235.
Play-action heavy 12-personnel offense that asks its second tight end to block in-line and win contested throws in the red zone
Year 1: TE2 who earns blocking snaps and short-area targets while learning in-line technique. Ceiling: high-end TE2 with 40-50 catch seasons and red-zone value in a two-tight-end system.
An 11-personnel spread offense that plays one detached tight end and asks him to win man coverage from the slot on early downs, where his lack of separation quickness leaves him covered.
The conversion was the entire point of the pick; his value rises with every snap the offense keeps a second tight end on the field.
Elijah Higgins Stanford Highlights
Stanford tape showing the contested-catch base of his game on the boundary.
Elijah Higgins | 6 | Stanford Cardinal WR
Full receiver reel with the body-control catches and perimeter blocking that sold the tight end projection.
Elijah Higgins - Mr. 'Do It All' In The Tight End Room
Team feature on the position conversion and how Arizona uses him across formations.
Higgins was a four-year Stanford receiver whose identity was size, hands and toughness. He was the Cardinal's leading target as a junior and again as a senior, playing every snap of a rebuilding offense with unstable quarterback play and almost no vertical support around him. Nothing about his tape was schemed easy.
His production told a specific story: 45 catches for 500 yards and four scores in 2021, then 59 catches for 704 yards in 2022, both team highs, with a yards-per-catch figure under 12 in each season. That is the flag and the appeal at once. He caught almost everything thrown near him and never lost a contested rep by default, but he rarely uncovered downfield, and defensive backs sat on his breaks because they did not fear a second gear. The signature plays were back-shoulder wins on the boundary and stalk blocks that sprang perimeter runs.
The board saw a Day 3 receiver with a body that belonged somewhere else. His combine testing was solid rather than special for a wideout, and evaluators openly discussed a move inside, where the same frame and hands would be a plus instead of a tweener label. Miami taking him 197th overall was a bet on position change, not on a receiver rotation spot, and the league treated the pick that way from the first week of camp.
- 01
Contested catch finisher
Plays through contact at the catch point, uses his frame to shield and consistently comes down with 50-50 balls on the boundary and in the red zone.
- 02
Hands and catch radius
Snatches away from his body, adjusts to low and back-shoulder throws, and gives a quarterback a wide margin for error on off-target passes.
- 03
Willing blocker
Climbs to safeties and sustains on the perimeter with real intent, the trait that made scouts comfortable projecting him into a tight end room.
- 04
Alignment versatility
Worked outside, in the slot and reduced, and handled the mental load of a Stanford route tree with multiple formations and motions.
- 05
Durability and availability
Played 28 games across his final three seasons and never missed time as the offense's primary target, absorbing heavy coverage attention.
- 01
Separation quickness
Lacks suddenness at the top of routes and struggles to uncover against press-man corners who can match his release timing.
- 02
Vertical speed
A 4.54 build-up runner who does not threaten the deep third, which capped his yards per catch below 12 in each of his final three seasons.
- 03
Route nuance
Rounds breaks and telegraphs stems, letting defenders sit on hitches and comebacks rather than honoring a two-way go.
- 04
Yards after catch
Goes down on first contact more often than his size suggests and offers little creativity in space once the ball is secured.
— — — positional median (p50)
- 40 yd
- 4.54sp50
- Vertical
- 35inp50
- Broad jump
- 126inp50
- Three-cone
- 7.01sp50
- Shuttle
- 4.50sp50
- Bench
- 17repp50
| Yr | Team | G | Rec | Yds | TD |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 2019 | Stanford | 12 | 0 | 0 | 0 |
| 2020 | Stanford | 6 | 15 | 176 | 0 |
| 2021 | Stanford | 10 | 45 | 500 | 4 |
| 2022 | Stanford | 12 | 59 | 704 | 2 |
| Career | — | 40 | 119 | 1380 | 6 |
Verified against cfbstats.com player pages for 2020, 2021 and 2022 (6/15-176-0, 10/45-500-4, 12/59-704-2); those three seasons sum exactly to the 119-1,380-6 career receiving line. cfbstats has no 2019 page for this player; the 12 games played as a true freshman come from Stanford/Wikipedia reporting that he contributed almost exclusively on special teams, so his 2019 receiving categories and all season start totals are left null rather than zero-filled. Career games left null because sources disagree (28 across the three verified seasons vs 31 listed by StatMuse).
A dash means the figure is not published by a source we trust — never a zero we invented.
Same room, same job: heavy-personnel tight end whose value is blocking snaps and situational targets.
Converted big-bodied target who carved out a long career as a blocking-first TE2 with red-zone pop.
Size and hands never translated to a defined role, leaving him as a roster-fringe fourth tight end.
Everything above is the pre-draft evaluation. This section is what actually happened — updated year over year.
Sixth-round Stanford receiver waived by Miami, claimed by Arizona and moved to tight end. Career highs of 30 catches for 301 yards with 10 starts in 2025; back with the Cardinals in 2026.
Miami drafted him 197th overall in 2023 and waived him before the season, and Arizona claimed him off waivers on August 30, immediately converting him to tight end. He played 11 games with two starts as a rookie and caught 14 passes for 163 yards and a touchdown while learning to put a hand in the dirt. Year two was the proof of concept: 17 games, six starts, 20 catches for 172 yards and two scores, plus occasional fullback snaps in a room that carried no true one. In 2025 he took a real step behind Trey McBride, starting 10 of 17 games with career highs of 30 receptions for 301 yards. He is back with Arizona in 2026, where he cleared concussion protocol in late August and returned for the preseason finale.
In hindsight, this is what a sixth-round pick is supposed to look like when the projection is honest. Nobody in the building thought he would be a receiver, and the team that saw the tight end first got three years of ascending, low-cost value out of him. He has never been a mismatch weapon and the volume ceiling is capped by the All-Pro in front of him, but 45 games with 18 starts and steady blocking snaps in year four is a clean return at 197. The receiver evaluation was correct that he could not separate; the miss belonged to anyone who read that as a reason to pass rather than a reason to move him inside.