Payne
Durham.
Payne
Durham.
Purdue· 6'6"· 253 lb· 4.87s 40
"A converted lacrosse player who became the second-most prolific touchdown tight end in Purdue history, Durham is a throwback Y whose value lives inside the twenty and inside the tackle box."Pre-draft read
Durham is a true inline Y tight end who lived in a three-point stance at Purdue and only rarely flexed into the slot. The trait that defines him is red-zone reliability: a 6-5, 253-pound target who wins with body position and late hands on back-shoulder and fade balls, and who catches away from his frame in traffic without letting contact break his concentration.
The second trait is willingness in the run game — he stays attached, keeps his feet moving on down blocks and does not quit on combos. He is a better play-side blocker than a mover in space, and the athletic ceiling is limited: a 4.87 forty means no vertical stress. The signature is the scoring, 21 career touchdowns, fifth in Purdue history.
A 12-personnel offense that keeps the Y attached and uses him on play-action leak routes and red-zone isolation, rather than a spread system that flexes the tight end into the slot.
Year 1: TE2 in two-tight-end packages and a red-zone target. Ceiling: a low-volume starting Y who blocks on early downs and produces four to six touchdowns a season.
A wide-zone offense that motions the tight end across the formation and asks him to win detached against nickels and safeties on the move.
Every unit of his value comes from being attached and near the goal line.
Career Highlights: Purdue TE Payne Durham | Purdue Football | 2023 NFL Draft
Big Ten Network career reel showing the red-zone wins, contested catches and inline work that defined his Purdue tape.
Payne Durham vs Syracuse (2022)
Full-game cutup from 2022 with every snap, useful for judging his blocking effort as much as his route work.
New Tampa Bay Buccaneers TE Payne Durham Highlights - Senior Bowl - Purdue TE
Senior Bowl week reps against draftable competition, the best look at how he handled one-on-one coverage.
Durham arrived at Purdue as a converted lacrosse player with one season of high school football and left as one of the most productive tight ends in program history. He is a traditional Y — attached, physical, comfortable in a stance — whose game is built on size, hands and situational awareness rather than movement skill, and whose four-year development curve is the reason scouts trusted the tape.
The production climbed every year: nine catches as a redshirt freshman, 16 in the shortened 2020 season, 45 in 2021 and a career-best 56 for 560 yards and eight scores in 2022, when he was second-team All-Big Ten and a Mackey Award semifinalist. The scoring number is the headline — 21 career touchdowns, fifth in Purdue history — and the leadership was real enough that he was voted captain through the Brohm transition. The flags were athletic: a 4.87 forty and 7.15 three-cone confirmed a tight end who separates on leverage, not speed.
Boards had him as a late Day 3 blocking-and-red-zone tight end. Dane Brugler slotted him tenth at the position, PFF had him 170th overall, and NFL.com gave him a 6.12 grade with a Jack Doyle comparison. At 171 overall, Tampa Bay was buying a TE2 who could hold up in 12 personnel behind Cade Otton.
- 01
Red-zone finisher
Twenty-one career touchdowns, fifth in Purdue history and second among tight ends, built on body position, timing and late hands on fades and back-shoulder throws.
- 02
Contested-catch strength
Catches away from his frame in traffic and holds on through contact, the reason he was Aidan O'Connell's most trusted target inside the twenty.
- 03
Inline blocking willingness
Comfortable in a three-point stance, stays attached on down blocks and combos, and never quits on a rep even against bigger Big Ten edge defenders.
- 04
Four-year development curve
Went from nine catches as a redshirt freshman to 56 for 560 and eight scores as a senior, a straight line of improvement that scouts trusted.
- 05
Leadership and toughness
Voted a 2022 captain and cited as a stabilizing voice through Purdue's coaching transition, a former lacrosse player with one year of high school football.
- 01
Athletic ceiling
A 4.87 forty and 7.15 three-cone confirmed a tight end who creates no vertical stress and will not threaten the seam against NFL safeties.
- 02
Separation quantity
Wins on leverage and size rather than route quickness, so his catches come on schemed spacing and jump balls instead of open grass.
- 03
Blocking power
Willing and attached, but he plays with more effort than pop and gets stalemated by NFL edge setters when asked to move a man off the line.
- 04
Yards after catch
Almost nothing after the reception at Purdue, where his career average sat right at ten yards a catch and explosive plays were rare.
— — — positional median (p50)
- 40 yd
- 4.87sp50
- Vertical
- 34.5inp50
- Broad jump
- 117inp50
- Three-cone
- —s
- Shuttle
- —s
- Bench
- —rep
| Yr | Team | G | Rec | Yds | TD |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 2018 | Purdue | 2 | 0 | 0 | 0 |
| 2019 | Purdue | 12 | 9 | 82 | 4 |
| 2020 | Purdue | 6 | 16 | 166 | 3 |
| 2021 | Purdue | 12 | 45 | 467 | 6 |
| 2022 | Purdue | 13 | 56 | 560 | 8 |
| Career | — | 45 | 126 | 1275 | 21 |
2020-2022 taken directly from cfbstats.com (Purdue team 559, player 1096612). cfbstats does not archive 2018-2019, so those seasons come from StatMuse game logs; the five-season sum reconciles exactly with Purdue official career line of 45 games, 126 receptions, 1,275 yards and 21 touchdowns. Durham opted out of the January 2023 Citrus Bowl, which is why 2022 shows 13 games.
A dash means the figure is not published by a source we trust — never a zero we invented.
Blocking-first TE2 who holds a roster spot for years on inline reliability with a handful of catches a season.
The consensus comparison: a plodding, dependable Y who blocked, produced in the red zone and started for years without ever testing well.
Big-bodied Day 3 tight end whose contribution never grew past heavy-package snaps.
Everything above is the pre-draft evaluation. This section is what actually happened — updated year over year.
Tampa Bay used Durham exactly as the profile suggested. He played 13 games as a rookie in 2023 with two starts and caught five passes for 58 yards, a blocking-package tight end behind starter Cade Otton. In 2024 he took the largest role of his career: 16 games, two starts, 11 receptions for 115 yards and the first two touchdowns of his career, mostly out of heavy sets, with a late-season calf issue slowing him. In 2025 the passing usage vanished — 17 games, one catch for 11 yards — while he stayed valuable as an inline blocker and special teams body. He remained on the Buccaneers roster entering 2026, the final year of his rookie deal.
Three seasons in, the pick is neither a hit nor a miss: 46 games, 17 catches, 184 yards and two touchdowns is a fifth-round TE2 doing his job. Nothing about the evaluation was wrong. The red-zone hands showed up in flashes, the blocking held up, and the athletic ceiling capped him exactly where the testing said it would. What Tampa Bay never got was the receiving package that made him a college weapon, because Otton took those snaps and Durham could not win on routes that required speed.