ENGLEWOOD, Colo. —The play itself wasn't anything spectacular.
The tight end broke out of his stance, headed upfield and caught a pass down the seam from Drew Lock.
It was just a routine play during the first day of Broncos training camp, but for Jake Butt, it meant a bit more.
There was no pain, no lingering soreness and no indication that he'd spent much of the last three years away from the field. After a host of knee surgeries, Butt finally feels healthy and ready to compete in a crowded position room.
"Moving around, running around, I've been feeling really, really good, honestly," Butt told DenverBroncos.com. "All my weight room numbers are up. This is the strongest I've ever been. That's for both of my legs. I feel fast and explosive. I get it. I understand that I'm going to have to earn anything I can get around here, and I'm OK with that. But for me, the main thing I'm excited about is I feel healthy, and I feel like I can go out there and be myself."
When healthy, Butt has intriguing talent. He won the John Mackey Award as a senior at Michigan as the nation's top tight end, and he set school records for career receptions (138) and yards (1,646). He tore his ACL in the 2016 Orange Bowl, though, which pushed the first-round talent down draft boards. Denver selected him in the fifth round of the 2017 NFL Draft, and he spent his first season on the non-football injury list as he rehabbed.
As he entered his second season, Butt showed why the team invested in him. He started the first three games of the season and caught eight passes for 85 yards. In Week 2 against the Raiders, he caught four passes for 48 yards, including a key catch on the Broncos' final drive to help set up a game-winning field goal. Butt, though, tore his ACL in practice ahead of the Broncos' Week 4 game and was placed on injured reserve. A year later, as the team headed into the 2019 season, Butt was still dealing with aftereffects and had to have a clean-up surgery on his meniscus.
"This one was probably the hardest one," Butt said. "Kind of just what made it so hard is I had just finally rehabbed 18 months pretty much from my second ACL. For me, I never was a guy that was injured. I think I might've missed one game in my entire college career — and that was from my first ACL, and I played a game six months after surgery. I've always considered myself as a reliable guy for the team, someone that really doesn't get hurt. This third one, it kind of took that identity from me. It was a little bit tough to deal with mentally, [but] I think it's made me stronger. I feel like I'm over that mental hump now, and I've had a whole offseason to actually performance train and get my body ready rather than rehab. I'm excited about the opportunity I have."
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August 16, 2020 at 01:55AM
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Healthy for the first time in two years, TE Jake Butt is ready to prove he deserves a roster spot - DenverBroncos.com
"time" - Google News
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