Film room: Bech adds physical possession receiver to offense

Diving into the second-round pick’s tape

The Las Vegas Raiders were looking to add depth at wide receiver heading into the 2025 NFL Draft and selected TCU’s Jack Bech in the second round with the 58th overall pick of the draft.

Bech’s college career began at LSU, where he spent some time at tight end and that shows up on his tape as physicality is the root of his game. The former Tiger and Horned Frog can out-muscle defensive backs to create separation, has strong hands with only four career drops on 200 catches, and hauled in 21 of 34 contested targets (61.8 percent), according to Pro Football Focus.

With that in mind, let’s get a glimpse at what the wideout can bring to the Raiders’ offense.

Bech checked in at the NFL Combine a little over 6-foot-1 and 214 pounds and then hit 19 reps on the bench press. The latter was the second-most among wide receivers, and he uses his strength well to create separation at the top of routes, which the clip above highlights.

TCU runs a switch release with the slot receiver working wide to run a comeback route while Bech stems inside before breaking on the out route. The inside stem gets the corner’s momentum going toward the middle of the field, and Bech capitalizes by using his hands to take advantage of the size and strength mismatch.

That allows him to get plenty of separation for an easy pitch and catch to move the chains on the 20-yard gain.

Here, we’ll get an example of the wideout’s toughness to make a contested catch for a touchdown.

He runs a slant route against man coverage on the goal line, where the linebackers are the low-hole players to help take away any routes over the middle. While TCU has a good play call for this coverage with the inside slot receiver running a fade route, the cornerback does a good job of avoiding the pick.

So, the corner ends up being in Bech’s hip while the linebacker is waiting in the middle of the field, creating a situation where the wideout has to make a contested catch in traffic while facing pressure from both sides. However, he shows off some strong hands to hold onto the ball and is willing to take a hit to put six points on the board.

These types of grabs are exactly what you’re looking for from a possession receiver.

We’ll take a look at another quality contested catch from the TCU product.

He’s facing press coverage this time and does a solid job of winning at the line of scrimmage by using an outside jab step to create some space on the inside for the slant route. But the cornerback does a good job of staying patient at the line of scrimmage to avoid getting beaten off the line and falling completely out of phase.

As a result, Bech wins on the route but the corner is in a position to recover, forcing the quarterback to throw the ball in front of Bech and a little high to keep it away from the defensive back. Luckily, the wideout has strong hands to make the grab while leaving his feet and having the corner riding his hip.

That results in another big catch over the middle of the field for a first down.

While Bech isn’t shifty enough to make defenders miss consistently and only averaged 5.5 yards after the catch per reception, according to PFF, during his career, he does have a good feel for defenders’ leverage to help tack on some YAC occasionally.

The route isn’t much to speak of on this rep as he runs a simple seam against a three-deep, three-under fire zone, and the linebacker steps downhill to cover the running back. But with the ball in his hands, Bech recognizes that the cornerback is coming in hot behind him and hits the brakes to work back toward the sideline, forcing the corner to overpursue.

Now, running laterally instead of getting up the field isn’t going to work in the NFL, but he does a good job of using another defender’s momentum against the defender to break another tackle.

Finally, where the TCU product does excel after the catch is with his physicality, refusing to go down and fighting for every yard to add another roughly five yards on this rep.

This next clip is a combination of the last two as the former Horned Frog beats press coverage and fights for extra yards with the ball in his hands.

Bech uses a skip release off the line of scrimmage to eat up some of the corner’s cushion. Then he stems outside and uses a jab step to get the corner to open his hips before using quickness or suddenness to spin the corner around and create plenty of separation on the slant route.

The pass is slightly behind Bech, but he adjusts to make the grab and work up the field. From there, he tacks on extra yards after contact by refusing to go down easily. Granted, he only adds about four or five yards in this specific example, but reps like this will pay off more down the line when defensive backs don’t use proper tackling form.

Finally, we’ll wrap up with an explosive play. While Bech doesn’t have the long speed to be a consistent deep threat, he is sudden and has impressive quickness at the top of routes to occasionally win deep.

He runs a corner-post route against bracket coverage, meaning one defensive back is responsible for staying on top of him and the other is there to take away any underneath routes and play from a trail position to help against a deep route.

However, Bech runs a perfect double-move route, selling the corner by keeping his shoulders pointed toward the sideline before using his quickness and change of direction skills to break on the post route. That puts the vertical defender in a blender, causing the defender to get turned around and allowing separation.

Finally, the TCU product has enough speed to beat the other defensive back and makes another beautiful hands catch to put the ball in the endzone for a 50-yard touchdown.

Overall, the Raiders found a quality possession receiver who can make tough catches and be a technician as a route-runner in the second round of the draft.