Bengals rookie WR Auden Tate training with Randy Moss

When the Bengals selected Auden Tate in the seventh round of the 2018 NFL Draft my hopes were not high. The team already has a surplus of young receivers and the competition at the position was expected to be steep this offseason.

My Florida State friends didn’t have great things to say. “He’s just a tall receiver,” “nothing to get excited about,” they said.

But, the rookie receiver has done nothing but impress since showing up in Cincinnati as the 253rd pick in the draft.

He’s drawing praise from his teammates.

“Unbelievable,” A.J. Green said of Tate’s catches, via Dan Hoard of Bengals.com. “We call him a young Brandon Marshall. The guy has unbelievable hands, he’s big (with) great body control. He had a very good (minicamp).”

His jump ball ability has been praised by our own John Sheeran as a reason he could make the roster.

Tate is the only receiver over 6-4 drafted by Marvin Lewis, and that height along with his build is his best and most notable asset in his Florida State film.

And he’s put those skills on display, too, which earned its own praise during minicamp.

On top of that, Geoff Hobson says he’s making “a real run at the roster.” And The Dayton Daily News and Cincinnati Enquirer haven’t been shy with their praise of him either. Now, as he prepares for training camp, Tate is doing something that Bengals fans are sure to be impressed by.

He’s working out with soon to be Hall of Famer Randy Moss.

Tate posted the above video on his Instagram account, showing him working with Moss, who will be inducted into the Hall of Fame this August after a standout NFL career spanning 13 seasons. Tate can certainly learn a thing or two from Moss who actually has a similar body frame to Tate. Moss is 6’4”, 215 pounds while Tate is 6’5”, 228 pounds. Tate’s size is expected to be a big asset for him, especially in the red zone, where he’ll be able to create mismatches.

It’s pretty cool to see the Bengals’ seventh round pick is going out of his way to not only train on his own in the lead up to camp, but to train with one of the best players to ever see an NFL field. Moss actually was enrolled at Florida State for a year, though he didn’t play a down for the school as he got into some legal trouble and transferred to Marshall where he played two seasons of college football before moving on to the pros.

It’s unclear how Tate and Moss connected, but it’s awesome to see no matter how it happened.