Two Clemson Pros Tabbed as NFL Players ‘To Root For’ in 2024

With the start of training camp right around the corner, NFL.com highlighted one player from each NFL team “to root for” during the 2024 season.

A couple of former Clemson stars — Cincinnati Bengals wide receiver Tee Higgins and Tennessee Titans receiver DeAndre Hopkins — were named among the aforementioned players.

Here’s what NFL.com’s Tom Blair had to say about why Higgins and Hopkins are players to pull for in 2024:

It’s incredibly difficult to succeed in the NFL, so you have to like players being rewarded when they pull it off. Presuming Higgins does not receive an extension and spends 2024 on the franchise tag , he’s one more productive campaign away from truly hitting paydirt on the open market. Last season was a mixed bag, with Higgins missing five games but also averaging a career high in yards per catch (15.6). As a rookie in 2020, the year before Ja’Marr Chase joined the team, Higgins paced Cincinnati in receiving yards (908) and TD catches (six), suggesting he has what it takes to lead a passing attack. Further evidence Higgins is WR1 quality: his numbers in the six games he’s played without Chase over the past three seasons (34 catches, 546 yards, four TDs). If Higgins helps Joe Burrow push Cincinnati back into title contention, he’ll be in line to make bank next March.

I began the AFC portion of this list with Derrick Henry , and I’ll end it with his former Tennessee teammate, who also showed he still has the juice to compete at a high level into his 30s. In his first year with the Titans, Hopkins appeared in a full complement of games and reached the 1,000-yard mark for the first time since 2020, despite working with a past-his-prime veteran ( Ryan Tannehill ) and a raw rookie ( Will Levis ) at QB. Hopkins is the active leader in career receptions (928) and ranks second among active players in career receiving yards (12,355), but he sits at 21st and 23rd in those categories, respectively, on the all-time lists. If he can get to 75 catches and 1,000 yards again in 2024, he should jump into the top 20 in both pursuits — and that should only help when it comes time to weigh his long-term legacy.

After being released by the Arizona Cardinals, Hopkins signed a two-year deal with the Titans last offseason and concluded his first campaign in Tennessee with 75 catches for 1,057 yards and seven touchdowns.

The 32-year-old Hopkins was a first-round pick of the Houston Texans back in 2013, and the five-time Pro Bowler has 78 touchdowns in his pro career to date, to go with his aforementioned receiving yards and receptions.

As for Higgins, although he’s coming off a down season in 2023 during which he was hampered by injuries, he has been highly productive overall in his NFL career. Entering his fifth year in the league in 2024, he has hauled in 257 receptions for 3,684 yards and 24 touchdowns since being drafted by the Bengals in the second round (33rd overall) of the 2020 draft.

The 6-foot-4, 219-pounder had back-to-back 1,000-yard receiving seasons in 2021 and 22, tallying 13 total touchdowns in that span.

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