Taylor Moton (born August 18, 1994) is an

American football American football (referred to simply as football in the United States and Canada), also known as gridiron, is a team sport played by two teams of eleven players on a rectangular field with goalposts at each end. The offense, the team with ...

offensive tackle Offensive may refer to: * Offensive, the former name of the Dutch political party Socialist Alternative * Offensive (military), an attack * Offensive language ** Fighting words or insulting language, words that by their very utterance inflict inj ...

for the

Carolina Panthers The Carolina Panthers are a professional American football team based in Charlotte, North Carolina. The Panthers compete in the National Football League (NFL), as a member club of the league's National Football Conference (NFC) South division. T ...

of the

National Football League The National Football League (NFL) is a professional American football league that consists of 32 teams, divided equally between the American Football Conference (AFC) and the National Football Conference (NFC). The NFL is one of the ...

(NFL). He played

college football College football (french: Football universitaire) refers to gridiron football played by teams of student athletes. It was through college football play that American football rules first gained popularity in the United States. Unlike most ...

Western Michigan West Michigan and Western Michigan are terms for an arbitrary region in the U.S. state of Michigan's Lower Peninsula. Most narrowly it refers to the Grand Rapids-Muskegon-Holland, Michigan, Holland area, and more broadly to most of the region a ...

. He was drafted by the Panthers in the second round of the

2017 NFL Draft The 2017 NFL Draft was the 82nd annual meeting of National Football League (NFL) franchises to select newly eligible American football players. It was held in front of the Philadelphia Museum of Art on April 27–29, returning to Philadelphia f ...

Early years

Moton attended

Okemos High School Okemos High School is a public high school in Okemos, Michigan, United States. It is the only high school in the Okemos Public Schools district. It is located southeast of the main campus of Michigan State University, between Bennett and Joll ...

Okemos, Michigan Okemos ( ) is a census-designated place (CDP) in Ingham County in the U.S. state of Michigan. The population of the CDP was 21,369 at the 2010 census. Okemos is located mostly within Meridian Charter Township, with a small portion extending sout ...

. He played football, basketball and ran track.

College career

Moton played at Western Michigan from 2012 to 2016. During his career he set a school record with 52 career starts.

Professional career

Moton received an invitation to the

Senior Bowl The Senior Bowl is a post-season college football all-star game played annually in late January or early February in Mobile, Alabama, which showcases the best NFL Draft prospects of those players who have completed their college eligibility. Pr ...

and played offensive tackle for the North who lost 15-16 to the South. He attended the NFL Combine and completed all of the combine and positional drills. A dozen NFL scouts attended Western Michigan's Pro Day, as Moton only ran positional drills with 13 other prospects. NFL draft experts and analysts projected him to be a second or third round pick in the 2017 NFL draft. He was ranked the fourth best offensive tackle in the draft by NFL analyst

Mike Mayock Michael Francis Mayock (born August 14, 1958) is a former American football executive and former player who served as the general manager of the Las Vegas Raiders of the National Football League (NFL) from 2019 to 2021. Mayock was a safety with ...

and was ranked the fifth best offensive tackle by ''

Sports Illustrated ''Sports Illustrated'' (''SI'') is an American sports magazine first published in August 1954. Founded by Stuart Scheftel, it was the first magazine with circulation over one million to win the National Magazine Award for General Excellence twic ...

'', NFLDraftScout.com, and

ESPN ESPN (originally an initialism for Entertainment and Sports Programming Network) is an American international basic cable sports channel owned by ESPN Inc., owned jointly by The Walt Disney Company (80%) and Hearst Communications (20%). The ...

. The

selected Moton in the second round (64th overall) of the

. The pick used to select Moton was acquired in a trade with the

New England Patriots The New England Patriots are a professional American football team based in the Greater Boston area. They compete in the National Football League (NFL) as a member club of the league's American Football Conference (AFC) AFC East, East divisio ...

in a trade that sent

Kony Ealy Kony Montoy Ealy (born December 21, 1991) is a gridiron football defensive end for the Edmonton Elks of the Canadian Football League (CFL). He played college football at Missouri and was drafted by the Carolina Panthers in the second round of the ...

to the Patriots. On May 4, 2017, the Carolina Panthers signed Moton to a four-year, $4.15 million contract with $2.28 million guaranteed and a signing bonus of $1.16 million. Moton was named the Panthers starting right tackle in 2018, and started every game the next three seasons. Set to be an unrestricted free agent, the Panthers placed the

franchise tag In the National Football League (NFL), the franchise tag is a designation a team may apply to a player scheduled to become an unrestricted free agent. The tag binds the player to the team for one year if certain conditions are met. Each team has on ...

on Moton on March 9, 2021. He signed the one-year contract two days later. On July 15, 2021, Moton signed a four-year, $71.25 million contract extension with the Panthers, worth $43 million in guarantees.

References

External links

Western Michigan Broncos bio

Carolina Panthers bio
{{DEFAULTSORT:Moton, Taylor 1994 births Living people Sportspeople from Lansing, Michigan Players of American football from Michigan American football offensive tackles American football offensive guards Western Michigan Broncos football players Carolina Panthers players