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HawgBeat's coverage of Arkansas' spring practice is presented by Wright's Barbecue. Already serving up the best meats in Arkansas, you can now also find Wright's meat rub and sauces at Walmart and Walmart.com.

FAYETTEVILLE — As soon as he announced his new tight ends coach, it became clear what Sam Pittman was looking from the position group in 2021.

The tight end duo of Blake Kern and Hudson Henry combined to catch 36 passes for 293 yards and three touchdowns during the 10-game season last year, which aren’t big numbers, but it was the other aspect of their spot that Cody Kennedy was hired to improve.

A former offensive line coach who had never actually coached tight ends, Kennedy is a Pittman disciple - working for him as a graduate assistant at Georgia in 2018 - and is expected to turn the Razorbacks’ tight ends into more physical blockers.

“With Coach Kennedy coming in this season, I think one thing we needed to work on as a group was just physicality and just being real nasty on the field,” Henry said. “That’s something that every day we talk about in our room, is finishing everything - finishing blocks, finishing routes, being the last guy to put a shove on a guy.”