It wasn’t that long ago that Shaquil Barrett walked away from the game of football. He was released by the Bucs earlier in the off-season and signed on with the Miami Dolphins. After doing some off-season workouts with them, it was right before training camp that Barrett announced he was retiring.
Now, the 31-year old has said there’s only one scenario in which he would come out of retirement and rejoin the NFL. It has nothing to do with money, playoff positioning, potential Super Bowl victories - it’s simply because he loves Tampa and only wants to play for the Bucs;
Now before you go dusting off that Barrett jersey in anticipation of his return, it seems highly unlikely that it’s going to happen. Not impossible - we’re not talking odds that Antonio Brown returns or anything like that - but the Bucs seem content with allowing their young edge rushers to get an opportunity.
With Yaya Diaby leading the charge, or at least hopefully leading the charge, the Bucs have a huge youth movement on defense but especially at the edges. Anthony Nelson is the longest tenured outside linebacker on the roster and he was drafted in 2019. Then there’s Joe Tryon-Shoyinka who was drafted in 2021. These are young players and it seems as though the philosophy of the Bucs’ staff is that it’s time to throw them in the deep end to let them sink or swim.
That would tell the Bucs exactly how important edge rusher is going into the off-season next year with free agency and the draft. Much like how they prioritized the interior offensive line this season, we could see the same at edge next season.
But all hope is not lost to those of you wanting Barrett to rock the red and pewter once again. The Bucs kind of have this ace in their back pocket now. If they have some bad injury luck and all of a sudden are thin at outside linebacker during a late season push or heading into the playoffs, Jason might just get Shaq on the phone and ask if he wants to go for one more ride.
And while it’ll be fun and exciting and fans will get hyped, remember that this isn’t 2019-2021 Shaq anymore. Two double-digit sack seasons since 2019, tackles for loss have gone down every year for the last four seasons - and that’s not to say he wouldn’t bring value or production to the team, but it won’t be the Shaq everyone loves to remember. It’ll be a guy that might get you a big splash play once in a game, not the one offensive coordinators had nightmares about.
It wasn’t that long ago that Shaquil Barrett walked away from the game of football. He was released by the Bucs earlier in the off-season and signed on with the Miami Dolphins. After doing some off-season workouts with them, it was right before training camp that Barrett announced he was retiring.
Now, the 31-year old has said there’s only one scenario in which he would come out of retirement and rejoin the NFL. It has nothing to do with money, playoff positioning, potential Super Bowl victories - it’s simply because he loves Tampa and only wants to play for the Bucs;
Now before you go dusting off that Barrett jersey in anticipation of his return, it seems highly unlikely that it’s going to happen. Not impossible - we’re not talking odds that Antonio Brown returns or anything like that - but the Bucs seem content with allowing their young edge rushers to get an opportunity.
With Yaya Diaby leading the charge, or at least hopefully leading the charge, the Bucs have a huge youth movement on defense but especially at the edges. Anthony Nelson is the longest tenured outside linebacker on the roster and he was drafted in 2019. Then there’s Joe Tryon-Shoyinka who was drafted in 2021. These are young players and it seems as though the philosophy of the Bucs’ staff is that it’s time to throw them in the deep end to let them sink or swim.
That would tell the Bucs exactly how important edge rusher is going into the off-season next year with free agency and the draft. Much like how they prioritized the interior offensive line this season, we could see the same at edge next season.
But all hope is not lost to those of you wanting Barrett to rock the red and pewter once again. The Bucs kind of have this ace in their back pocket now. If they have some bad injury luck and all of a sudden are thin at outside linebacker during a late season push or heading into the playoffs, Jason might just get Shaq on the phone and ask if he wants to go for one more ride.
And while it’ll be fun and exciting and fans will get hyped, remember that this isn’t 2019-2021 Shaq anymore. Two double-digit sack seasons since 2019, tackles for loss have gone down every year for the last four seasons - and that’s not to say he wouldn’t bring value or production to the team, but it won’t be the Shaq everyone loves to remember. It’ll be a guy that might get you a big splash play once in a game, not the one offensive coordinators had nightmares about.
.jpg)
.png)
.png)
.png)
