Tag, You Are It (Maybe)
February 25th, 2021
Bucs GM Jason Licht.
If Bucs AC/DC-loving general manager Jason Licht needs to use the franchise tag this season on a free agent, he can.
But he may not. In fact, to hear him yesterday in his offseason media session, Licht is going to try to meander through free agency — the dinner bell rings to signal the start of free agency on March 17 (not when Ira inhales his corned beef and cabbage) — without using the franchise tag.
“The tag is an option for any one of our players right now,” Licht said. “We don’t necessarily have plans to use it on one particular player versus another. Right now, we’re trying to keep as many of these players that we have and move forward to next year – [whether] that’s a long-term deal, a short-term deal or we use the tag.
“You’re not going to get me to tell you who’s going to get tagged because right now, we couldn’t even tell you ourselves.”
Provided the Bucs truly, sincerely want to keep sack king Shaq Barrett and receiver Chris Godwin, the first one to sign on the dotted line could mean the other guy gets tagged. That’s how Joe would do it. Don’t want to be tagged? Sign on the dotted line.
If both capitulate and sign, then Joe’s tagging kicker Ryan Succop. Yes, Joe wrote that. Those who believe that’s ridiculous haven’t watched Bucs kickers throughout the Lost Decade. Now that was ridiculous.
How is it the old saying goes, “If you have it, use it.”
February 25th, 2021 at 8:12 am
While I agree that we must keep Succop, is it really wise to play head games with a kicker?
February 25th, 2021 at 8:20 am
J thinking this time, is wise thinking… agree 100%…
February 25th, 2021 at 8:21 am
We are in win now mode. If we need to I would tag Succop. He proved he can get the job done.. Can you imagine how silly wed look having Super Bowl asperations and signing some unknown Kicker to have him stink and cost us games?
The kicking position is overlooked until its late in the 4th and we need 3 points to tie or win the game…
February 25th, 2021 at 8:23 am
I feel you on the kicker sentiment. But franchising Succup turns his 2020 salary of 1 mil into 4.8mil for 2021. There is no savings there, only desperation.
February 25th, 2021 at 8:28 am
@ Joe
Do you have any idea of how much cap space we will have if Tom Brady restructures?
We currently have between $20-$30 mil depending on where you look.
Tagging Godwin will cost @ $15.3 mil. Tagging Shaq will be @ $19 mil…
February 25th, 2021 at 8:35 am
Marine: from what I’ve read on OTC’s explanation, there are no savings on restructuring any player with 1 year left in their contract. A restructure gives a player their salary that year as a bonus instead, and pro-rates the bonus cap hit over the rest of the term. So Evans, Marpet and Brate are your most likely restructure candidates. Cutting them in the future means dead money as a result.
Extending Brady, D Smith or Marpet and giving them signing bonuses or guaranteed money in return for a 2021 cost reduction is where you gain savings on the front end in exchange for risk on the backend. What you can save all depends on how much less they are willing to take this year in exchange for future incentive which is impossible to say for us.
February 25th, 2021 at 8:36 am
I meant extending Jensen, not Marpet.
February 25th, 2021 at 8:48 am
Leighroy … I’m with you on no savings from restructuring any player with only 1 year left in their contract. New Orleans saved some by doing that with Brees, now they owe him a bunch, and he’s reportedly gonna retire (and they’ll STILL owe him & get zapped on the CAP).
Renegotiating with Brady for a 2-year contract though does make some sense … for 2021. Of course, it could really bite us in the butt in 2022. But then again, earth could get hit by a huge meteor in 2022 & wipe out all the dinosaurs once more, so I say go for it in 2021.
Wasn’t it Admiral Farragut who said ‘Damn the torpedoes, full speed ahead’? (Of course, that was back in the Civil War when torpedoes were really underwater mines, but don’t tell the good Admiral).
February 25th, 2021 at 8:51 am
Even if our guy gives us a home town discount with shaq or godwin , it will still be 4 years 60 mil (15 per) with 50 mil guaranteed
Get some deals done cause 17 game season coming and contracts will go way up even with 1 more regular season game
February 25th, 2021 at 9:00 am
I will be shocked if we don’t use the Tag this year.
The only question in my mind is, will it be Godwin or Shaq who gets Tagged ?
February 25th, 2021 at 9:04 am
Licht knows what he’s doing and you can look at his past record to tell you what will happen this year:
– no crazy signing bonuses
– no long-term deals that could lead to dead money
– no deals that pay a player for past production (David)
Extending Brady opens the championship window for 2021 & 2022. It also sends a message to any vet FA that they can take a two year deal and chase a ring.
With the cap dropping, there are going to be some seriously good players being cut. Guys that have made their money and just want a championship before they retire
February 25th, 2021 at 9:26 am
@ Leighroy/Defense
So at most the Bucs may have @ $40 million to use this offseason?
If so – draft picks will cost @ $6.5 mil.
QB2, QB3, kicker and long snapper will cost @ $10 mil.
That leaves $23.5 mil.
Franchise tag Godwin? $15.3 mil.
With 15-20 more free agents to sign…
Yikes.
February 25th, 2021 at 9:35 am
devenport buc, normally i would agree with you, but his track record has been while team building, not during a super bowl window. so he may have a different thought process this time around. now i doubt we’ll ever be in the saints position, but i wouldn’t be surprised if he bucks some trends to keep things together for a couple years
February 25th, 2021 at 9:56 am
Geez, tagging the kicker at over 4mil, ouch. But I can’t watch another year of godawful place kicking. Joe’s right when he says some of us have ptsd after the years past. How much did pinion earn, I’m pretty sure the bucs can find another punter who can handle kick off duty for far less $$$
February 25th, 2021 at 10:16 am
Marine Buc … I gave up trying to make the numbers work. They don’t … not if you go in with the assumption that we retain all our high $$$ players. They won’t work this year & they certainly won’t work next year when we look at re-signing Vea, Davis & a host of FAs who’ll be on 1-year contracts THIS year.
Bottom line IMO: There WILL be changes in our starting lineup & key rotational players. Only questions that I still have are WHO will get the axe, and WHEN will they get the axe.
We simply can’t afford the SAME TEAM that won this past SB. BUT … we CAN afford a TEAM that’s good enough to win THIS year’s SB. After that IMO, all bets are off.
It’s about PRIORITIES right now.
o Priority 1 IMO is fielding a starting defense, with quality key rotational players, that’s on a par with the Bucs’ defense that showed up in the playoffs. Easiest way to do that is to keep the key players together for 1 more year. And that’ll mean re-signing LVD, Shaq, Suh & Minter as a minimum, as well as retaining Gholston for another year. Personally I think we need to spend THREE of our high draft picks (Rnds 1-4) on (1) a DE/OLB; (2) a DT; and (3) a LB. We’re woefully shallow (depth) in all 3 of those areas.
o Priority 2 IMO is re-signing Succop. He’s worth in the neighborhood of $4 mil per year (maybe more), and I’d give him a long-term deal (3-5 yrs) because HE’S THAT GOOD.
o Priority 3 IMO is making sure that we can field a quality offense that COMPLEMENTS our defense. Right now we’ve got too much $$$ committed to our starting offense (IF you include our FAs in the discussion), and changes will need to be made. HOPEFULLY much of that can be accomplished with restructuring contracts, but I think it’s delusional to believe that we can keep the whole thing intact for another SB run. Patriots never managed to do that (they ‘adjusted’ year-to-year), and we won’t fare any better. The NFL’s salary CAP sees to that.
February 25th, 2021 at 11:14 am
@ defense
I can’t make the numbers work either. It will be interesting to watch how the Bucs navigate this offseason.
I believe we will lose Shaq, Godwin and L. David.
Its possible L. David stays but not likely…
I believe we find another pass rusher via FA on the cheap (Dupree, Miller).
Same with wide receiver.
We draft a RB, LB and WR in rounds 1-3…
Then sign as many FAs from last year as we are able including our kicker.
February 25th, 2021 at 12:04 pm
tagging succop kinda makes sense
Kickers don’t use up a lot of cap space and are able to generate points and wins
Its going to be a real jigsaw puzzle to keep this team together
Time to start looking at the FA lists
February 25th, 2021 at 1:23 pm
Tom should lead his team into restructured contracts.
February 25th, 2021 at 6:07 pm
This is the most unprecedented Super Bowl window in Bucs history. Licht has to pull out all stops to keep as many FAs as possible. I expect the Glazers will instruct Licht to do whatever it’s takes even if the Bucs have to go to cap hell for next three years. No risk it, no biscuit goes for player contracts also.