Free Agency Countdown: 28 Days — Josh Sweat Equity
February 10th, 2025
The big board at JoeBucsFan.com has a big No. 28 on it.
The countdown clock is a shade under 675 hours.
Exactly four weeks from today, at high noon on March 10, teams can negotiate with agents and reach agreements to sign players in free agency. Adam Schefter and friends will be reporting signings like Joe pounds Hooters wings on Super Bowl Sunday. Those reported deals can be made official on Wednesday, March 12.
This year, the Bucs will have salary cap room and they can craft more by, for example, giving Mike Evans a contract extension and legitimately making him a “Buc For Life. Other current contracts can be worked as well.
No, money won’t be a good excuse for the Bucs not signing a quality edge pass rusher this offseason.
That brings Joe to an easy target to consider. Beastly Eagles edge rusher Josh Sweat is a pending free agent. The world watched him go wild on the Chiefs last night with 2 1/2 sacks and loads of pressure.
Sweat, a 2018 fourth-round Eagles draft pick out of Florida State, had 8 sacks in the regular season. He turns 28 next month. He’s also a relatively low-mileage guy after not becoming a full-time starter until his fourth season, 2021, when he landed in the Pro Bowl.
After a huge Super Bowl, it sure feels like Sweat will be overpriced in free agency. Maybe he’ll help drive the price down of other free agent edge rushers.
Some sort of addition is coming to the Bucs’ edge rush. “Status woe” can’t be the approach. Can it?
February 10th, 2025 at 9:36 am
Glazer Boys too cheap to land a top flight edge rusher. They’ll find a bargain basement deal instead.
February 10th, 2025 at 9:38 am
Last night he priced himself out of landing in Tampa.
February 10th, 2025 at 9:40 am
His pressure on Patrick Mahomes caused that interception to Baun last night. Go get him Bucs!
February 10th, 2025 at 9:48 am
If the Bucs release Dean then we could definitely make this happen. Plus that frees up our first round pick to go after one of the top CB like Barron out of Texas. There are plenty of high quality LB to be had in the second round.
February 10th, 2025 at 9:58 am
Get corners and LB who can cover. Our pass rush was actually good we just can’t cover. Our defense was top 10 in sacks, pressure %, hurry %, knocking QB to the ground %. We were bottom 10 in most other categories notably INT and passes defended.
We don’t need to spend cap space or draft capital to acquire more pass rush. We need a new DC and guys who can cover.
February 10th, 2025 at 9:59 am
Worst part of the year os the next month… ugh. Have to find a pass rusher in free agency. I was surprised and disappointed when we did nothing to adddress the postion last off season
February 10th, 2025 at 10:00 am
Watching that game made me wonder how many sacks JTS would have had because those tackles were trash. All smoke and mirrors with Sweat. Why did he play us in week 4 and end up with a tackle and 1 sack against Justin Skule, he’s an average edge rusher not somebody you break the bank for
February 10th, 2025 at 10:00 am
Guys that win a super bowl right before they hit free agency have a track record of over paid and under preformance.
February 10th, 2025 at 10:01 am
People need to watch the super bowl again. Iggles weren’t blowing up the line they were holding tight coverage for more than 2 seconds forcing Mahomes to get antsy. Their D-line did a great job in contain once that happened but they weren’t just popcorning guys at the snap and free runs at Mahomes.
Hopefully Licht is not taking the same poor conclusions as most of Bucs fans.
February 10th, 2025 at 10:03 am
The guy was just a one-year rental for them, I do not believe they can afford to resign him. That said, he’s probably going to be higher than we want to pay, sadly
February 10th, 2025 at 10:10 am
it does show you dont have to target garrett to improve pass rush you can find other options
February 10th, 2025 at 10:18 am
Go get him Bucs
February 10th, 2025 at 10:36 am
Baron Browning is a potential target. He profiles almost identically to young Shaq, except he can also play ILB. 25, played thru rookie deal and missed most of last season after a week 2 injury. 11.5 career sacks. Perhaps a starter that could either breakout or give time to develop whomever is drafted for edge.
February 10th, 2025 at 10:36 am
Usually, after a team wins a Super Bowl, the player and team have a mutual interest in resigning the guy. I’d guess he stays in Philly.
February 10th, 2025 at 10:38 am
Sweat, a 2018 fourth-round Eagles draft pick out of Florida State, had 8 sacks in the regular season. He turns 28 next month. He’s also a relatively low-mileage guy after not becoming a full-time starter until his fourth season, 2021, when he landed in the Pro Bowl.
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I think we may be missing something important here.
Apparently, there’s somebody on the Eagles defensive staff that knows how to develop talent.
Maybe we should be looking for a staff addition(or replacement).
February 10th, 2025 at 10:38 am
The pass rush was only good because either A. we blitzed, or B. Vita or Kansey broke through the middle. If we blitzed then you could have four Deion Sanders back there and someone would still be open.
February 10th, 2025 at 10:47 am
Just remember that under the current defensive scheme, Sweat or anyone edge like will be covering the 15 yard deep hash to sideline zone.
February 10th, 2025 at 10:48 am
Something tells me that Josh Sweat’s production was the result of others on the dline. I’ll rather trade for Myles Garret or Trey Henrickson.
February 10th, 2025 at 10:56 am
Jeff
“Glazer Boys too cheap to land a top flight edge rusher. They’ll find a bargain basement deal instead.”
I’m genuinely curious Jeff. Why would you post that?
First and perhaps most important is the Glazers are MANDATED to spend a minimum on the team. They are also RESTRICTED by the cap on how much they can spend. They have been the opposite of cheap when it comes to players, paying them so much that Bucs went waaaay over the cap amount the Glazers were er “allowed” to spend,
2nd When they purchased ManU the economy happened to go in the tank just as they were leveraged out the wazoo! That did force them to tighten up and hire a rookie coach like Rah. Once they got out of the leverage problems with Man U they’ve spent like drunken pirates! They’ve been anything but cheap.
February 10th, 2025 at 11:02 am
Licht will sit on his hands like he did after the 2020 season, dude is too complacent to be great
February 10th, 2025 at 11:08 am
I 100% percent agree with Joe when he screams about the lack of an edge rush.
Love the fact that our interior guys put up good sack numbers, but those are not the guys that should be leading your team in sacks. We were blessed to have JPP and Barrett in their prime for a few years, then injuries and age put an end to that. Since then our edge rush has gone from MEH to BLAH..
The opportunities to add someone are going to be there.
Of course we know Garrett wants out of Cleveland. Sweat as noted above. The Bengals could easily screw up with Trey Hendrickson. A guy one of the Joe’s or maybe both Joe’s was hyping up, Hassen Reddick, is a UFA. I wouldn’t put Jerry’s Jones ego past dealing Parsons, probably in his delusional mind, trying to recreating the trade of Hershel Walker that made the 1990’s Cowboys great. Future HOF Kahlil Mack is going to be available. Even if they don’t do a trade, a UFA mercenary like Dante Fowler Jr. would be an upgrade over JTS.
February 10th, 2025 at 11:13 am
Too expensive for us. They’re going with the young guys we already have on the roster
February 10th, 2025 at 11:32 am
Sweat will likely re-sign with the Eagles hoping for another ring. If he wants to test the FA market, the Eagles can always ‘tag’ him. I doubt that he will be leaving Philly this year.
February 10th, 2025 at 12:04 pm
We had a defense that dominated in a Superbowl before. Twice. Sighhh. Go Bowles
February 10th, 2025 at 12:08 pm
I’m like half hour from Philly. Sweat is nothing special at all. Better options than him he’s going want mad loot
February 10th, 2025 at 2:19 pm
Don’t go chasing an edge rusher late in the first round……either pay the price in FA or trade up for a winner……we should have learned our lesson with JTS.
As for the draft….we need to come away with a CB & ILB in the 1st 2 rounds……then probably another CB, S….
Our offense is set…..resign Godwin…..
February 10th, 2025 at 3:04 pm
Dumboldguy, is a perfect call name for you….
Mister, what game were you watching? The eagles ABSOLUTELY BLEW UP the cheifs line again and Again and AGAIN PERIOD!
It was TRULY a page out of our play book of the 2020 Tampa Bay Buccaneers SuperBowl CLUB SEALING ABSOLUTE DOMINATION of the cheifs….
It sure seemed clear that for the majority of the game that he didn’t even have 2 seconds to throw! And since the eagles did NOT blitz Mahoney even one single time, then it seems MORE THAN CRYSTAL CLEAR that the cheifs o line and Patty Mahoney was Brutally raped for HOURS! And that the Pass Rush IS INDEED WHY the eagles Dominated the game.
For you sir, this is a “COME ON MAN” moment…..
GO BUCS!
February 10th, 2025 at 4:41 pm
“money won’t be a good excuse for the Bucs not signing a quality edge pass rusher this offseason”
$52.5M in required dead cap payments this year says otherwise. That’s very close to 20% of the entire $275M ‘budget’ in 2025……
Hopefully ‘quality’ and ‘expensive’ are 2 different things in the Bucs free agency search for help rushing the passer from the edge. $10M or less is feasibly doable – $20M+ is not…..
Jason needs to find the next Shaq Barrett – who initially signed a 1 year $4M deal upon arriving in Tampa Bay – and proceeded to post 19 1/2 sacks that same year.
February 10th, 2025 at 4:44 pm
The Bucs only have 2.2 million in cap space. The Celine Loving GM Light mismanaged the cap. They still have 17.4 million in dead money for Shaq barret and 11.8 million for Ryan Jenson. That is why you don’t restructure contracts to future years. Pay as you go. *The exception would be for a GOAT at QB).
When Celine Dion loving GM says he likes the guys he has what he is really saying is he mismanaged the cap and can not afford to get free agents.
February 11th, 2025 at 12:51 am
Free agent edge would help us solve some other problems for sure. Free to focus on getting ILB and corner help in the draft.
But contracts for these guys are crazy! Can these guys cover TEs and RBs though?
You know Todd has checked…
Go Bucs!