Final Draft Predictions, Roster Needs | Bucs Insider

some things about the draft. After months of prognosticating and evaluating and talking about it, we're finally on the final countdown here, So of course it's going to be a very draft centered inside Er Live that we have here, and any questions you have about that or anything else with the Buccaneers you can put underneath our live video on Facebook and the comments section. We'll get to those in a few minutes, but for now, as we give

people a chance to do that. Jason Light spoke to the media this week, the man of the hour, the man everybody wants to know a thousand things from, but the man who also will tell us very little about what they're going to do on purpose. So from what he get, what he was able to give you, guys, were there anythings that you felt like gave you some nuggets, some insights, something that you found interesting about what he said? You got it right on the head there, that this

is an annual thing. Probably most teams do it. That your general manager speaks before or the draft, and it's an exercise in the media asking questions they hope he'll talk about and him strategy. But he does talk I think, pretty candidly about some of his processes when it comes to drafting. And you know, every He'll tell you every every draft pick, even in the first round, is a coin f lift there. There are a lot of them

are just not gonna work out. But to try to increase your chances of success, there are a few things he does and tries not to do. And one of the big ones for Jason is never to push need too high, is the way he put it, So don't. He's got his board set up, I need and best player, and what he wants most of all is for those two to collide at the top. Whatever the players have to the top both lists, and that's the perfect outcome.

And um, that's what he's gonna try to do. So let's just take, for an example, let's say the Buccaneers. He called him perceived needs, because he's clearly drawing a LINEB team what everybody says our needs and what they think our needs. Let's say a perceived need is edge rusher and the you have a here of top five of them there, and by the time it gets to you, there are none of those left, and there's a bit

of a drop to the next here. But you've got players at other positions that are higher on the board. Where you make your mistake and where your gret it even a year from now, is when you just jumped down to this guy at the position of need, of greater need than anybody else, because if you think about it, at some point, with the way roster's turned over, you can make a pick at any position and you're probably

gonna need it within a couple of years. Right, So you got to think about right now, but you also have him and I to the future. And it got me to thinking about um a question we took a couple of weeks ago about at twenty seven, are there any positions where the Bucks could reasonably get the first

player off the board at that position? And I went back and looked at all of Jason Light's eight draft so far and who we took in the first round, and there have been a couple of times where we have gotten the first guy at the position, and and recently it's worked out quite well. You know, two eighteen Vitave was the first interior defensive lineman, got him at twelve. Devon White the next year at five, the first off ball linebacker. But it doesn't always work out that way.

And I think the best example there as Tristan Worf's. There was two years ago there were four players that everybody gets their blue chip tackles, to the point where when there were three of them were gone and we were sitting in four team, we traded up. We gave up a fourth round pick just to move up in one spot to make sure we got the last one. He was the last one left. He wasn't necessarily lest one. We're born. As we know, Tristan Worse worked out really

really well. Yeah, and that can be the difference in how deep a draft is at a certain position where you know, there were four that teams thought were worth drafting, no matter where it was in that first round. But they're gonna be years and positions where you really only want the first guy, or you know, maybe it's a

bit huge difference between the first and the fourth. And so that's going to be interesting to see how that will work this year and in terms of looking at the first three rounds or so first four rounds of particularly, we know everybody likes to focus on Thursday, but I think that we can all definitely trust that process Jason light was talking about because in his tenure here they

have done pretty well, especially those those first few rounds. Yeah, that was another bit of I think, concrete bit of information that Jason gave us yes or on Tuesday. Uh. And I think a lot of people feel this way about this draft. It's not a particularly top heavy draft. There aren't a whole lot of guys, you know, must go in the top five. There's a lot of disagreement about where some guys that like defensive end ed rusher

in what order they're gonna go in. Uh. And Jason said there may not be thirty guys that they have a first round grade on this year, so you know, it's it's kind of scraping a little bit there to to at the end of the first round. But he says he does think this is a good deep draft in terms of mid round picks, that when you're picking in the second, the third, and fourth round, there are gonna be quality guys there and those are very important picks.

I mean, look at this, this is just the last since two thousand seventeen, players that the Bucks have picked in the second, third, or fourth round that became really core players for the Buccaneers and that Super Bowl team and the one that went thirteen and four last year. A couple of have taken that success, unfortunately for the Bucks and moved on, like Alex Kappa and Jordan Whitehead. But those guys, right, there were key players, key core guys.

That's how what the team was built on. I mean, I know we brought in Tom Brady obviously, but that team, even with Tom Brady, probably doesn't win the Super Bowl if you weren't hitting on mid round picks. And those picks are probably gonna be especially important this year in the Bucks pick at sixty in the third round, and I don't remember the exact number the fourth round pick, but yes, we're all gonna be a focused on first

round pick, but these middle round picks are gonna be key. Yeah, that is going to be huge, and I think that's also why some people have wondered if maybe the Bucks will try to trade down. So this is going to be a little plug for our road to the draft that we're going to shoot right after this that will come out later so that everybody can hear a little bit more about our theories on trading up, trading back,

how likely that could be. And so definitely tune into the next in our final road to the draft that will be shooting after this. So I know that we in the past have talked about one of the potential positions you saw the Bucks looking at was defensive line, and it just turned out that Jason Light got asked about that. So did that give you any information? Yeah, I think the reason he was asked is because I'm not the only one who's been mocked drafting defensive linemen

like Davante Wyatt, for example, to the Buccaneers. It's a common thing you'll see in mock drafts because it is a position where it could be some value left at the end of the first round and uh and and the Buccaneers are potentially losing a couple of players there. Jason Lights answered that the question was he brought a Vita Veay and Will Gholston and Nacho Rakeine roaches and said they like some of the young guys too, like maybe he means Benning, Pat uh Kobe Smith, maybe Patrick

O'Connor who just resigned. And those are all good points, but you still you look at this in Dominican Sue and Steve McClinton. If they don't return, that's about what that's about. Eleven snaps. That's a lot of snaps lot decluding the playoffs, that's a lot of snaps replaced. And if you don't think Benning pot Away or Patrick O'Connor is going to step up and take another five hundred snaps, which you know, I don't think you can predict that

confidently right, then you probably do need some more. Now, Jason's point was the draft isn't the only way to get There's still more free agency. There's undrafted fre agency, there's trades. You specifically mentioned how the trade deadline didn't happen until you know, months and months from now, and and he did trade for Stephen Clinton a couple of

years ago. So that's a very good point. And he's right, the Buccaneers are not gonna be painted into a corner at the end of the first round or in the second round or whatever to take an interior defensive alignment. That being said, you can still see the logic why if they need and the best player intersect that would be a great pick for Buccaneers. Well, and we're gonna get into the Facebook questions now, and you mentioned trades, So I think Chris Ell is how you say this name, Chrissell?

So do you think the Bucks will try to trade for Deebo Samuel? I knew that. I knew that question was the people in the office. As soon as that came out, I'm like the first question and turned out to be the first question is going to be, well, the Bucks trade for Deeviel Samuel. You know, I can't help I have to bring up that since the Super Bowl year and uh and last year too, that things you would consider implausible. You know you can when Leonard

Fournett was cut, the Buck is gonna get learned from that. Well, I don't know about that, you know, Gronk all the Antonio Brown that said, So, I won't dismiss it, right, And and Deebel Samuel is a great player and you could use a lot of different stuff in the offense with him. I'm sure Tom Brady would love Dad Deebo Samuel. But you've got to consider the Bucks cap spaces nearly

minimal at this point. Um, they they probably aren't going to sign anybody else else until after the draft, and it would be very difficult financially, and I know you can make it happen there there's always a way to work with the cap, but you're it's not easy, and you're you're hurting yourself down the road a little bit.

And so if there's any position in which the Bucks would take on another like eighteen to twenty million dollar player, it's hard to see it being a wide receiver when you already paying Mike Evans and Chris god when the time. So I don't think it's likely. I think there's a lot more likely landing spots if he has traded, But I guess never say never, Never say never, are right? And then our next one, Daniel asked, do you think that we're going to have more offensive or defensive picks

in the draft? I think defensive. I think, um, the only way that well we have We only have six picks and two of them are in the seventh round, and I challenge anybody pretty quite positions they're gonna take with two of the last tin picks draft, right, Um, so of the first four, one in each four rounds. Actually, it could be pretty even because I could see us at some point taking an offensive guard or or an offensive tackle, and I could also see us taking a

running back or a tight end. So this is a bit of a cop out answer, but I think it could be pretty even in those first four, like maybe a defensive lineman, maybe a quarterback, a tied in an offensive lineman. I can see that happening. And I'm not gonna make any guesses as to what you're gonna pick with pick number two, right, Yeah, that's a very good point. Um. And then we had Christina asked any news on JPP No, and Um, again, I think the Buccaneers have gone through

most of what they're gonna do in free agency. I think obviously the big question marks still out there are Rob Gronkowski and Domincnsue, especially Rob Gronkowski as one we all think is the most likely to return. Um. Yeah, there's no news on that, and I don't really think I'm expecting any. Okay, And then our final one, we kind of talked about this, but Chad wanted to know do you go after a Titan later in the raft

and then anywhere on groun kits. So I think part of this is also if we were to draft to tight end, where do you think in the draft that might happen. It depends on how important of a need the Buccaneers think that is. Because we're and we're gonna, like you said, we're gonna talk about trade scenarios in the next in our next road to the draft here in a minute, um, But if you were, if you were to think that's like one of their top needs on their board, then I could see it like a

trade down. You won't find a mock draft that has a tight end in the first round. Went through twenty of them in five minutes yesterday. Couldn't find a single tight end. But the consensus top tight end is Trade McBride of Colorado State. And one of the reasons why he is at the top is he's already a good pass catcher who's a big guy who they think can

be a blocker. So he can be that kind of rare to way tight end like a Rob Gronkowski that you're trying to find, and that guy could get down the field right away and two tight ends instead's even if Rob Gronkowski is here, and he could be a

very important player. If Rob Gronkowski is not here, So if the Buccaneers were to maybe trade back, it might need it could be a second round target, but there's enough depth in the middle rounds of that position, like a Kay Dot and or a Gelanni Walker, that the Bucaneers could get a guy in a third or fourth round. So if our if our guests and I would think they go somewhere else with their first pick, but a

Titan could be possible in the second, third round. All right, Well, that is going to do it for us on this edition of Buccaneers Insider Live presented by Miller Lte. Thanks for all of those questions, and we hope you guys are gonna be tuning in to our live show we're

gonna be doing next Thursday, right before the Draft. We're gonna be doing it from the Draft party that's here at Raymond James Stadium, and we're also gonna be streaming it live, so you guys will be able to check it out no matter where you are, So we'll see you then