Gerald McCoy named Tampa Bay Buccaneers best first round pick of decade

Gerald McCoy was recently named as the best first round selection over the past ten years made by the Tampa Bay Buccaneers; do you agree?

TouchdownWire’s Barry Werner has published a piece in which he seeks to identify each NFL team’s best first round pick over the past decade. For the Tampa Bay Buccaneers, Werner picked a man who many fans have mixed feelings about in former defensive tackle Gerald McCoy.

McCoy was recently cut by the Buccaneers after nearly a decade of wearing the pewter and red. The disrespect that he feels about the move and the way the team handled it is well documented, and McCoy is now with the NFC South division rival Carolina Panthers.

Chosen as the third overall pick out of Oklahoma back in 2010, McCoy was the longest tenured Buccaneer until this offseason. During his time in Tampa Bay, McCoy tallied a total of 54.5 sacks, 79 tackles for loss, and 140 hits on opposing quarterbacks. Over the past two seasons, McCoy has topped and tied his career best in hits on the quarterback, showing he still knows how to apply pressure up the middle.

While wearing the chrome Buccaneers helmet, McCoy represented the city of Tampa Bay in six Pro Bowls, and was named as an All-Pro once in his career. While the divorce between McCoy and the Buccaneers has been messy to this point, he will one day shortly after his retirement be inducted into the Buccaneers’ Ring of Honor.

There would be serious steam to name Mike Evans as the best first round pick of the past ten years as he has tallied 1,000 yards in each of his five years in the league. Here, McCoy has been the Buccaneers’ best first round pick over the past decade as he has the likes of Jameis Winston, Adrian Clayborn, Mark Barron, and Doug Martin to contend with as well as Evans.