Buccaneers’ Five Biggest Draft Busts
By James Yarcho
Number Four: DE Booker Reese, Number 32 Overall – 1982
Ah yes, nothing like communication issues to ring in a draft bust. See, Booker Reese was a defensive end out of Bethune-Cookman College that the Buccaneers absolutely loved. They loved him so much that the accidentally drafted offensive lineman Sean Farrell at seventeen overall instead.
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Oops.
They said a faulty phone connection led to the miscommunication and that they intended to draft Reese at seventeen. Refusing to miss out on their guy, the Bucs traded away heir first round pick in 1983 – we’ll get to that in a moment – in order to move up to the thirty-second pick and ensure they draft Reese. Reese would go on to ride the pine for the Bucs for two seasons before being shipped off to the Rams where he would play for two more seasons before drugs got the better of him and he was out of the NFL for good.
That first round pick the Buccaneers traded away? Well, that was the eighteenth overall pick in a draft that featured John Elway, Eric Dickerson, Jim Kelly, Dan Marino, Darrell Green, Roger Craig and a plethora of other future Pro Bowl players. Did the Bucs draft any? Of course not.