Buccaneers rumors: Tampa wants Bengals’ first overall pick

The rumors have started to come out that the Tampa Bay Buccaneers have their eyes on the Bengals’ first overall pick and Cincinnati is listening to offers.

The Tampa Bay Buccaneers may be the most divided organization in the NFL on what they need to do at the quarterback position in 2020. This division is between everyone; the staff, the ownership, and also spreads throughout the fanbase in an extremely polarizing way.

While much of the sports world is split on Jameis Winston, one player that everyone seems to agree on is LSU quarterback Joe Burrow. Burrow put together one of the most impressive college football campaigns in history, one that was even better than that of Jameis.

As of now, the Bengals hold the first overall pick and seem in prime position to bring in Burrow to be their franchise quarterback. While this seems like a no-brainer for the Bengals, word has started to surface that Cincinnati is hearing offers for their first overall pick with the Bucs included on the list of possible suitors.

According to former Tampa Bay Buccaneer and radio host Dan Sileo, the Buccaneers are one of several teams that are looking to move up in the draft to bring in Joe Burrow.

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While the Buccaneers’ most likely choice is the franchise tag for Jameis Winston, this move does make sense for the Bucs.

For starters, Joe Burrow would fit very well in a Bruce Arians system. Burrow has the arm talent and the ability to throw a high rate of passes in an effective and accurate manner. Bruce Arians has said nothing but good things about Burrow and would likely jump at the chance to bring the Heisman Trophy winner to Tampa Bay.

The Buccaneers do also have the capital to trade to Cincinnati, even though it would likely be a king’s ransom. To get from the 14th overall pick up to the first overall pick the Bucs would probably have to give up at least two or three first round picks along with a myriad of other picks.

This may seem like a dangerous move, but the Buccaneers could actually make this work. Assuming they were able to hold on to a second round pick in 2020 to draft a tackle to protect Burrow, missing out on first round picks for several years may not be too bad if they find a consistent quarterback.

The Bucs have an extremely young team and have very few glaring holes on both sides of the ball. The Buccaneers have spent plenty of picks on the secondary over the course of the last three years to avoid those positions for a decade.

The Buccaneers have stellar wide receivers, a deep group of tight ends that could be supplemented in later draft rounds, no NFL team should ever draft a running back high, and the few depth holes on defense could also be filled in later draft rounds or free agency.

By letting Jameis walk the Bucs would give themselves some substantial cap relief in 2020 which would grant them the ability to keep the defense mostly intact, requiring little to no draft picks to maintain its growing dominance in the future.

When its all said and done, the Buccaneers may look like they are leveraging their future by making this trade, but the negatives seem to be substantially outweighed by the possibility of having a non-controversial quarterback under center.

By making this move, the Buccaneers would most likely cut down on interceptions, pick-6’s, and fumbles which were the bane of the team in 2019. In addition, this move would also give Bruce Arians a quarterback that he is fully behind.

Tampa Bay was close to making a playoff push in 2019. It would be tough to maintain that same level of success with a rookie under center in 2020, but Joe Burrow is the type of player worth taking that risk on.