Tampa Bay Buccaneers: Justin Watson to miss four months

With the Tampa Bay Buccaneers beginning training camp today, we have our first bit of injury news, as wide receiver Justin Watson is set to miss up to the next four months after undergoing a knee procedure, per ESPN’s Adam Schefter.

During the offseason, Schefter bombs on Twitter are always welcomed, as they’re almost always regarding roster moves. Once training camp commences, not so much. They usually aren’t the best news this time of year, and this is no different.

Now, this obviously isn’t saying the Bucs are toast now that Watson is on the shelf, but it isn’t the best news for Watson individually. Obviously, injuries are never good news for the individual, but when it comes to the current makeup of the Buccaneers roster as it pertains it Watson, it’s exacerbated.

The wide receiver room for the Bucs is a crowded one, both in quantity and quality.  Despite Watson being a staple on special teams, having 20 tackles to his name a year ago, and a worthy reserve receiver, he still had his work cut out for him when it came to making the final roster.

There’s the obvious Mike Evans, Chris Godwin, Antonio Brown, and you can even throw Scotty Miller into that mix. After that, you have the very talented, and young, Tyler Johnson, as well as rookie fourth-round pick Jaelon Darden, who’s already been turning heads. That’s just the pass catching aspect. With special teams, Darden has return man skills, as does Jaydon Mickens obviously, and we didn’t even mention him yet.

This doesn’t necessarily spell doom for the 2018 fifth-round pick out of Penn, as Justin Watson is an incredibly hard worker, but it certainly isn’t a good sign.

Elsewhere, the Buccaneers also placed tight end Cameron Brate, fellow wide receiver John Franklin and cornerback Chris Wilcox on the PUP list. Training camp just kicked off today, and already we have some news coming out, but that’s the way it goes. Hopefully it’s all up hill from here on the Bucs’ quest to go for two.