Buccaneers: 3 moves to right the ship after a shaky start to 2021
By Rob Leeds
The Buccaneers need a band-aid for their secondary
It doesn’t matter who, but the Buccaneers need to add at least one more member to their secondary at the rate the injuries are happening. The best-case scenario would be to add a corner that can also play safety, like Ross Cockrell, but a pure safety or corner wouldn’t hurt either.
All of the Buccaneer starters at corner are currently injured or coming off an injury. Richard Sherman ended up playing a massive chunk of the defensive reps last week after very little practice, and while this week should be better with more time to prepare, the constant injuries are reaching a dangerous level.
Tampa is currently on pace to field one of the worst secondaries in NFL history. The Bucs may have a decent overall defense on paper, but stopping the pass is more important than stopping the run, and the numbers are skewed with teams completely abandoning the run when playing the Buccaneers.
The Bucs have been able to overcome a weak secondary for most of this season and a portion of last season, but they can’t hope to stay the top team in the league if they can’t stop the pass.
A free agent or a trade option would work perfectly here. Tre Boston is a good fit at safety, and D.J. Hayden has some upside as a veteran corner with some starting experience in the event of another catastrophic injury, but there are plenty of options for the Bucs as long as they find someone.