As hard as it is to hear, the Buccaneers aren’t going to be able to keep everyone.
Free agency is not always as easy as the Buccaneers made it look last offseason. Teams have to make hard decisions. Cuts. Move on from young players. This is life in the world of a strict salary cap, and Bucs fans are going to see this on display sooner than they would like.
Today is a fun day as expectations shoot up with the news that Tom Brady is coming back, but we also need to approach the coming hours and weeks with a bit of realism.
The Bucs aren’t going to be able to keep everyone. The salary cap has expended over where it was last season, but that still won’t be enough to keep everyone.
The cap wizards in the front office should be able to come up with some smart ways to push the money down the road and find a way to keep the roster intact for another run at a Super Bowl, but the Buccaneers should start to come up with plans to deal with the loss of the following players:
The Buccaneers can’t keep everyone
Carlton Davis
Davis is a top-tier corner and will command the corner market alongside J.C. Jackson. Every team is in search of a CB1, and the Bucs choosing to use the franchise tag on Chris Godwin over Davis will likely come back to bite them.
Alex Cappa
Cappa is a young guard with some great football ahead. The Bucs would love to find a way to keep him alongside Ryan Jensen to stem the bleeding from the loss of Ali Marpet, but Cappa is also going to do very well on the open market. A better deal may be too good to pass up.
Jordan Whitehead
Like his counterparts on this list, Whitehead is one of the best in the league at his position. The league tends to overlook Whitehead and his incredible versatility for lesser safeties with bigger names, but it seems impossible to think some other team won’t throw more money at Whitehead than the Bucs.
The Buccaneers would be in the best position going forward if they could find a way to keep all three of these players, but there is a real chance that they could lose some combination of them as soon as later today.
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