Five years ago, the hope was that we'd be sitting here today singing the praises of Joe Tryon-Shoyinka, but instead, the Tampa Bay Buccaneers are bidding him farewell.
The writing had been on the wall for some time now, but on Tuesday it became official when Tryon-Shoyinka left the Bucs in free agency to hopefully find another chance at becoming the player Tampa Bay thought he could be.
According to NFL insider Jordan Schultz, Joe Tryon-Shoyinka's next chance will come in Cleveland.
The Browns gave him a one-year deal worth $4.75 million, which is about as much of a 'Prove-It' deal as it gets. It's a big chance for Tryon-Shoyinka, though, as he showed flashes of being the guy Tampa Bay needed him to be but never fully developed.
He now gets that chance in Cleveland, where he'll come under the wing of Myles Garrett and be able to learn from one of the best. For his sake, hopefully that's a missing element, as Bucs fans won't be missing him too much when next season rolls around.
Joe Tryon-Shoyinka gets a chance to overcome his draft bust status with Browns
It's not a high bar that Tryon-Shoyinka needs to clear, either. In his four seasons with the Bucs he recorded just 15 sacks and the needle is moving in the wrong direction. Over the last three years he's played in a decreasing amount of games, finishing last season with the fewest games played since his rookie year.
His production took a tumble as well. In 2023 he finished the season with 45 tackles and five sacks which set Tryon-Shoyinka up to finally take a big leap forward, but instead he went backward. He finished last year with just two sacks and almost half as many tackles, which is a big reason why the Bucs are moving on.
Tampa Bay's pass rush was overall lackluster last season, hence the overhaul we've seen so far this offseason. Haason Reddick coming to town should give the defense a nice boost, and the lack of production that Tryon-Shoyinka had won't be hard to make up.
It's a bummer, as he came to the Bucs with such hype and with the potential to be a key figure on one of the league's best defenses. Instead he'll head to the second stop of his career hoping to bounce back and find a way to latch on longer than he did in Tampa Bay.
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