Pewter Report’s Scott Reynolds answers your questions from the @PewterReport X account this week in the Bucs Mailbag. Submit your question to SR each week via X using the hashtag #PRMailbag. Here are the Bucs questions we chose to answer for this week’s edition.

QUESTION: What positions can you guarantee we will hit in the draft with all this late cornerback movement in free agency? I feel like linebacker and defensive line will be flooded by Jason Licht.

ANSWER: The signing of Kemon Hall and Chase Lucas does not mean that the Bucs are done at the cornerback position. Tampa Bay should absolutely continue to add another cornerback or two – preferably a veteran with starting experience. Neither Hall nor Lucas has an NFL start under his belt, and neither has an interception or even a pass breakup. These two cornerbacks are special teams players who will compete with Josh Hayes for a roster spot – not necessarily contend for a role as CB4 before Zyon McCollum, Jacob Parrish and Benjamin Morrison.

I would suspect that Jason Licht will draft one cornerback this year. But I would not be surprised to see him double up at inside linebacker or outside linebacker – or both, as Pewter Report’s Josh Queipo suggested in last week’s Point-Counterpoint column. I would prefer the Bucs double up at inside linebacker if they are only going to double up at one position.

Georgia ILB CJ Allen – Photo by: IMAGN Images – Brett Davis

Tampa Bay currently has four inside linebackers on the roster, and two of them – SirVocea Dennis and Christian Rozeboom – are only under contract through 2026. Alex Anzalone, who is slated to start at Moneybacker on the weak side to replace Lavonte David, and Nick Jackson, a practice squader who may not make the team this year, are signed through 2027.

The Bucs need to come away with one of the top three inside linebackers in this year’s draft class – outside of Ohio State’s Sonny Styles, who will likely go in the Top 10. I’m talking about Texas Tech’s Jacob Rodriguez, Georgia’s CJ Allen and Cincinnati’s Jake Golday. Then find a good another good one for developmental depth and special teams on Day 3.

Drafting two linebackers – one in the first three rounds and one on Day 3 – could help solidify this position for the long term while immediately upgrading the competition for this season. Of course if Licht wanted to flood the outside linebacker position with a pair of pass rushers, that wouldn’t be a bad thing. The team’s sack total dropped to 37 last year, which was the lowest in the Todd Bowles era in Tampa Bay. Al-Quadin Muhammad is 31 and was only signed for one year, while Chris Braswell, a former second-rounder, is entering his third season trying to shake the “bust” label.

QUESTION: If the Bucs were going to double dip at a position in the draft, which do you think it could be? I sneakily think interior defensive line needs the most loving this year.

ANSWER: Well, I already suggested that inside linebacker would be my first choice, followed by outside linebacker. Tampa Bay absolutely needs to upgrade both of those positions, and getting two edge rushers would give Jason Licht some cover in case one of them is a bust, is slow to develop or gets injured. Fixing the pass rush has to be a paramount issue heading into the draft.

You mentioned defensive tackle, and I’m not sure I can see the team drafting two defensive tackles this year. Tampa Bay’s top three defensive tackles are a pair of first-round picks in Vita Vea and Calijah Kancey and new free agent acquisition A’Shawn Robinson. The Bucs are also high on Elijah Roberts, last year’s fifth-round pick, and just re-signed veteran Rakeem Nunez-Roches. That’s five defensive tackles that seem assured of roster spots.

Texas Tech DT Lee Hunter – Photo by: IMAGN Images – Ben Queen

Jayson Jones, a 6-foot-6, 320-pound practice squad tackle spent last year on injured reserve, and the team is intrigued about him as he’ll enter his first offseason in Tampa Bay. So if the Bucs are going to draft a defensive tackle, he would likely replace Jones as DT6 on the depth chart. For that reason, I can’t see the team drafting two defensive tackles this year.

Yet with Vea entering a contract year at age 31, and the 31-year old Robinson and the 32-year old Nunez-Roches both on one-year deals, adding two young defensive tackles this year would make sense for the long term. But there just isn’t room on the roster this year, especially after drafting Roberts last year. So I would expect Tampa Bay to draft one this year and then another one in 2027.

The Bucs have brought in five defensive tackles that we know of for official 30 visits, and had formal interviews with six defensive tackles at the NFL Scouting Combine. That’s a lot of interest in the defensive tackle position, which tells me that the team will be drafting one this year. For what it’s worth. Texas Tech’s Lee Hunter is the only known overlapped who took part in a visit and a formal interview.

QUESTION: I’ve seen a lot of mocks where the Bucs take Jermod McCoy at No. 15. The last thing they need to do is use another high draft pick for a cornerback coming off a significant injury or that has an injury history. They can’t do that, right?

ANSWER: It will be interesting to see if Tennessee cornerback Jermod McCoy falls to Tampa Bay at No. 15, and if he does, do the Bucs wind up drafting him? McCoy suffered a torn ACL in January 2025, which caused him to miss the entire 2025 season. In his first season with the Volunteers, McCoy had a phenomenal season with four interceptions and nine pass breakups while allowing two touchdowns. McCoy earned an 87 defensive grade per Pro Football Focus with an opposing QB rating of 53.6. He spent one season at Oregon State in 2023 where he recorded seven pass breakups and two interceptions while allowing four touchdowns.

You are correct that the Bucs drafted a cornerback with an injury history last year in second-rounder Benjamin Morrison. And since 2021, the team has dealt with injured cornerbacks, whether it was Carlton Davis III, Jamel Dean or Zyon McCollum. Last year, Morrison missed seven games, while McCollum missed four games and Dean missed three. So drafting another cornerback coming off an injury is a valid concern.

Tennessee CB Jermod McCoy – Photo by: IMAGN Images – Steve Roberts

The good news for the 6-foot-1, 192-pound McCoy is that he’s 15 months removed from his injury. He was cleared to resume practice at the end of the year and did, yet didn’t play in any Volunteers regular season games. McCoy participated in the Tennessee pro day and ran between 4.37–4.41 in the 40-yard dash, and had a 38-inch vertical with 10-foot-7-inch broad jump. Those were very good numbers that solidified his Top 15 draft status.

The bad news regarding McCoy is that he really only had two years of football tape, and only one of them is elite. He hasn’t played football for an entire year and didn’t choose to compete at either the Senior Bowl or the NFL Scouting Combine despite being medically cleared for both. The Senior Bowl was 12 months out from his injury and the Combine was 13 months later from his torn ACL.

If McCoy is there at No. 15 it would present an interesting decision for the Bucs. Drafting him with the 15th overall pick pretty much means he’s the starter over Morrison based on his draft status. So then the team essentially drafted a backup cornerback with a second-round pick last year. Yet if McCoy is a major upgrade over Morrison, he’d be worth it. It would be interesting to see if the Buccaneers would pull the trigger on McCoy if he falls to No. 15.

QUESTION: I’ve been a big fan of Jacob Rodriguez, like many others, but recently I heard an analyst say there’s no way teams will consider him as a first-rounder because of how many missed tackles he routinely has. So I looked into it and his 13.9% missed tackle rate is highest by far of all the top linebackers.

ANSWER: That is true. Texas Tech inside linebacker Jacob Rodriguez’s missed tackle rate of 13.9% is higher than that of Georgia’s CJ Allen (6.8%) and Cincinnati’s Jake Golday (9%) and Missouri’s Josiah Trotter (11%). But his missed tackle rate is actually better than that of Arizona State’s Keyshaun Elliott (16.8%) and Alabama’s Deontae Lawson (16.3%).

Texas Tech ILB Jacob Rodriguez – Photo by: IMAGN Images – Nathan Giese

According to Pro Football Focus, Rodriguez missed 22 tackles in 2024 and 20 tackles last year. However, he also recorded 127 tackles in 2024 and 128 tackles last year. That’s an awful lot of tackles. In fact, it’s more than all of those other linebackers had by a lot. Allen had 88 tackles, Golday posted 105 stops, Trotter had 84 tackles, Elliott recorded 98 tackles and Lawson had 89.

As an anonymous NFL scout told Tyler Dunne and Bob McGinn for the linebacker position on the GoLongTD website: “His only issue is he’s got those short arms (30 7/8). It does show up in space when he can’t finish on tackles. He’ll make 10 and then miss two, something like that. He’s going to have some missed tackles but he’s going to make a ton, too.”

And that’s the thing about Rodriguez. He’ll miss two, but he’ll make 10 – plus create a takeaway or make a big splash play. I think the good will outweigh the bad when it comes to Rodriguez’s game and that the Bucs should do whatever they can to draft him this year – either at the end of the first round or the top of the second round, as I suggested in Friday’s SR’s FAB 5: Jacob Rodriguez No Matter What For The Bucs.

QUESTION: Who are the Pewter Report team’s draft crushes – other than JRod?

ANSWER: Great question! And we’ll have the answer in Tuesday’s PR Roundtable on PewterReport.com. Be sure to read that column to find out!

I did two Pewter Pulse videos on my offensive and defensive Bucs draft crushes that you can check out below.