While some consider the drafting of a guard within the top ten not a worthwhile investment or a prudent use of draft capital. Looking at the explosion in recent history of what teams are paying for quality guard play, is incomprehensible. There are 64 starting guards in the NFL. Eight of which have an average yearly salary of $10 million or more. 19 have an average yearly salary of between $5 to $9.9 million. That’s a total of 27 making more than $5 million a year on average or roughly 42%. Looking at the top 27 paid guards in the NFL and the average salary is roughly $8.25 million per year. These figures don’t take in to account the new deals that are looming on the horizon for Andrus Peat, Brandon Scherff or Zach Martin which will undoubtedly push the average salary for the top paid guards closer to $9 million per year
If Bradley Chubb is off the board at seven, and Quenton Nelson is sitting there, the Bucs would be best suited to take the best player and value available at that spot. Nelson represents a complete transformation to the interior of the offensive line paired with Jenson and Marpet. The reduced cost associated with the drafting of Nelson at seven, over a potential free agent signing next off-season comes in the way of fixed cost with a yearly average of cost of Nelson being $5.3 million per season based on capped draft slotting that’s a net savings of nearly $4 million per season that would realistically be spent to plug another whole or used to create space to sign Marpet to a long term deal solidifying the interior of the Bucs offensive line for the next 4 to 5 years.
