As the Bucs enter the final preseason game of the year, Tampa Bay has about 95 percent of its starting positions set on offense and defense. It’s very rare that a team has so few open starting spots, but that’s what happens when you become Super Bowl champions and all 22 starters return.

One of the last decisions the coaches have is who will be the starting running back on offense. The Bucs’ depth chart has Ronald Jones II as the current number one back, but often times the team will start off practice with Leonard Fournette in the backfield. That’s also how the Bucs began their first preseason game, too.

With the competition coming down to the wire, Saturday’s preseason finale at Houston could be the last chance for each back to lay claim to the starting job. Assistant head coach and run game coordinator Harold Goodwin has watched the battle closely in camp and mentioned that their performances in the game may decide the winner.

It’s a tough decision to make, but he’s confident in both of them.

“Through training camp, I think we can go with either one,” Goodwin said. “Obviously there’s not a whole lot of preseason exposure. I think Saturday night will tell a lot. I think either one that goes in there as the starter will do fine because obviously we can always rotate them and whoever has the hot hand after that can play the rest of the game. It’ll be interesting to see what happens Saturday night and hopefully they both have success to make it a hard decision for us coaches.”

Goodwin said that this decision will ultimately come down to offensive coordinator Byron Leftwich and head coach Bruce Arians, but he has one prerequisite for whoever the starter is.

“Me, I’ll take whoever gives me four yards or more,” Goodwin said.

Adding Giovani Bernard gives the Bucs a three-headed monster in the backfield. Regardless of who starts, Tampa Bay has great talent to work with at the position. It’s a nice luxury to have as a coach, too.

“I think it’s huge,” Goodwin said. “Every guy brings value to the table now. Do I want to be the guy that makes a decision of who starts that week or whatnot? That’s BA’s job. Those guys are three great backs. Whatever we need, they’ll give us all they got.

“I like them all to be personally honest with you. I think Gio brings a different element in the third down package from a screen standpoint – things of that nature. I thinks he’s a hell of a runner, like I said earlier, but the other two are great runners. I think they could be a bit better catching the ball at times as we all know, but they’ve gotten better doing that throughout camp as well.”