Jameis Winston had everything the Tampa Bay Buccaneers could have wanted in a quarterback.

A great resúmé from college that included a national championship and a Heisman Trophy. A strong arm. Ideal size for a pocket passer. Scrambling ability. A knack for making plays. Leadership. Community service work. Hard-working attitude. Likeability. Coachability.

All of those factors are what made the Bucs use the No. 1 pick in the 2015 NFL Draft to select Winston to be the long-awaited franchise quarterback. Tampa Bay even tanked the second half of its 2014 season finale against New Orleans just to ensure that the team had the first selection ahead of Tennessee, which also needed a quarterback.

Jason Licht, Jameis Winston and Lovie Smith – Photo by: Cliff Welch/PR

Winston had it all.

But he also had all of those damn turnovers.

In the end, those 88 career interceptions – including a league-high 30 last year – and 50 fumbles, according to Pro Football Reference, outweighed all of Winston’s good in Tampa Bay.

The fact that Tom Brady was in fact behind door No. 2 was simply too good to pass up. Bucs head coach Bruce Arians took note of the fact that Brady only threw eight interceptions last year, and the most he’s thrown in a season in the past decade was 12.

Twelve.

Oh, the irony as TB12 heads to TB.

After spending his first year in Tampa Bay watching the Bucs beat themselves, Arians, along with general manager Jason Licht, knew the team needed to move in a different direction at quarterback.

Brady will be a Buccaneer and the Winston era in Tampa Bay has come to an end.

Winston set several franchise records, including 19,737 yards and 121 touchdown passes in his five years in Tampa Bay. Unfortunately for Winston and the team, those yards and touchdowns resulted in just one winning season with him at the helm, a 9-7 campaign in 2016, and an overall record of 28-42 under center as the Bucs’ starting quarterback.

He didn’t have a great running game to help provide balance over the years, nor did he have even a good defense to play opposite of until the second half of last year. But let’s not kid ourselves here. Winston turned the ball over 100-plus times in Tampa Bay, and that played a large role in four losing seasons, too.

Bucs QB Jameis Winston – Photo by: Mary Holt/PR

Winston’s quarterback play was like that of a roller coaster, plenty of exciting twists and turns and thrills, but his play could also make you feel nauseous at times. Winston was the kind of quarterback that unfortunately kept both teams in the game.

It’s painfully ironic that his first pass in Tampa Bay was a pick-six in 2015, just as his last pass was a pick-six – in an overtime loss to Atlanta to drop the Bucs to 7-9 on the season in the 2019 season finale.

Winston had the reputation for being a turnover machine during his sophomore year at Florida State and unfortunately wasn’t able to shake it during his five years in Tampa Bay despite working with a couple of quarterback coaches, a couple of offensive coordinators and a couple of offensive-minded head coaches.

Winston threw more interceptions over the last five years than any other quarterback, and that’s the reason why he may have a hard time finding a starting job in 2020 just a year after leading the league in passing yards with 5,109 and finishing second in passing touchdowns with 33. With Carolina opting for Teddy Bridgewater and Indianapolis choosing Philip Rivers, Winston’s only chances at a starting job may be with the Los Angeles Chargers, New England or Chicago – but during the free agent tampering period his name hasn’t gotten much traction, and he is competing against the likes of veterans Andy Dalton and Cam Newton, too. In 2020, it’s hard to fathom he’ll make anything close to his $20.92 salary last year during his fifth-year option.

It’s stunning to think that no quarterback drafted by the Buccaneers has signed a contract extension since the inception of the franchise in 1976. Tampa Bay has spent four first-round picks on Doug Williams, Vinny Testaverde, Trent Dilfer, Josh Freeman and Winston, a second-rounder on Shaun King and a third-rounder on Chris Simms and none of those quarterbacks were re-signed once their rookie deals expired.

Bucs QB Jameis Winston and head coach Bruce Arians – Photo by: Getty Images

Dilfer lasted the longest in Tampa Bay, signing a six-year deal after being drafted in 1994. Freeman and Winston made it to their fifth-year options, but Freeman had a personal and professional meltdown in 2013, and Winston threw too many interceptions, including an NFL-record seven pick-sixes, last year.

“You can’t win with 30 interceptions” was the mantra in the halls at the AdventHealth Training Center during the offseason after the coaches and scouts finished their evaluation of the Bucs’ 2019 season.

Arians is known as “The Quarterback Whisperer” and has had success working with several Pro Bowl and Super Bowl-winning quarterbacks, including Peyton Manning, Ben Roethlisberger, Andrew Luck and Carson Palmer. In his first and only season working with Winston it became clear that he didn’t believe Winston’s penchant for throwing interceptions could be corrected at a level sufficient enough to get the Bucs to the playoffs, which is why Tampa Bay decided to go in a different direction at the quarterback position.

Every NFL team tries to upgrade its roster in offseason. Sometimes that even happens at the quarterback position.

Even at age 43, Brady, a six-time Super Bowl champion, the NFL’s all-time winningest quarterback of all-time and the No. 2 passer in NFL history, has to be considered an upgrade over Winston in Tampa Bay.

Bucs QB Tom Brady – Photo by: Getty Images

Maybe Winston joins other former Bucs quarterbacks in leaving Tampa Bay to go win a Super Bowl elsewhere with another team. Winston is a highly competitive guy, and being released a year after leading the NFL in passing might be the fuel he needs to become a quarterback that is less careless with the football and more focused on protecting it.

But if Winston stayed in Tampa Bay he might not ever have gotten to that point.

The Bucs are in “win now” mode and just couldn’t afford to wait any longer to see if Winston could finally solve his turnover problem. Arians and Licht opened door No. 2 in free agency and certainly liked what they saw in Brady.

Unfortunately for Winston, that means he’ll be shown the door by Tampa Bay.