FAB 3. Bucs Getting Into The Compensatory Draft Pick Game

Tampa Bay general manager Jason Licht’s philosophy shift to avoid overpaying big-name free agents and signing less heralded free agents to smaller, one-year prove-it deals may pay off for the Bucs in three different ways.

Bucs GM Jason Licht – Photo by: Cliff Welch/PR

First, if any of the newly signed free agents are a “miss,” as has been the case with a plethora of Licht’s signings, including the likes of Michael Johnson, Anthony Collins, Alterraun Verner, Bruce Carter, Chris Baker, Nick Folk and Chandler Catanzaro among others, the team has no financial obligation or dead cap space moving forward next year. The Bucs aren’t obligated to hold on to a mistake for an additional year due to a large sum of guaranteed money.

Second, if any of the newly signed players uses the prove-it, contract-year scenario to their advantage, the Bucs get a highly motivated, highly productive player that benefits the team in the win column in 2019. That player or those players will have obviously played well in Tampa Bay’s schemes and may be looking forward to re-signing with the Bucs.

And last but not least, Tampa Bay’s recent penchant for signing free agents to lesser, one-year deals, like Deone Bucannon’s one-year, $2.5 million deal, Shaquil Barrett’s one-year, $4 million deal and wide receiver Breshad Perriman’s one-year, $4 million contract helps the team’s quest for compensatory draft picks, which is the Bucs’ strategy moving forward.

A quick glance at the OverTheCap.com compensatory draft picks cancellation chart flies in the face of the fact that the Bucs believe they will land one or two compensatory draft picks next year for losing the likes of Kwon Alexander, Adam Humphries, Ryan Fitzpatrick and Adarius Taylor in free agency with much bigger free agent deals. But don’t fret, Bucs fans.

Bucs QB Ryan Fitzpatrick – Photo by: Cliff Welch/PR

Sources have told me that the team doesn’t believe its signings will cancel out any compensatory draft picks it could receive because it’s based not only on the number of players that have been signed and lost in free agency, but also the amount of the contracts and the amount of playing time and impact that the free agents have in 2019. If Alexander, Humphries, Fitzpatrick and Taylor are all starters with their new teams and players like Bucannon and Barrett are part-time starters behind Kevin Minter and Carl Nassib, respectively, that aids the Bucs in the NFL’s mystery formula for assigning compensatory draft picks.

Because the Bucs have overspent in free agency in a desperate attempt to upgrade the team’s talent and win more games for the better part of the last decades, compensatory draft picks have been quite elusive. In fact, Licht has received just one, which was a seventh-round compensatory pick in 2018, which was the next-to-last selection that year. That pick was used in trading down a few spots with Buffalo and acquiring the Bills’ second-round picks.

As stated in the previous section of this week’s SR’s Fab 5, free agency is becoming too costly, and drafting quality players that can be developed into three- or four-year starters on low-cost, rookie deals is the best way to go. Free agency is more of a risk than the draft and produces a lower hit rate when it comes to talent acquisition.

Most general managers will tell you that hitting on one third of a team’s free agent class would be a win, while it’s not uncommon for teams to hit on half of their draft class. Using those odds, it would make more sense to acquire more draft picks, and that’s exactly what Patriots head coach Bill Belichick continues to do each year.

Patriots head coach Bill Belichick – Photo by: Getty Images

Since the league began awarding compensatory draft picks in rounds 3-7 starting in 1994, the Ravens have had the most with 50, while the Patriots and Cowboys have each been awarded 42. Over the last four years, New England has led the way with 10 additional compensatory draft picks, including two third-rounders, an additional sixth-rounder and an extra seventh-rounder this year.

The defending Super Bowl champions enter the 2019 NFL Draft with a league-high 12 picks and the rich continue to get richer. Holding true to a 50 percent hit rate in the draft, Belichick can expect to have six of his 12 draft picks stick on the roster as starters or backups for the next few years. That means three more players on cheap, rookie contracts than the Bucs would have through the draft process as Tampa Bay only has seven picks, which would result in just three of those players sticking on the roster as starters or backups a few year down the road.

The Bucs want to get into the compensatory draft pick game in 2020 and seem poised to do so with what has taken place in free agency thus far. Perhaps more importantly, they are setting up a perpetual compensatory draft pick situation by having a plethora of players hit free agency in 2020, including this year’s free agent signings like Bucannon, Barrett and Perriman along with players like Minter, running back Peyton Barber, guard Earl Watford, defensive end Carl Nassib, and possibly cornerback Vernon Hargreaves III.

If any of those Buccaneers blows up statistically and leaves via free agency in 2020 for riches elsewhere, it could set Tampa Bay up to receive more compensatory draft picks in 2021. If the Bucs win as they expect to this season, the hope is that more players would want to come to Tampa Bay and play for Bruce Arians and Todd Bowles on similar, one-year, prove-it deals and the compensatory draft pick strategy continues for years to come.

Bucs head coach Bruce Arians and GM Jason Licht – Photo by: Cliff Welch/PR

Of course this new philosophy will place even more importance on Arians and his coaching staff’s ability to draft and quickly develop players. Great coaching makes a difference in New England, and the Patriots seemingly always let players go in free agency – like they did with defensive end Trey Flowers and left tackle Trent Brown – because of their ability to draft their replacements and have the coaching staff quickly prepare those rookies to start and produce.

Having 12 picks instead of seven allows for more room for error when it comes to selecting players. The Bucs will employ the compensatory draft pick strategy moving forward as a way to secure more draft picks and acquire cheaper, younger talent that can be developed and either re-signed as the team has done with Mike Evans, Ali Marpet and Donovan Smith, or let go and receive compensatory draft picks the following year.