FAB 2. Stewart Is Bucs’ Latest Second-Round Bust

While there are sparks of innovation here and there, the NFL is nothing like college football where innovation reigns. The NFL has been – and likely will continue to be – largely a copycat league.

So fresh off watching the Philadelphia Eagles upset Tom Brady and the New England Patriots behind backup quarterback Nick Foles to cap off the 2017 season, Bucs general manager Jason Licht decided to play follow the leader.

Bucs DT Beau Allen and DE Vinny Curry – Photo by: Getty Images

The Eagles were a tough team with a bunch of tough, physical players, including the likes of defensive linemen Fletcher Cox, Vinny Curry, Brandon Graham, linebacker Nigel Bradham, safety Malcolm Jenkins, center Jason Kelce and running back LeGarrette Blount among others.

The Bucs were far from tough and were coming off a disappointing 5-11 season in Dirk Koetter’s second year and wanted to be a more physical team. So Licht did what Philadelphia did and acquire a bunch of tough guys in the 2018 offseason.

He signed Curry and reserve nose tackle Beau Allen away from Philadelphia, added a tough defensive tackle in Mitch Unrein from Chicago in free agency, traded for physical edge rusher Jason Pierre-Paul, and spent three of the first four draft picks that year on massive nose tackle Vita Vea, and physical cornerbacks in M.J. Stewart and Carlton Davis. Licht then found another tough guy in defensive end Carl Nassib off waivers at the start of the season.

Some of those moves worked out. Pierre-Paul was a big hit, notching 12.5 sacks in his first season in Tampa Bay. Vea and Davis are starters with star potential as they enter their third season in the NFL, and Nassib served a purpose, notching 12.5 sacks combined in his two seasons with the Bucs. Allen was a decent acquisition for depth purposes, while Curry didn’t have much left in the tank at age 30, and Unrein succumbed to a wicked concussion in training camp that ended his NFL career.

Bucs DBs MJ Stewart and Carlton Davis – Photo by: Cliff Welch/PR

But the real bust of the players that Licht acquired in 2018 was Stewart, who was actually drafted ahead of Davis in the second round that year. After just two seasons in Tampa Bay, the Bucs waived Stewart this past week just as training camp had begun.

Stewart had six career interceptions and 41 pass breakups at North Carolina where he was a four-year starter with four picks coming during his sophomore year. But Stewart didn’t have any INTs during his last two years with the Tar Heels and that should have been a red flag.

Stewart was a physical cornerback that won the scouts and coaching staff over with his tough guy attitude, but the problem was that he wasn’t an NFL-caliber athlete, as the following charts from MockDraftable.com show.

The best thing about Stewart’s data from the NFL Scouting Combine is his weight (200 pounds), bench press (18 reps) and 60-yard shuttle (11.19). Those numbers were in line with the physical presence he was supposed to bring to Tampa Bay. But they key measureables that apply to cornerbacks in terms of speed, quickness, agility and change of direction ability just weren’t there.

Stewart had pedestrian numbers in the 40-yard dash (4.54), three-cone drill (6.9), 20-yard shuttle (4.28), and was clearly over-drafted. If Licht and his scouts liked Stewart’s toughness, taking a gamble on him in the fourth round would have been much more appropriate than burning a high second round pick.

Bucs CB MJ Stewart – Photo by: Getty Images

Poor data in the vertical jump (35 inches) and the broad jump (118 inches) showed sub-par athleticism and should have been an immediate red flag to Licht, director of college scouting Mike Biehl that he didn’t have the tools to cover NFL-caliber receivers. Being physical and tough is fine, but you have to stay with or catch up to the receivers first in order to display that physicality and toughness.

It was evident right from the start that Stewart might be a bust. In fact, Stewart gave up a couple of touchdowns and got burned in coverage repeatedly in an embarrassing, 48-10 loss to Chicago in Week 4. I called for head coach Dirk Koetter to fire defensive coordinator Mike Smith after that game and to turn the defensive play-calling duties over to linebackers coach Mark Duffner in my 2-Point Conversion column. Koetter ultimately did that, but just waited a few weeks to pull the trigger.

Just four games into Stewart’s rookie career he looked like a bust, which prompted me to devote an entire segment of my 2 Probing Questions section to question whether Stewart had the athleticism to play in the slot, which he didn’t. As Stewart’s playing time diminished in 2018 it became obvious that his days in Tampa Bay were numbered. The fact that Stewart didn’t pan out as a rookie forced Licht to focus on the cornerback position once again.

Last year, Licht drafted cornerbacks Sean Murphy-Bunting and Jamel Dean in the second and third rounds to replace former first-rounder Vernon Hargreaves III and Stewart. Murphy-Bunting and Dean starred as rookies and were playing really good football towards the end of their first season in the NFL.

Hargreaves was jettisoned after the Arizona game last November and Stewart’s services were no longer needed as of this past week. Earlier in the summer in a previous SR’s Fab 5 column, I wrote about Stewart would need the training camp of his life to turn around his NFL fortunes with the Buccaneers. That ultimately didn’t happen, and it’s no surprise.

Bucs CB MJ Stewart – Photo by: Getty Images

It’s one thing for players to add size or become more physical at the NFL level, but that wasn’t Stewart’s problem. What players can’t do at the pro level is become faster and more athletic, and that was Stewart’s problem – from the beginning.

Stewart was a bad pick from the start, and unfortunately the second round hasn’t always been kind to Licht since he became Tampa Bay’s general manager in 2014.

Licht’s Second Round Picks Since 2014
2014: TE Austin Seferian-Jenkins – Bust
2015: LT Donovan Smith – Six-year starter
2015: LG Ali Marpet – Six-year starter
2016: EDGE Noah Spence – Bust
2016: K Roberto Aguayo – Bust
2017: FS Justin Evans – Bust due to health rather than performance
2018: RB Ronald Jones II – Emerging starter
2018: CB M.J. Stewart – Bust
2018: CB Carlton Davis – Three-year starter
2019: CB Sean Murphy-Bunting – Two-year starter
2020: FS Antoine Winfield, Jr. – Promising rookie

With five second-round busts out of his first eight second-round picks, the Bucs have to hope that Licht got all of his bad luck out of his system with Stewart. If Davis and Murphy-Bunting can continue to ascend and Winfield emerges as the playmaking starter the team hopes he can become, Licht’s fortunes in the second round will have been reversed as he will be on a roll with three consecutive hits in the second round as the 2020 season begins.