Tampa Bay Buccaneers free agency 2020: Top 5 targets

Teddy Bridgewater

What the Tampa Bay Buccaneers have here is rare. Usually, when a team has to make a decision on a quarterback, it’s usually their current quarterback or terrible internal options. This season is much, much different. Let’s take a quick look at who the Bucs could pick in free agency or trade for based on the rumors if they wanted to move on from Jameis Winston:

Tom Brady, Drew Brees, Andy Dalton, Derek Carr, Dak Prescott, Ryan Tannehill, Marcus Mariota, Cam Newton, Ryan Fitzpatrick (Fitzmagic baby!), Josh Rosen, Joe Flacco, Philip Rivers and Nick Foles are all names that could be available. That’s an insane list. No, really. We can’t remember ever seeing a QB list like that, and that’s not even including Winston, or the player we want them to sign in Teddy Bridgewater.

Sometimes, teams will overcorrect when they sign the wrong coach. This would be like the Bucs doing that with a QB. The Bucs are dealing with a high risk, high-reward QB right now in Winston. Bridgewater will stay safe and make the smart play as much as he can. When he replaced Brees last season for the Saints, he had a career best completion percentage (67.9 percent). That number put him ahead of Russell Wilson, Deshaun Watson and Patrick Mahomes.

Obviously he’s not those three, but he was still very, very good last season. It’s been a long time since the major knee injury that almost cost him his career. He lost some of his athleticism, but he gained a lot of intelligence on the field.

He’s going to get the ball to Mike Evans and Chris Godwin at the best possible times. Maybe they need to rethink some of their downfield play calling, but the safety factor of it will be too appealing not to try. He will demand some money, but with so many other options, we don’t see it coming close to Jameis’ demands. Maybe around $16 million a year would do it. The predictions that he’s going to get a lot more seem optimistic, but ultimately unrealistic.