What Broncos GM George Paton Can Learn From Bucs' World Championship
It's easy to fixate on the quarterback when you are building a team, because it's the most important position, yet the most difficult to find.
However, it's just as important to do a good job of building a team around a quarterback because, if you don't have the right quarterback at a given time, you at least have the pieces in place so that, when you do find the right quarterback, you're good to go.
There may be no better example of this than the World-Champion Tampa Bay Buccaneers. Of course, Tampa didn't become a true contender until it added Tom Brady in free agency.
But what happened in the years prior to Brady's arrival? Let's go back to 2015, to when the Bucs placed their best on another QB, and how the process unfolded.
The Buccaneers made Jameis Winston the No. 1 overall pick in the NFL draft. Tampa was in need of a rebuild after going 2-14 the previous season.
Winston wasn't necessarily bad, but he never proved to be the guy the Bucs could build around. The Bucs finished 9-7 in 2016 but never had a winning record in his other four years with the team.
Despite Winston showing he was average at best, and perhaps better described as mediocre, the Bucs gave him five seasons as the starter. This included picking up the fifth-year option in his rookie deal.
One can argue that a first-round pick might get more years to prove himself, but I don't think most Broncos fans would be willing to give a QB five years to show he can get it together and at least be capable of producing great games.
This is particularly true when you consider that the Bucs were in position to add either Josh Allen or Josh Rosen in the 2018 NFL draft. Say what you want about those two, whether at the time or now, but both were projected to go high in the draft that year. Still, the Bucs passed on both and traded down with the Buffalo Bills.
Winston didn't improve as a passer and, while he threw for 5,109 yards and 33 touchdowns in 2019, that came off 626 attempts, tied with Jared Goff for the most in the league. And, of course, he threw 30 interceptions, the most in the league.
Then, fate would have it that Brady would hit free agency last spring and he chose the Bucs. Thus he magically lifted a team from 7-9 purgatory to the playoffs, right?
Well, yes and no. It's true that Brady made the Bucs a better team and the resource to put get them over the hump, but Tampa had been quietly putting pieces into place before his arrival. Let's look at what happened.
Blocks Just Waiting for Building
When Winston was drafted, the Bucs already had LB Lavonte David and WR Mike Evans on the roster. Both are elite players at their positions and both were ultimately extended by the Bucs.
The team also had DL William Gholston, a good but not great player, who also got extended. The Bucs also added undrafted free agent TE Cameron Brate in 2014.
Brate spent most of his first year on the practice squad, then did the same in 2015, aside from one week he spent on the New Orleans Saints practice squad, before the Bucs signed him back to their active roster. From 2016 on, he remained on the roster and ultimately signed an extension.
The year the Bucs drafted Winston, the team also drafted OT Donovan Smith and OG Eli Marpet. Both are good but not great players, and both got extended. Two years later, the Bucs drafted WR Chris Godwin.
Then came 2018 in which the Bucs found a lot of their players through the draft. The 2018 draft netted DL Vita Vea, OG Alex Cappa, RB Ronald Jones II, CB Carlton Davis, and S Jordan Whitehead. In 2019, the Bucs added two more lynchpins: LB Devin White and CB Sean Murphy-Bunting.
Then came free agency where the Bucs' major signings were C Ryan Jensen in 2018 and edge rusher Shaquil Barrett in 2019. Later in 2019, Tampa added DT Ndamukong Suh.
Through waivers, the Bucs added DT Rakeem Nunez-Roches in 2018, who filled in this past season when Vea missed time, and also added OG Aaron Stinnie in 2019, who played a few games this past season.
As for trades prior to Brady's arrival, the Bucs landed edge rusher Jason Pierre-Paul in 2018 for a third-round pick that year, while swapping fourth-rounders.
You'll notice that the Bucs were getting a lot of key acquisitions, primarily through the draft but a couple in free agency, a couple in waiver claims, and one in trade. The 2018 draft, in particular, netted a lot of key contributors.
Now we come to 2020 — after the Bucs signed Brady, the team acquired TE Rob Gronkowski in a trade, and added OT Tristen Wirfs and S Antoine Winfield, Jr. in the draft. Throw in cheap free agents such as RB Leonard Fournette and WR Antonio Brown, and the Bucs had a good team built around the QB they just signed.
However, the Bucs didn't build the entire roster in the span of one season. They spent multiple years adding pieces here and there, with more found through the draft than through other avenues. This is how they assembled a roster that became a playoff contender when they found the right quarterback.
What it Means for Broncos
Now let's get to the Denver Broncos, and the refrain that is sure to surface: 'But we can't give Drew Lock five years! That's ridiculous!'
First of all, I'm not saying that the Broncos should give Lock five years. What I'm saying is that you don't want to trip over yourself for a quick-fix QB at the cost of continuing to build the roster so that, when you find the right signal-caller, you have a team that is truly ready to contend.
Remember that the Broncos' 2015-17 seasons didn't yield much through the draft, save for Justin Simmons and Garett Bolles. Denver also had major misses in free agency when it came to addressing the right tackle position. True, the lack of a QB didn't help, but that didn't sink the Broncos by itself.
More recently, the Broncos have gotten better with drafting, with Bradley Chubb, Courtland Sutton, Josey Jewell, Noah Fant, Dalton Risner, Jerry Jeudy, and KJ Hamler among the picks showing promise. However, free agency still need improvement, as evidenced by the signing of Ja'Wuan James, and while the trades for A.J. Bouye and Jurrell Casey weren't bad, they didn't pay the dividends that the Bucs got when they acquire Pierre-Paul.
In other words, the Broncos got a few things corrected with their team-building approach, but not enough, and not just at the QB position. There's talent in place, but are all the pieces there to where a plug-and-play QB could step in? I wouldn't say so.
Therefore, you want to be careful when you look at outside QBs. By all means, do your homework on them, explore every possible avenue, but be careful not to throw too much at the position.
If the price is too high, or you aren't convinced somebody is 'your guy' in the draft, better to put more pieces into place around Lock. Again, that doesn't mean Lock gets five years — but it does mean if he doesn't improve in 2021, you know you have a stronger roster in place, and then you are in a better position to make a bold move and find that QB.
It's easy to get frustrated with QB play considering that the Kansas City Chiefs have Patrick Mahomes, the Los Angeles Chargers have Justin Herbert, and even the Las Vegas Raiders have steady play at the position in Derek Carr, but go look at the Bucs — when they had Winston, the Saints had Drew Brees, the Atlanta Falcons had Matt Ryan, and the Carolina Panthers, for a couple of those years, had a healthy Cam Newton playing at a high level.
Building through the draft and using free agency and trades wisely paid off the Bucs in the long term. If new Broncos GM George Paton does the same, it should also pay off in the long term, even if it takes beyond 2021 to find the right QB.
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