The Tampa Bay Buccaneers have been fairly busy in free agency. No earth-shattering signings, though retaining Doug Martin was important, but they added players at every position of need at mostly reasonable prices -- even if each of those players has some questions to answer.
Usually, addressing your needs and Pete Prisco liked what the Bucs did, giving them a B overall.
The Skinny: They were aggressive in free agency and landed three players at need positions. They got guard J.R. Sweezy from Seattle, a solid player who probably got too much money. But he's a tough guy, and they need that. They then helped the defense with corner Brent Grimes and defensive end Robert Ayers. The big move was re-signing running back Doug Martin, which is OK since he's their back and not another team's discard.
B: They had issues they needed to address and they did so. Not with stars, but solid football players. Getting Martin back was big.
That seems fair enough. The Bucs seem to have had a solid free agency period, but hardly an impeccable one. In some ways, this is reminiscent of 2014 when the Bucs signed Anthony Collins, Alterraun Verner and Michael Johnson -- all veteran players with question marks. All of those players were signed to reasonable deals -- and all three of them turned out to be disappointments.
We won't rightly know how good this free agency class was for at least one season. If they turn out to be busts, though, the Bucs can say goodbye pretty easily. As is always the case, Tampa Bay structured its contracts to be able to cut all of their players after two years with no future commitments.