It was widely speculated that the Buccaneers would definitely retain at least one of their top two free agents following the Super Bowl. There was no way they’d be able to keep wide receiver Chris Godwin as well as edge rusher Shaquil Barrett.
But they did.
Tampa Bay was able to place the franchise tag on Godwin and re-signed Barrett. They were moves all parties agreed to and now that we look back on it, it appears that there may have never been any doubt the Bucs weren’t keeping both.
Despite how seamless it may look now, general manager Jason Licht says that it was a “chess game” when asked how they were able to pull off retaining them.