The Tampa Bay Buccaneers signed Bruce Arians as their head coach on Tuesday. Because Arians retired as the head coach of the Arizona Cardinals in 2017, technically the Cardinals still had his rights. Due to this, the Buccaneers had to trade a draft pick with the Cardinals to make the signing official.
Per Adam Schefter, the Buccaneers will give up their seventh-round pick in 2019 for the Cardinals' sixth-round pick.
So the deal is: the Buccaneers get Bruce Arians’ rights and Arizona’s 2019 7th-round pick in return for the Buccaneers’ 2019 sixth-round pick, per source.
— Adam Schefter (@AdamSchefter) January 9, 2019
Bruce Arians retired at the end of the 2017 NFL season because of his health and old age. It was not expected that his retirement would just be a short hiatus. In his time with the Cardinals, he led them to 13 wins with an appearance in the NFC Championship Game.
Arians also has two Coach of the Year awards. His first was as an interim coach with the Indianapolis Colts back in 2012, and once with the Cardinals in 2014. He has a successful pedigree working with quarterbacks.
It remains to be seen where the Buccaneers go with Jameis Winston. He performed very poorly last season and was benched in favor of Ryan Fitzpatrick. They went only 5-11 on the season after a hot start with Fitzpatrick under center.
On the season, Winston started nine games and threw for 2,992 yards with 19 touchdowns and 14 interceptions. He had a 64.6 percent completion percentage with a 71.8 quarterback rating. Fitzpatrick, on the other hand, threw for 2,336 yards with 17 touchdowns and 12 interceptions. He had a 66.7 completion percentage and a 64.4 quarterback rating.
It will be very interesting to see if Arians will be able to turn this franchise around.
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