Following four seasons playing for the Denver Broncos, linebacker Shaquil Barrett set out to find an opportunity to earn a starting job. That search landed him with the Tampa Bay Buccaneers.
In his first season under coach Todd Bowles, who was the defensive coordinator at the time, Barrett set the NFL world on fire and helped put the Buccaneers on the national map as he racked up 19.5 sacks during the 2019 season.
Unfortunately, it wasn’t enough to get Tampa Bay to the postseason, but it was enough to help lure quarterback Tom Brady into the fold, and a Super Bowl championship came with him that following year.
While that much success is not likely to take place in his return to the Buccaneers — partially because there’s simply not enough time to expect that kind of sack production, even when including playoff opportunities — it isn’t hard to see why Barrett would feel excited and rejuvenated as he makes his return to where he found his greatest professional success.
“I’m doing good. I’m just taking it all back in,” Barrett said in his first interview since coming out of retirement to rejoin the Bucs. “Feel like a rookie again, just re-motivated, rejuvenated, and just happy to just be part of the team and trying to make a run to the playoffs.”
Barrett says two or three weeks ago he found out three teams were interested in his services and that one of them was the Buccaneers, and that’s when his interest piqued and talks of coming out of retirement took a sharp turn into being very serious.
With other teams interested in having Barrett on their roster, the edge rusher admitted he likely would have come back even if the Bucs didn’t want him. But being in Tampa Bay is the most advantageous situation for him, he said, and the right one for him of any other of the 31 possibilities that may have lay before him.
“It’s so much more sweeter to be able to come back here to home. And for the guys that I know already and the playbook,” Barrett said. “I got to put that time and those hours in to get everything back down, so I come out and play fast. But yeah, it was a no-brainer to come back to come back here.”
