Shaq Barrett Is 'Definitely' Playing This Year, Will It Be With Bucs?

Shaq Barrett made a late-season cameo with the Bucs after he applied for reinstatement and signed with the team in late December. Barrett originally inked a one-year deal with the Dolphins but retired before ever playing a game with them. After he announced that he would return, Tampa Bay brought him back once he cleared waivers to where he blossomed into a Pro Bowl pass rusher.

With the 32-year-old once again on the free-agent market, will he be back wearing red and pewter next season?

Shaq Barrett’s Agent Drew Rosenhaus Says He’ll Be Playing This Year

At the NFL Annual Meeting, Shaq Barrett’s agent Drew Rosenhaus shared that his client will not be walking from the game again.

“He’s definitely going to play this year,” Rosenhaus said.

This follows what Barrett said after returning to the Bucs’ locker room.

“This is a this year thing and then [this] offseason, [I’ll] hit it really hard and be probably the best I’ve been in a long time for next year,” Barrett said about preparing for another season. “So, yeah, I’m planning on playing until, not forever, but at least another two, three years.”

To remain a factor and on a 53-man roster at this point of his career, Barrett will need to attack the offseason as hungry as he was when he first came to Tampa Bay. He did not make as much of an impact as he would have liked down the stretch. Donning the No. 56, the veteran pass rusher played 12 defensive snaps in the regular-season finale and just five more defensive snaps during the Wild Card loss to the Commanders.

From a conditioning standpoint, it was always going to be tough to crack the rotation. Still, Barrett was not able to make a noticeable impact despite the outside pass rush being lackluster and only generating a total of 12 sacks. The team signing Haason Reddick this offseason has already added a hungry veteran into the mix, but will the team look to keep its fifth leading sacker in franchise history for another year?

How Can Shaq Barrett Fit Into Bucs’ 2025 OLB Plans?

Haason Reddick and Yaya Diaby will lead the Bucs outside linebacker room going into 2025, but what is the plan after them on the depth chart?

The 2025 NFL Draft will bring more a definitive answer to this question, as Tampa Bay could still look to add to the room as early as the first round. Should another young pass rusher be drafted, they would presumably slot in third and fourth, depending on how 2024 second-round pick Chris Braswell is developing ahead of his second season. Tampa Bay also re-signed Anthony Nelson as a veteran depth option to fill in and get some run.

This squeezes Shaq Barrett out from playing as much as he did from 2019-2023 when he was a full-time starter. The only realistic path to playing time is if he makes the team as the sixth outside linebacker and is a designated third-down pass rusher who gets 10-15 snaps a game.

An injury would open things up, but it is not even a guarantee that Barrett would be the best option at the end of the bench. While Jose Ramirez and Markees Watts did not receive much playing time last year, both are younger and have presumably higher ceilings at this point.

Should Shaq Barrett re-sign on a veteran minimum deal, he would face an uphill training camp and preseason battle to make the roster. Barrett has made it clear in the past that he would only come back to play for the Broncos or Bucs, and he followed through on his word coming back for a second stint.

Seeing the field will require a lot of hard work, but he has come out of nowhere to make a name for himself before. We’ll see what happens after the draft.