The Tampa Bay Buccaneers' 2023 season ended with a Divisional Round playoff loss in Detroit on Sunday, and that meant the end of the team's practice squad contracts. However, most of the players who were on that unit at season's end will be sticking around to start the 2024 offseason.
On Tuesday, the Buccaneers re-signed 14 of its 16 practice squad players to reserve/futures contracts for the 2024 season. These contracts will take effect when the new league year begins in March. The players who got futures contracts were:
- DL C.J. Brewer
- T Silas Dzansi
- OL Luke Haggard
- CB Keenan Isaac
- WR Cephus Johnson
- RB Patrick Laird
- S Richard LeCounte
- WR Ryan Miller
- CB Quandre Mosely
- OLB Jose Ramirez
- G Logan Stenberg
- TE Tanner Taula
- WR Raleigh Webb
- TE David Wells
The contracts for the other two players among those 16, CB Derrek Pitts and DL Deadrin Senat, were allowed to expire, making them free agents.
The expansion of practice squads to 16 spots and the introduction of the game day elevation options in recent years has allowed teams more continuity and more flexibility with those players. Eight of the 16 players who finished the season on the Bucs' practice squad – Dzansi, Haggard, Johnson, LeCounte, Miller, Ramirez and Taula were signed in Week One and spent all 20 weeks on that crew. Two more – Isaac and Wells – were on either the active roster or the practice squad for all 20 weeks.
The majority of the players the Bucs signed to futures contracts on Monday are in their first two years in the NFL, with Laird and Sternberg as the notable exceptions. Dzansi, Haggard, Isaac, Miller and Taula all entered the league as undrafted free agents with the Buccaneers last May. All will get a chance to try to earn a spot on the 2024 roster, as Wells, defensive lineman Mike Greene, tackle Justin Skule did in 2023. Those three all signed futures contract with the Bucs last January after the team was eliminated from the playoffs.
