For the third straight year, the Tampa Bay Buccaneers have signed defensive lineman Greg Gaines to a one-year deal. Gaines first joined the Buccaneers in 2023 after four seasons with the Los Angeles Rams and has since re-upped in each of the last two offseasons.
Gaines has been a steady member of Tampa Bay's interior-line rotation for the past two years, playing in all but two of the team's 34 regular-season games and making five starts. He was on the field for 42% of the Bucs' defensive snaps in 2023 and 41% of the snaps in the 15 games he played last fall.
Overall, Gaines has recorded 41 tackles, two tackles for loss, 2.0 sacks, nine quarterback hits and one fumble recovery in his two seasons in Tampa. Including his four years with the Rams, in which he played in 59 games with 25 starts, Gaines has amassed 163 tackles, 13 tackles for loss, 12.5 sacks, 33 QB hits and two fumble recoveries.
A fourth-round draft pick by the Rams in 2019, Gaines started 17 games for the 2021 Los Angeles team that went on to win Super Bowl LVI. He had a career-high 4.5 sacks that season along with 13 quarterback hits. Gaines posted another 4.0 sacks and six QB hits in 2022. He played his college ball at Washington and is a former Huskies teammate with Buccaneers nose tackle Vita Vea.
