Home Free Agency Buccaneers Worst-5 Free Agent Signings All-Time

Buccaneers wide receiver Alvin Harper / via Sports Illustrated

Buccaneers Worst-5 Free Agent Signings All-Time

March 19, 2024

With the NFL and the Tampa Bay Buccaneers heading into wave two of free agency we thought it’d be fun to list the Pewter Pirates “Worst-5 Free Agent Signings All-Time” as seen by our staff of content creators. Up first is columnist Carter Brantley.

Carter Brantley

1. Chris Baker
2. Alvin Harper
3. Anthony Collins
4. Eric Wright
5. Derrick Ward

Woof. These are some tough names, and Baker is the most brutal in my opinion. He was signed to a 3-year deal and lasted exactly… 1 very unproductive season. I wasn’t alive to see Harper shit the bed after being the #2 on some very good Cowboy teams, but man were his numbers in Tampa awful, as is the fact that he was released after 2 seasons.

Collins was a very viable candidate for #1, but the Buccaneers were so bad those years anyways that it’s hard to list him up there. He was Donald Penn’s replacement and uh, well, he wasn’t a very good one; he was released after one season following his signing of a 5-year deal. Nasty stuff. Wright was mostly included because hey, that was Easy-E’s name, but he was also signed to a 5-year deal and was unable to pass a physical after a disappointing first season in a Bucs uniform, nulling the trade the Bucs had agreed to with San Fransisco to get rid of the middling, overpaid corner.

Ward was known as part of that elite New York Giants backfield, but was as unproductive as it gets when arriving in Tampa Bay. He was released after 1 year (notice a pattern here?) and never could recapture that NYC magic.

Devin Sanguinett

1. Alvin Harper
2. Anthony Collins
3. Chris Baker
4. Ryan Neal
5. Chris Conte

What all these guys have in common is that they are, to put it politely, bums. Every single one of them should be charged with robbery for what they did to the team. I tried to sort this out based upon investment into the player alongside performance. Which is why guys like Ryan Neal and Chris Conte aren’t as high. It’s hard to compare players across different position groups, but it can be argued Neal and Conte are technically worse players. But, Neal and Conte only got one-year deals. Guys like Alvin Harper, Anthony Collins, and Chris Baker were all supposed to be the guy. They were not. Harper went from catching everything to not being able to catch the flu, a turnstile would offer more protection than Anthony Collins, and Baker was a locker room disaster (something the Bucs already knew before they signed him).

Jeremy Morrow

5. Michael Johnson came over from Cincinnati in 2014. Unfortunately he had decent stats there and the Buccaneers over paid for his services. Call it the nature of a premium position but he only lasted on season. I thought he was going to do well. I was wrong.

4. Charlie Garner, was too old and over paid when he was brought in.

3. Derrick Ward benefited from a running back committee and scheme in New York. One he didn’t have in Tampa. It also helps if you show up for training camp.

2. Johnson’s teammate Anthony Collins came the same season. After the Buccaneers let Donald Penn leave they over paid for a tackle with little tape to show for his price.

1. Lastly my favorite bad free agency signing. The tree loving Chris Baker. This freeloader amounted to an absolute horrible decision. He could be one of the laziest players in Buccaneers history.

Rick Hughes

5. Tim Brown – Yes, THAT Tim Brown was a Buccaneer. You don’t remember that? No one else does either. This is thanks to Jon Gruden and his love for veterans.

4. Charlie Garner – Just re-read everything I said about Tim Brown. Same thing. Wash. Rinse. Repeat.

3. Eric Wright – The funny thing is that the most I can say about him is “No. Not THAT Eric Wright.” He came to Tampa in 2012 after a four interception season in Cleveland and you don’t remember him. He signed a five year contract with the Bucs and there is a reason that you don’t remember him. The reason is that flamed out and only totaled 38 tackles for the team. Not per season. 38 tackles TOTAL.

2. Chris Baker – He is most remembered for his time in Cincinnati and humping a palm tree during the Bucs season of Hard Knocks. He was purely awful in Tampa. He got a big contract and he was truly done trying to be great before the ink had dried on the contract.

1. Alvin Harper – The excitement is memorable to anyone who has been a Bucs fan for a while. Harper was a HUGE part of the Dallas Cowboys and had massive, memorable catches in the NFC Championships for the Cowboys in two consecutive years. This was THE signing of the off-season and Bucs fans were excited. If you don’t remember him you are definitely new around Bucville. Long story short, he was awful and everything about this is the stuff of Buccaneer legend. He was bad. REALLY bad and that was even the worst part. He literally had his finger tip cut off by the Bucs training staff in a freak accident.

“They couldn’t do anything. There wasn’t anything to stitch. They couldn’t find the little piece they cut off.”

Sound horrifying and embarrassing? Welcome to being a Bucs fan newbies!

AJ Turn-Up

1. DeSean Jackson: Drama queen and all-around POS
2. Chris Baker: Lazy and ineffective
3. Michael Johnson: Just sucked
4. Chris Conte: Inconsistent and got Thanos’d
5. Carl Nicks: Bad play and that whole MRSA thing

Bucs Report Staff

1. Alvin Harper
2. Chris Baker
3. Michael Johnson
4. Anthony Collins
5. Charlie Garner

Alvin Harper takes the No. 1 spot here, but just by a finger tip. Chris Baker was just a lazy blowhard. Michael Johnson got big money and proceeded to do nothing that justified it. Anthony Collins was another overpaid guy who underperformed. Charlie Garner signed a six-year contract for $20 million with $4 million guaranteed in 2004. He then proceeded to rush for a little over 100 yards and was released after one year.