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Tampa Bay Buccaneers cut 2016 second-round kicker Roberto Aguayo

NFL: Tampa Bay Buccaneers at Cincinnati Bengals David Kohl-USA TODAY Sports

The Tampa Bay Buccaneers are a trendy pick to at least earn a wild card spot, having nearly managed exactly that just last season, but we really cannot ignore that they inexplicably traded up in the 2016 draft to choose a kicker in the second round! You know what’s even worse than trading up to draft a kicker in round 2? Cutting that kicker only one year later.

Via Buccaneers press release:

The Tampa Bay Buccaneers announced today that the team has waived kicker Roberto Aguayo.

In his rookie season with the Buccaneers (2016), Aguayo went 22-of-31 on field goal attempts and 32-of-34 on extra point attempts.

Aguayo missed a field goal and an extra point in Tampa Bay’s preseason defeat to the Bengals on Friday night. Apparently that was the final straw and the Bucs will roll with veteran Nick Folk from here on out. Roberto was the most accurate kicker in college football history when he was at Florida State, so presumably another team will pick him up soon.

Let’s remind ourselves of what Tampa Bay gave up to actually do this:

Buccaneers get: Second-round (#59) overall pick
Chiefs get: Buccaneers’ third-round (#74) and fourth-round (#106) picks.

For what it’s worth, Kansas City didn’t fare that much better with the Bucs picks; third-rounder KeiVarae Russell was cut as a rookie, and fourth-round safety Eric Murray is assigned to special teams duties. That’s not nearly as bad as giving up multiple picks to go back into the second so you can get a kicker who proved to be a downgrade from his predecessor, Connor Barth. This wasn’t even a justifiable move had Aguayo actually been good.

The good news for the Bucs is that Noah Spence and Vernon Hargreaves III both look like they’ll be big successes, so the 2016 draft won’t go down as a disaster, but it’s really hard not to see the Aguayo decision as one of the worst draft moves in recent memory.

That’s not to say Aguayo is not fixable. So as inspired by this tweet from Brock Huard, do you want to see the Seahawks bring Aguayo in to compete with Blair Walsh (who himself had a rough 2016, but otherwise had an actual good track record early in his career) for the starting job?

Poll

Should the Seahawks bring in Roberto Aguayo as competition for Blair Walsh?

This poll is closed

  • 63%
    Yes
    (939 votes)
  • 36%
    No
    (532 votes)
1471 votes total Vote Now