Buccaneers Promote Peyton Barber To Active Roster

By foxsports
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After waiving the injured Mike James, the Buccaneers have promoted running back Peyton Barber to the active roster, giving the Bucs a third running back for Sunday.

It’s no surprise that the corresponding move to Mike James’ shocking release was that undrafted rookie running back Peyton Barber was called up from the Buccaneers’ practice squad to round out the 53-man roster Thursday morning. Barber was the best back behind James in preseason and there won’t be a learning curve for him as there would be on such short notice like there would be by signing a free agent.

That being said, I still fully expect the Buccaneers to sign free agent running back Jacquizz Rodgers after their week one game against the Falcons. As Jenna Laine pointed out yesterday, signing Rodgers before then guarantees his salary for the season;

In order to fill Barber’s spot on the practice squad, the Bucs brought back Evan Spencer, who was waived to make room for new receiver Cecil Shorts. According to Dirk Koetter, Shorts will see the field Sunday despite only being signed Tuesday;

“When he’s been healthy, he’s been a very productive player in this league. He’s smooth, he’s explosive, he can return kicks. We definitely upgraded. Everybody’s been complaining about the back end of our receiver group and that was a definite upgrade there. The hard thing is the timing of it, just getting him up to speed. But when you get a guy that – I think he told me he went through three systems in Jacksonville, plus one in Houston. Just meeting with him a little bit last night, you can tell that the guy’s a vet and he’ll pick it up fast, but we’re going to get him out there and have him ready to go, he’ll be on the field this week.”

Do you like the promotion of Peyton Barber? Do you still expect the Bucs to pursue a running back next week? Let us know in the comments below.

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