What You Need to Know:

• Despite opening the season sharing work with Ronald Jones, Fournette finished 2021 ranked 11th in opportunity share (carries + targets).
• Fournette’s usage climbed after the Week 9 bye. He went from 56.4% carry share and 11.1% target share before the bye to 62% and 17.8% in healthy outings after the bye.
• For comparison’s sake, “Lombardi Lenny” got 53% of carries and 15.2% of targets over the 4-game playoff run at the end of the 2020 season.
• Fournette improved on Pro Football Focus rushing and receiving grade last season over 2020, his 1st year with the Bucs. His yards after contact per attempt and elusive rating also climbed.
• Tampa Bay’s offensive line climbed from 9th in Football Outsiders’ adjusted line yards in 2020 to 5th last season. The Bucs lost G Ali Marpet to retirement, but they signed Shaq Mason in free agency to replace him. PFF graded Mason 6th-best among all guards as a run-blocker last season; 3rd-best the season before. He beat Marpet each time.
• Fournette notoriously arrived for minicamp “a little heavy,” admitting that he weighed “240-something.” He also called 228-230 his target playing weight. Is that a concern? We’ll see.
• The Buccaneers let Ronald Jones walk in free agency. They retained Giovani Bernard. The biggest addition was 3rd-round pick Rachaad White.
• After allowing him to hit the open market, Tampa Bay re-signed Fournette for 3 years at $21 million, with $12 million of that guaranteed.
• Bucs RB Leonard Fournette is down to 245 pounds and "back in shape," per insider Doug Kyed. Fournette's belly made headlines in June, but it sounds like he's back to playing weight.

Draft Sharks Bottom Line:

Fournette took the backfield lead as last season wore on, and then the Buccaneers committed a surprising amount of money to bring him back in free agency. Tampa let Ronald Jones walk and added 3rd-round pick Rachaad White. We’ll see what that means for touch distribution. We’ll also see about Fournette’s waist line at the start of training camp. Assuming he’s in better shape at that point and stays healthy through camp, Fournette looks well set up to rank among the league leaders in opportunity share. He’ll belong in Round 2 of drafts across formats.