Bottom Line

White comes off a disappointing rookie year and will start in a bad offense.

But he could be in line for one of the largest opportunity shares in the league.

That alone makes the former third-round pick a solid selection as a PPR RB2.

What We Learned Last Year

• White played significantly fewer snaps than Leonard Fournette last year. Despite appearing in one more game, White played just 38.6% of snaps for the season vs. 56.7% for Fournette.
• The rookie did see a significant playing-time bump from Week 10 on.
  • Through the first nine games, he reached 40% snap share just once and fell short of 30% five times.
  • White averaged just 4.2 carries and 2.8 targets per game over that span. He averaged 3.1 yards per carry and 6.75 yards per catch.
  • Week 10 saw a season-high 22 carries (for 105 yards) in a game Leonard Fournette left early.
    • Fournette would miss the ensuing game and Week 18.
  • White played his two largest snap shares of the season in Week 10 (64%) and Week 12 (90%, with Fournette out). He also barely played in the Week 18 game Tampa didn’t need.
    • In between, he cracked 40% playing time in three of five games, including two at 50+%.
  • Even with Fournette back over those five games, White climbed to 10.2 carries and 4.8 targets per game.
• Just like Fournette, though, White didn’t perform very well when he got the ball. Among 51 RBs with 90+ carries last season, White ranked:
  • 46th in Pro Football Focus rushing grade
  • 41st in elusive rating
  • 45th in rush yards over expected per attempt

What to Expect in 2023

• White could be in line for large workloads. The team released Fournette in March and has added only Chase Edmonds to the backfield.
  • Edmonds played so well in 2022 that the Dolphins traded him less than halfway through a two-year deal. And then the Broncos dumped him after the season.
• Even though we don’t expect the Buccaneers to be good, they should run the ball at a higher rate than the past two years. They finished each season last in run rate, rushing on less than 34% of plays each time.
• With Baker Mayfield battling Kyle Trask to take over for Tom Brady, the offense certainly shouldn’t be leaning pass nearly so much.
• Besides Edmonds, Tampa Bay sports only Ke’Shawn Vaughn, Patrick Laird, and undrafted rookies Sean Tucker and Ronnie Brown (not that one) at the position.
• The O-line gets C Ryan Jensen back after he lost almost all of last season to a knee injury. Second-year G Luke Goedeke is expected to slide out to RT to replace Donovan Smith. Second-round rookie G Cody Mauch is expected to start right away. The team signed G Matt Feiler to a small one-year contract and expects to start him as well.
• This unit will need to improve significantly over last year’s, which ranked 28th in Football Outsiders’ adjusted line yards, a measure of how much rushing yardage the blocking accounted for.