Leonard Fournette finds a new home with Bucs

Leonard Fournette has found a new team and will remain in Florida.

It didn’t take long at all for former Jacksonville Jaguars running back Leonard Fournette to find a new team as NFL insider Ian Rapoport reported that he’s headed to Tampa Bay. That’s right, Fournette will be remaining in the state of Florida and will be joining Tom Brady, Rob Gronkowski, Bruce Arians, and company.

Moments later, Fournette confirmed the news himself by posting an edit of him in a Bucs uniform on social media.

The Jags shocked the NFL community by waiving Fournette Monday morning. According to coach Doug Marrone it wasn’t off the field or character related, but more so because the Jags liked what they saw out of their other running backs.

“Well, I think what happened was I tried to challenge everyone, coaches and scouts, to look at what we’ve been doing in practice. Not knowing how the players are going to come back, not knowing who we had, not having a lot of experience to them and that we’d have to make good decisions on what’s best for the team. Let’s not go ahead and say ‘well, because this player did this before, we’ll get the same type of results’,” Marrone said Monday.

“Really we’ve just tried to take the team and put the best team together from what we’ve seen in our practices. At the end of the day, I felt that was the best decision for our team and think it gives us the best opportunity with the skill sets that we have with the other players in there. I just felt that’s what’s best for the team. And doing it now, we’ve exhausted all trade opportunities and weren’t able to get anything there so I just felt we can now work on the team, the plan, and getting ready for the season.”

In connecting the dots, not only did it feel like the Jags didn’t view him as a scheme fit for new offensive coordinator Jay Gruden, but it also feels like they are looking to utilized a committee approach at running back. With Fournette wanting to be a volume back, this could’ve presented problems.

Fournette will join a running backs group in Tampa that consists of Ronald Jones II, LeSean McCoy, and Ke’Shawn Vaughn among notables. He’ll enter his career in Tampa with 2,631 rushing yards and 17 rushing touchdowns. As a pass-catcher, he’ll enter 2020 with just over 1,000 yards for two touchdowns.

Update: Per Ian Rapoport, Fournette’s deal is a one-year deal that could max out at $3.5 million.