When the Buccaneers took running back Jeremy McNichols in the fifth round of this year’s draft, there was some talk about how he’d fit into the effort to cover for Doug Martin’s suspension to open the year.
With less than a week to go before rosters drop to 53 players, the question appears to have shifted to whether McNichols will make the team. Viewers of Hard Knocks will remember McNichols catching heat for missed assignments and he only played two offensive snaps against the Browns over the weekend.
McNichols lost a yard on one carry and missed a block in pass protection on the other, leaving coach Dirk Koetter to say that the rookie’s got a lot to show them against the Redskins on Thursday.
“He’s doing fine on special teams. He’s just making too many mistakes on offense and he had a protection error that led to a sack so I took him out at that point,” Koetter said, via the Tampa Bay Times. “That was my decision. He’s going to play a lot on Thursday night and he’s going to get one final chance to show what he can do.”
Martin will miss the first three games of the year and it seems likely that Jacquizz Rodgers, Charles Sims and Peyton Barber will be on the initial 53-man roster. McNichols will have to be a lot better against Washington if he’s going to be the fourth man in the backfield come September.