The Tampa Bay Buccaneers can’t release Aqib Talib until the lockout ends. But one report suggests that the lockout is the only thing keeping the team from cutting Talib, and he’s already played his last game for the Bucs.
The St. Petersburg Times reports that Talib is “all but gone,” and that only the lockout has kept the Bucs from cutting him already. Talib, in the view of the Bucs, has run out of chances.
Talib, Tampa Bay’s 2008 first-round draft pick, has been trouble from the beginning, starting with a fight at the rookie symposium and continuing with punching a teammate in practice and punching a cab driver in St. Petersburg. Now he’s facing charges of aggravated assault with a deadly weapon.
Although there’s a school of thought that the Bucs should keep Talib and get him some help, it appears that the Bucs think Talib is beyond the point where they can help him, and Talib is on the way out.