Skip navigation
Favorites
Sign up to follow your favorites on all your devices.
Sign up

Bruce Arians: Devin White is everything we want as a person and player

NFL Draft

NASHVILLE, TENNESSEE - APRIL 25: Devin White of LSU reacts after being chosen #5 overall by the Tampa Bay Buccaneers during the first round of the 2019 NFL Draft on April 25, 2019 in Nashville, Tennessee. (Photo by Andy Lyons/Getty Images)

Getty Images

Buccaneers coach Bruce Arians new long before the draft that LSU linebacker Devin White was the player he wanted with the fifth overall pick.

Arians said today that White is a perfect fit for what they want to do on defense, and anyone who thinks a middle linebacker isn’t a big need doesn’t understand everything White can do from the position.

“The tape speaks for itself,” Arians said of White. “People say we need a pass rusher? He’s pretty good at that. And we do like to blitz up the middle, and quarterbacks don’t like pressure up the middle. He fits everything we want as a human being and a football player. I couldn’t be more excited. I probably said six weeks ago, ‘This is our guy.’”

The Bucs got their guy, at a position that has been devalued in some corners of the NFL, but not, apparently, in Tampa.