The Tampa Bay Buccaneers are headed toward a thrilling finish in the 2024 regular season. With just 2 games left and their playoff lives still very much at stake, every snap is going to matter for the Buccaneers.
No player on the team will have more incentive — literally — to perform at a high level than Tampa Bay’s very best player in quarterback Baker Mayfield, who ESPN’s Ben Baby reported has a whopping $5 million in contract bonuses still on the line.
“A wild-card win nets Mayfield $500,000, and each successful round carries a higher bonus value that maxes out at $2.5 million for a Super Bowl victory,” Baby wrote on December 25. “But the team-based goals aren’t the only ones that could pay off for Mayfield. He can also earn $500,000 if he’s in the top 10 in the league or top five in the NFC in any of the following categories: passer rating, touchdown passes, passing yards, completion percentage or yards per pass. As of now, he qualifies in the top 10 in the league in each category; if he can stay there, he will rake in $2.5 million in incentives.”
The Buccaneers are 8-7 and play their 2 remaining games at home, against the Carolina Panthers in Week 17 and against the New Orleans Saints in Week 18. The Buccaneers don’t have a scenario in which they can clinch a playoff spot in Week 17, but the probability of them making the playoffs drops to 16 percent with a loss and goes up to 64 percent with a win.
Tampa Bay is currently in ninth place in the NFC playoff standings and are coming off a 26-24 loss to the Dallas Cowboys in Week 16.
Mayfield Delivered Big On ‘Prove It’ Contract
Mayfield’s NFL career has gone from dead in the water in 2022 to a great comeback in 2023 and one of the NFL’s elite quarterbacks in 2024 — and in the process may have changed how NFL teams look at quarterbacks.
Mayfield experienced the highest of highs as the No. 1 overall pick in the 2018 NFL draft by the Cleveland Browns to the lowest of lows, when he was traded to the lowly Carolina Panthers in order to be replaced by Deshaun Watson in Cleveland before eventually being released by the Panthers and playing well in a short stint with the Los Angeles Rams.
When the Buccaneers signed Mayfield to a 1-year, $4 million “prove it” contract in March 2023, it was a sign of desperate times for both parties.
The Buccaneers were left looking for a proven starter after Tom Brady retired for the second time in as many years and lacking faith in backup Kyle Trask, a 2nd-round pick in the 2021 NFL draft.
Mayfield shocked the football world in 2023 with career highs of 4,044 passing yards and 28 touchdowns while rallying the Buccaneers to a third consecutive NFC South Division title. In the process, he made his first Pro Bowl.
Mayfield Becomes Top 10 NFL Quarterback
Now, it’s worth debating if Mayfield is a legitimate Top 10 NFL quarterback and, if so, whether his 3-year, $100 million contract signed with the Buccaneers in March 2024 could end up representing one of the great bargains in recent NFL history.
Mayfield is having the best year of his career in 2024 and is sixth in the NFL with 3,920 passing yards, 34 touchdowns and 15 interceptions with 2 games left — he’s also completing 70.9 percent of his passes and has rushed for career highs of 308 yards and 3 touchdowns.
Out of the Top 10 highest paid quarterbacks in the NFL in 2024 — with an average salary of $55.5 million per season — only Cincinnati’s Joe Burrow, Detroit’s Jared Goff and Baltimore’s Lamar Jackson are in the Top 10 in the NFL in passing.
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Buccaneers QB Baker Mayfield Still Has $5 Million in Bonus Money at Stake