Simeon Rice, 43, is serious about coming back and playing for Tampa Bay

The Tampa Bay Buccaneers need to bring back Simeon Rice, just for the entertainment.

Rice was one of the NFL’s best pass rushers and one of its biggest personalities when he played from 1996-2007. He’s still one of the best personalities. And he thinks he can still rush the quarterback too.

With the Tampa Bay Buccaneers in desperate need of a pass rusher, former Bucs great Rice tweeted that he could still play. He wasn’t joking, and if you’ve ever met Rice, that’s no surprise. He has never lacked confidence. Rice, who is 43, tweeted that he wanted to come back to play for the Buccaneers and confirmed to ESPN’s Jenna Laine that he was serious.

“If they want a pass rusher, they should bring in a pass rusher extraordinaire who was one of the dominant pass rushers of any era,” Rice told Laine. “What is it going to cost? You don’t have one.”

Rice also tweeted at Laine that “I can get them to the playoffs.” The Buccaneers are dead last in the NFL with seven sacks. No other team has fewer than 10. Tampa Bay has suffered a lot of defensive line injuries. On Wednesday they put end Noah Spence on injured reserve.

So there’s a need. Rice has 122 career sacks and wants to play. It seems like Rice wouldn’t have much to offer, since he looked finished his last NFL season with the Denver Broncos and Indianapolis Colts, and that was 10 years ago. It’s never going to happen. But it sure would be entertaining if the Bucs took him up on his offer.

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Frank Schwab is the editor of Shutdown Corner on Yahoo Sports. Have a tip? Email him at shutdown.corner@yahoo.com or follow him on Twitter!
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