Per NFL Network’s Mike Garafolo, Barton’s deal is fully guaranteed. The rookie center has big shoes to fill, as he’ll officially be tasked with replacing the now-departed Ryan Jensen, who retired after last season due to a knee injury he suffered in July 2022. Barton earned a PFF blocking grade of 75.9 last season while allowing two sacks and 11 pressures.

Barton (6’5/313) was considered the 14th-best high school guard in the nation when he enrolled at Duke in August 2020. A former lacrosse player, Barton was awarded Duke’s Falcone Award for his commitment to strength and conditioning as a freshman when he played 430 snaps at C when their starter went down. He slid over to his permanent LT role in 2021, but struggled in pass protection allowing six sacks, 20 pressures and a 3.5% blown block rate in 747 snaps. 2022 is when it all came together for Barton, improving to 98.7% block efficiency with just two sacks and eight hurries to go with a sensational 88.2 PFF overall grade that ranked fourth among all FBS tackles that year. In fact he was one of only two tackles nationally that earned 85th percentile grades in both run blocking and pass protection that season, which codified his excellence in both phases of the game. Last year a nagging lower body injury cost Barton four games and compromised him in multiple others, especially against UNC when he allowed four of his 11 total pressures on the year. The first-team All-ACC LT still managed to blow just 1.2% of his blocks and graded out at a 79th percentile level despite being hobbled. He didn’t test at the Combine, but Barton’s 32.875” length arms are amongst the shortest in the class and will likely relegate him to a guard/center role in the NFL, but since he played tackle for the last three years in college he’s grouped with the OTs in the ranks. Tampa in 2023 had the league’s tenth best pass blocking unit, per PFF grades, and the third worst run blocking unit.