Only 15 players in NFL history have been drafted out of Georgia Southern, and Kindle Vildor is one of the most recent.

The Atlanta, Georgia, native was selected in the fifth round by the Chicago Bears in 2020. (His GSU Eagles teammate, kicker Tyler Bass, also was part of the 2020 draft, taken in the sixth round by the Buffalo Bills.)

Vildor was one of the best players in Georgia Southern history, having been a second-team All-American in 2018, and then the fourth-highest drafted player to ever come out of the Eagles program.

In Vildor's first five NFL seasons, he played for four teams, counting his brief practice squad stint with the Philadelphia Eagles in 2023 (Vildor also played for the Bears, Tennessee Titans and Detroit Lions.)

Last March, the Tampa Bay Buccaneers signed Vildor to a one-year, $1.3 million deal.

Bucs Roundtable will take a look at where each of the Buccaneers' 2025 free-agent signings stands going into this year's cycle. Our series has featured offensive lineman Charlie Heck and linebacker Haason Reddick.

Here, we check in with 28-year-old journeyman Kindle Vildor.

The Bucs signed Vildor in an effort to add to their secondary depth and to bolster their special teams unit. He played in 12 games, seven on defense. Vildor finished with 16 total tackles, three passes defended and an interception, with the pick coming in a 30-19 Week 6 win over the San Francisco 49ers on Oct. 12. In addition to the interception against the Niners, Vildor had three tackles and two passes defended.

The low point of Vildor's season took place during Tampa's collapse against the Atlanta Falcons on Thursday Night Football on Dec. 11 at Raymond James Stadium.

Late in the game, with the Bucs clinging to a two-point lead, all Tampa needed was to stop the Falcons on fourth-and-14 and the game would have been over.

Covering the boundary, Vildor was trying to split the leverage between running back Bijan Robinson, who was running a swing route, and receiver David Sills, who was going vertical. Vildor's decision to try to split rather than just leaving Robinson alone led to a 21-yard completion to Sills, which eventually led to a game-winning field goal.

"(The) fourth-and-long, it was a big blunder," Bucs coach Todd Bowles told reporters after the game. "That was inexcusable. Inexcusable."

Bowles was then asked to clarify if he wanted Vildor to pay attention to the sticks and not Robinson.

"That’s his job," Bowles said. 

Whether that "blunder" was a reason or not, Vildor went from playing 45 defensive snaps against the Falcons, according to Pro Football Focus' count, to not playing any the next week against the Carolina Panthers and only playing a combined six in the remaining two games.

His one-year deal from last year now expired, Vildor is again an unrestricted free agent. As of now, there's nothing that indicates whether the Bucs will re-sign him or release him, but it wouldn't be a surprise for the Bucs to look to upgrade their secondary depth in a different way.

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Click here for more from our "Whatever Happened" series about the Buccaneers' Class of 2025 draft picks.  

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