“A Little Spark On Our D-Line”
September 25th, 2011
There was talk before today’s flushing of the Falcons about how the Bucs’ defensive line would have a solid pass rush if only they could force third-and-long situations.
Those were absent against Detroit, plus Matthew Stafford was taking short drops and releasing the ball quickly. Then in Minnesota, the Bucs got gashed against the run, and fell behind quickly.
So in many respects, today, with a pocket passer in Matt Ryan, was the first good look at the Bucs’ pass rush.
And it showed up.
Gerald McCoy and Brian Price definitely disrupted up the gut, and Adrian Clayborn and Dakoda Watson had sacks off the edge. Regardless, there was a reasonably consistent rush, which seemed to be absent for years.
After the game, Joe asked Aqib Talib whether he could feel the pass rush as he chased Julio Jones.
“Definitely. We’re on that line playing man, man. A lot of times, by the time Julio got out of his route, Matt Ryan was already retreating, throwing the ball away, or on his back or whatever,” Talib said. “We definitely felt like there was a little spark on our d-line today.”
With the crowd roaring at raucous levels on 2nd-and-long and 3rd-and-long today, and the Bucs pinning their ears back, Joe really felt a flashback to the glory days, especially under the lights.
Joe’s not about to compare the teams, but the feeling was there.
September 25th, 2011 at 10:40 pm
Really good stuff Joe. The crowd was really loud today. Really loud. Great game.
September 25th, 2011 at 10:59 pm
Joe what was the attendance? Many empty seats?
September 25th, 2011 at 11:45 pm
Very few empty seats. Great crowd- really loud.
Talib on Jones? As was discussed on the thread- Barber played jones the vast majority of the time. And Biggers had White . It was strange, but Talib wasn’t playing either Of those guys, and came of the field on many two WR sets.
September 26th, 2011 at 1:12 am
Tampa—>Baaaaaaayyyy:
From where Joe was sitting, looked 80-85 percent full in the lower deck.
September 26th, 2011 at 1:13 am
Thanks Dew!
September 26th, 2011 at 1:55 am
Talib pretty much dominated. He allowed 3 catches for under 35 yards.
Biggers on the other hand allowed 150+ yards. It is getting ridiculous at this point.
Our DL and LB core played great. It made up for Bigger’s mistakes.
September 26th, 2011 at 1:57 am
@Capt Tim Talib played whoever wasn’t catching the ball. Barber played almost all of the second half at nickel. Biggers and Talib swapped sides a lot. It worked in favor of our pass rush, but not in favor of Biggers.
Ryan was targeting Biggers like a mofo.
September 26th, 2011 at 2:13 am
Mauha Deeb- Biggers was on Roddy White the entire game. Normally that’s Talib’s job. I wonder if he’s got a minor injury or something. Talib is or top corner- he normally plays the number one WR. It didn’t happen today. Why?
September 26th, 2011 at 2:24 am
talib was on the rook. tampabay.com bucs beat did a story on how aquib was on the rookie to try and confuse ryan. did pretty well till that one play on a scramble
September 26th, 2011 at 2:29 am
@Capt Tim Biggers was lined up against Jones many times. Jones’ largest plays were against Biggers. As were White’s. Biggers simply played a bad game but he was not game planned on White the whole game.
Talib was out there but was rarely targeted so you didn’t see him. When Biggers was on the field, Barber was in the slot. When Barber was in the Slot, Biggers and Talib were swapping sides. We played a ton of Nickel, which is also why we saw fairly little of Watson.
I’m sure this was Raheem’s way of trying to keep Biggers out of trouble, but it did not work.
September 26th, 2011 at 2:31 am
I’ll wait till tomorrow to watch a second time for a stat count of who played who when, how many times, and in what packages.
September 26th, 2011 at 6:14 am
So…did Myron Lewis play at all yesterday? I heard he was active.
September 26th, 2011 at 7:56 am
Listened to gene deckerhoff on the radio, but I couldn’t get a feel for how Foster played. I know this was a concern before the game; how did he look?
September 26th, 2011 at 7:57 am
The Stadium sounded like it was rocking! Maybe a sign of good things to come.
September 26th, 2011 at 8:44 am
@Bucnjim – Foster looked really good man. They had a close-up of his face on a 3rd in long, you could see it in his eyes that Raheem was talking to him, then he barked out some orders and went right into the play. It was all very smooth for a guy in his 3rd game. His coverage was excellent as I remember, and per usual his play on the line was dominant.
September 26th, 2011 at 8:46 am
3rd Level was still only 30% full, and the corners were maybe 50% in the lower sections, but the club seats and lower sideline were pretty close to 100% full. Definitely signs of improvement, but my eyes yesterday tell me these rumors of a sellout this next Monday are something I will just have to believe when I see it.
But the stadium WAS ROCKING. Felt my ear-drums pop twice in the 4th quarter. There was an epic-group-fail on getting a wave established, but maybe next time whatever idiot was trying to start it will wait till we are on Defense instead of offense.
Also, I can’t wait until Thomas starts kvetching about McCoy having no tackles or sacks officially, but the dude literally lived in Matt Ryan’s face all game. Very impressed by the whole D-line!!!
September 26th, 2011 at 8:58 am
Just saw the highlight of the Clayborne & Foster sacks; very impressive I have to say. Glad the crowd was loud and proud at the stadium.
September 26th, 2011 at 9:20 am
Loved the way the D played yesterday, Forster’s all around play yesterday should make everyone forget Ruud, he did get turned around on the Gonzo TD, but that seemed to be his only real mistake, next time he makes that play, he looked to have a full grasp of the defense, I’m sure Rah cut down the D playbook a little. Watson needs to start over Black, he is a much more complete LBr at this point, Hayward looked okay stepping in for Hayes when he got dinged. Price is a beast, McCoy finally figured it out, Clayborn was unleashed and amazing, the D line as a whole played real well, 30 rushing yards net for a team that needs to run to throw, thats how we beat the Dixie Chickens.
September 26th, 2011 at 10:11 am
Joe,
That pic was from a middle screen where Mccoy was freelyt released per design by the O-Line. The pass was complete but the backer made a great play on the RB. You can’t consider it disruption if the design of the play was a free release of the tackle to complete a screen behind him.
I know that there is a narrative to try to redefine what constitutes productivity for McCoy, but Price doesn’t need a new definition – he produces and shows up frequently despite playing injured.
I thought that Clayborn looked very active yesterday as well.
By the way, What was McCoy’s stat line yesterday? 0-0-0-0.
Price was very active and actually productive. I think that Price is ready.
September 26th, 2011 at 10:46 am
@thomas
Spend the 40 bucks on Game Rewind on NFL.com and JUST watch McCoy. He’s usually the 1st guy off at the snap, the 1st guy getting penetration and the 1st guy making the QB shuffle his feet. Case in point, look at the Clayborn sack from yesterday:
http://www.nfl.com/videos/tampa-bay-buccaneers/09000d5d82291564/Buccaneers-defense-sack-11-yd-loss
GMC gets penetration after two steps, Ryan has to sidestep him and then BOOM Clayborn saws him in freaking half!
To your point, however, McCoy doesn’t seem to know how to finish after his great initial move. He wins initially but either doesn’t get rid of the blocker or anchor down against the guy and make the play through the blocker.
He’s got the hard part down. The sacks will come!
September 26th, 2011 at 11:10 am
It is common for the DT to force the QB out so the DE gets a sack or pressure. Even if McCoy ends the year with 20 sacks Thomas will have some excuse as to why. he just cannot admit that McCoy is a good player and will be for years to come. He will also get better with time. Even Sapp took time to develope, but Thomas will not admit to that either. Simply put, he is a tool, not a Bucs fan. BTW, what happened to Eric the lawyer? At least his negative attitude was laced with humor.
September 26th, 2011 at 11:57 am
Guys,
Thomas doesn’t understand football, there is no point. Mccoy was very disruptive and looks very good, he does need to learn to wrap up , but that said him filling the gaps and forcing the RB to bounch or look for a new hole directly lead to no gain and tfl by our LB’s on more than one occasion. He also forced some bad throw’s with his hands up in Ryan face, and yeah got a soft penalty on one of those instances.
McCoy will start getting sacks once oline’s start scheming our ends and Price. Until then let Tommy (and Ron and Ian) hate…and our defense will keep improving.
September 26th, 2011 at 2:03 pm
Saying McCoy is not producing is not hate it is fact. Being first off the ball doesnt mean a thing if you cant do anything afterward.
My opinion is that Price and Clayborn played very well, McCoy was a non-factor. How is that hate? You sheep (because the team brainwashes you) pick and choose who it is okay to criticize. McCoy is a chose one, Price isn’t so you ignore the compliments to Price and focus on the obvious criticisms being levied against McCoy.
I saw that McCoy applied some pressure on Clayborn’s sack – it wouldn’t have matter if Clayborn didn’t win his one-on-one but that was one solid McCoy play.
Other than that, McCoy had a stupid 15 yard penalty and 0-0-0 stat line. He has nearly as many penalties as tackles, and three more penalties than sacks. Nobody can say that he has been productive, has he showed up in the run game – a little, the passing game – virtually not at all.
He plays like a middle round draft pick, not a 3 overall with a 50 million dollar contract.
September 26th, 2011 at 5:13 pm
And I am sure you said the same thing about Sapp. We do not ignore Price, and he is also a chosen one. You just cannot help beating a dead horse. We know what you are going to say. Last time I checked football was a team sport. Maybe you should start watching tennis or something. Maybe if you simply posted a nice post about Clayborn and Price instead of your Jack Ass rants about McCoy and sheep people would take you more seriously. Is that too much to ask? Being positive about the team and the players does not make people sheep, and you look like an ass for stating over and over whenever someone calls you out on your BS. How about saying that the DC called a good game, or will you focus on passing stats, and not the run d or the score.
September 26th, 2011 at 8:28 pm
It is so amazing to me that Thomas doesn’t comment once when we win, except to trash McCoy. But no, he’s not a hater or a troll. I’m sure if we lost, he would have the same amount of posts. Anybody here believe that? Thomas, you are a piece of trash who knows nothing. Hell, watch the damn highlights on NFL Network and you will see 2 running plays that McCoy absolutely blew up. But because he funneled it to someone else and he doesn’t get a tackle, he sucks right? Your hatred for him is borderline sick, as if he slept with your woman (that is, if you actually ever had a woman). How many yards did Atlanta run for again? You think McCoy had nothing to do with that? You are nothing more than a joke. Nobody takes you serious, and nearly everyone would be happy if you never posted again. Funny how all the analysts say how well he played (just heard Mayock on NFL Network say him and Price dominated), but the great Thomas with his infinite wisdom says otherwise. Let me think about who I should believe….. I’m going to go with someone who actually knows something, versus someone who has a personal vendetta against one particular player. I just hope we keep winning so I don’t have to read any more of your ridiculous posts, because we all know you were the saddest guy in Tampa yesterday.
September 27th, 2011 at 1:42 am
“I can’t wait until Thomas starts kvetching about McCoy having no tackles or sacks officially”
On the Coach Raheem show, Mon evening on 620, I heard Rah say that McKoy was awarded 1/2 of the sack that Clayborne got. Also stated that he’s happy with McKoy’s play. McKoy isn’t anywhere near a ‘superstar’ yet, but seems to be doing OK for a second year player. Can’t wait to see what happens as this Defense developes.