Pro Bowl: Evans Out? Zuttah In?
December 10th, 2014
Mike Evans isn’t among the NFL’s very best wide receivers?
Prior to this past weekend’s slate of games, the Around the League folks at NFL.com penned a guide to Pro Bowl voting, specifically for offensive players. Not one Buccaneer even entered the discussion.
Editor Gregg Rosenthal didn’t think Evans was worthy of considering for the eight Pro Bowl slots allocated to wide receivers.
This is annually the toughest position to fill out on the Pro Bowl ballot. Injuries make it even trickier this year. My locks at the position include Demaryius Thomas, Antonio Brown, Emmanuel Sanders, Jordy Nelson and Dez Bryant. That leaves three spots for the following strong candidates: Jeremy Maclin, Calvin Johnson, A.J. Green, DeSean Jackson, T.Y. Hilton, Randall Cobb, Julio Jones, DeAndre Hopkins and Alshon Jeffery. That’s a loaded list.
Megatron and Green are out because they missed too much time. Maclin is close to a lock for his monster season coming off a torn ACL. My final two spots would go to Jones and Hilton, although it’s painful to leave Cobb off the list.
There are still three games to play, and Evans is tied for third in touchdown catches (10) among wide receivers. If he can keep up the end zone magic, that could get him in Pro Bowl with lots of votes from coaches and players.
Of note on the NFL.com guide, former Bucs center/guard Jeremy Zuttah was listed as a prime candidate for one of four Pro Bowl spots for centers. Zuttah is an anchor on the Ravens’ offensive line and he’s gotten all kinds of kudos in Baltimore. Their offense has been one of the most balanced in football, ranked 10th in total yards and seventh overall in points scored per game (27.4).
December 10th, 2014 at 10:07 am
Jeremy Zuttah, further proof of the incredibly awful talent evaluation skills of the Lovie and Licht era. Zuttah might be better than our whole line combined.
December 10th, 2014 at 10:09 am
Will someone plz explain to me the reason Lovie released Zuttah, Penn, n Joseph.
December 10th, 2014 at 10:15 am
Wish we could’ve picked up that Zuttah guy.
December 10th, 2014 at 10:16 am
I can kind of see the logic of NOT extending Penn and Joseph
BUT why Zuttah?
I never saw that logic.
Zuttah is a Center AND a Guard.
Both deficiencies on the BUCS OLine
Zuttah > Dietrich-Smith
December 10th, 2014 at 10:19 am
Tough to make the Pro Bowl when you are on a really, really crappy team.
December 10th, 2014 at 10:26 am
We didn’t release Zuttah he was traded that’s even worse
December 10th, 2014 at 10:30 am
hard to get in the pro bowl when you are on a losing team. look at lavonte david as an example. lavonte is one of the best in the NFL at his position. mike evans will make the pro bowl once the offensive line improves. they need to be able to set up the play action pass. they can’t do it at this time. the reason is because they can’t run the ball.
December 10th, 2014 at 10:32 am
I never loved Zuttah in Tampa, but he was pretty solid. Man, how I long for the days of having a solid player on our offensive line.
December 10th, 2014 at 10:37 am
So now it is becoming apparent that L&L traded Zuttah and cut loose Larsen, Penn and Joseph for what is the worst OL in the NFL. I am sure that the coaching staff that Tedford assembled (did Tedford hire the OL coach, TE coach, Wr coaches etc?) will probably all be fired but doesn’t L&L; at least Licht be held accountable for such a grotesque f-up? What has Licht done to deserve another year besides being Lovie’s lapdog????
December 10th, 2014 at 10:47 am
inevitably, a number of nominations will first go to players on teams that are having great success. it’s possible then that guys like jordy nelson and dez bryant opt out because they just played in the conference championship or are about to play in the superbowl, so evans is likely to get in as an alternate. it is a banner year for WRs at the moment, and Mike is behind the pack on catches and yards (he did come on more later in the season, unlike the other vets that are candidates), and the total lack of team success certainly hasn’t helped his case. the zuttah move continues to be a head scratcher, i think his biggest crime (he and tim wright) was where he chose to play college ball
December 10th, 2014 at 10:47 am
Worst thing about it McLovie or licht won’t admit their own mistakes. They just give us the talking points and expect us to be good little idiots. What a couple of jerks.
December 10th, 2014 at 10:54 am
Just imagine how good Evans would be with a great QB. Of course any Qb with an O-line like ours would suck.
December 10th, 2014 at 11:01 am
It is highly understandable if those who were made “former” Bucs by Lovie Smith, are truly grateful to have the opportunity to be on better teams Coached by such better coaches… And so they should be!
If only the Bucs could work out a way to trade for Jim Harbaugh to be their HC, they would at least have a glimmer of hope for next season!
December 10th, 2014 at 11:02 am
FIRE LOVIE AND THE REST OF THE COACHES AND LETS DON’T FORGET LICHT TOO. IF THIS TEAM IS ANYTHING LIKE LOVIE PUT ON THE FIELD THIS YEAR EXPECT THE WORSE FOR NEXT, FIRE , FIRE , FIRE…….
December 10th, 2014 at 11:15 am
Zuttah, Penn and Joseph. All better players than the hand picked players Lovie signed. Lovie will probably be back next year but the Glazers need to hold him accountable for the O-line disaster. The only way to do that is take away his ability to be judge and jury over the roster.
December 10th, 2014 at 11:20 am
a Penn-Larsen-Zuttah-Joseph-Dotson combination couldn’t possibly be worse than the current lineup…how they expected to put together a functional OL with 4 new starters and 2 gaping holes at guard before traiining camp, was scary at the beginning and even the most clueless football fan could look at it on paper and question how this was going to work.
December 10th, 2014 at 11:35 am
yea fire lovie and bring back an 11-21 coach who never beat a rookie quarterback in schiano right? guys are retarded. this team sucks and despite popular opinion it was never that good anyway. how many close games did the bucs win and lose? quite a few meaning this team didn’t have the balls and mentality to finish out games long before lovie got here. idiots you don’t fire a coach a winning head coach after one season, if you do that WHAT CREDIBLE COACH WILL WANT TO COME HERE AFTER DOING THAT?
December 10th, 2014 at 11:38 am
Something tells me there is more to the story. Is it possible Zuttah told L 7 L he did not want to be here? Was he or was he becoming a cancer in the lockerroom?
December 10th, 2014 at 12:10 pm
I believe Lovie wanted EDS all along. The Bucs didn’t want to pay Zuttah $5M either.
December 10th, 2014 at 12:12 pm
@ bucs4lyfe
Well than paint me an idiot then because it seems a whole lot better to drop a bunch of close games from being a competitive team than it does to get your ass handed to you before the second quarter is over because you aren’t playing like an NFL caliber team. 2-11 without much drama (other than Tedford)…I’d say it’s pretty obvious Schiano was better than Smith as a Buccaneers HC so far.
December 10th, 2014 at 12:34 pm
The Bucs aren’t even discussed anymore. We just get mentioned in the listing of the bottom-tier teams while they discuss the TitMs and Raiders. Under the Glazer boys, we’ve become completely irrelevant.
December 10th, 2014 at 12:35 pm
*Titans
December 10th, 2014 at 1:55 pm
Happy for Zuttah, and annoyed at the stupidity of L&L. Thats why my JBF fan poll stays at “Little Confidence.” It’is becoming more, and more, apparent that Lovie watched little film of last years Bucs.
December 10th, 2014 at 1:57 pm
Jim Harbaugh is’nt coming to the Bucs, ever.
December 10th, 2014 at 5:17 pm
That’s what happens when you play for the Succaneers!
December 10th, 2014 at 11:28 pm
Lets examine this trade. Zuttah was picked in the 3rd round and we traded him for a 5th round pick this coming year. And this is after determining that he can play both guard and center competently. I think he also filled in at left tackle once for Donald Penn. He only made about 4 million a year not the 9 mill Penn and Joseph were each going to get. It is no wonder we suck when we give away decent players for lesser picks than they are worth. Even I can see that and I’m just a computer geek not an NFL professional coach or GM. Never understood that trade and never will.
December 10th, 2014 at 11:48 pm
Sadly we need young talent, and this trade had to happen. The rock star screwed us for many years of his crap drafting. I don’t fault them for trading him, unless our draft doesn’t pan out. There are some decent building blocks on this team but they cannot strikeout in the 2015 draft. It just goes to show what happens when you draft a qb that doesnt work out, I mean look at the jets, it’s the same thing. Get Mariota or Winston IDC we just need a franchise qb.
December 11th, 2014 at 6:38 am
This team’s history of trading players who then go on to greatness is almost 40 years deep.
Closing the loop on one example, drafting Mariota might be the best chance they have of avenging the Steve Young trade.