Bucs Got Lucky
July 6th, 2015
In studying last year’s games, the Washington Post suggests the only reason the Bucs beat the Redskins was Robert Griffin III’s incompetence.
Yes, the Bucs were a nutkick of a 2-14 team last year. The only people remotely happy about that were liquor store owners — for all the Bucs fans trying to purge the season from their memory banks with mass quantities of alcohol.
In retrospect, it was damned near a winless season, as nauseating as that is to comprehend. Yes, it was close.
Half the wins came from a thrilling come-from-behind victory engineered by quarterback of the past and quarterback of the future and maybe quarterback of the present, Mike Glennon. He perfectly executed a two-minute drill to beat the playoff-bound Steelers on the road in Pittsburgh, the first time the Bucs won a game in the Steel City.
The other came against the sorry Redskins, also on the road. It shouldn’t have been, writes Mark Bullock of the Washington Post. Joe’s previously referenced the deep Xs and Os look that the paper of record in our nation’s capital is doing breaking down each Redskins game to see what went right, and what went wrong. There was quite a bit that went wrong for the Redskins last year.
Per Bullock, the Redskins easily could have beaten the Bucs if they only had a competent quarterback, rather than brittle Robert Griffin III.
It’s hard to look past Griffin as the result of the failures of this game. We already saw how Gruden managed to get receivers open, only for Griffin to miss them. Griffin never looked comfortable in the pocket or confident with his ability to make throws. …
With plays like these, its difficult to put blame on Gruden. He clearly, at least in my eyes, did what he could to make Griffin more comfortable and give him easy reads and throws. But Griffin just failed to execute. Coming off a bye week and playing Tampa Bay at home, Griffin and the Redskins should have had perhaps their best offensive performance of the season. But instead, Griffin had his worst.
Using screengrabs from Game Rewind’s All-22, Bullock highlights play after play that the Redskins had receivers running free like eagles sailing over an Appalachian mountain range. And RGIII, for reasons unknown, failed to deliver the ball.
So take away one exciting late-game drive, and one incompetent quarterback, and the Bucs would have matched Lovie Smith’s buddy, Rod Marinelli, as being the only teams in NFL history to go 0-16.
Yes, last year was puke-inducing. It damn near was so much worse.
July 6th, 2015 at 10:18 am
There never was any competition for the number one pick it seems. I’m not even sure the Bucs tanked any games on their way to winning the Winston derby. They were just that bad. Griffin’s biorhythm’s must have been out of whack in that Bucs win.
July 6th, 2015 at 10:32 am
this guy is ridicolous their is a whole bunch of what if’s in football, for example if evans woulve gotten up against the rams the bucs woudlve won, if asj woulve never fumble the ball against the vikings the bucs wouldve won, if theyy never call that pass interference on verner against the saints the bucs wouldve won, if the bucs never had 12 men on the field against the bengals the bucs wouldve won, and if the bucs didnt tank the last game against the saints the bucs wouldve won. this guy is a moron for making excuses for rg3 the redskins were terrible last year, this dumb writer should just accept it instead of making his own theories.
July 6th, 2015 at 10:52 am
And if my aunt had balls she’d be my uncle!
July 6th, 2015 at 10:53 am
Mike Evans ate medium rare filet mignon in that game. Nobody for the Skins came close. Keep crying in your beer, Mark Bullock. You’re stuck with RGIII for the foreseeable future.
July 6th, 2015 at 10:54 am
Seriously… Every team in the NFL could have been 16-0 if they only…… Stupid stupid.
July 6th, 2015 at 10:55 am
0-16 would’ve been horrible.
Can’t play the what if game. It’ll just drive you nuts. What if the Bucs hired Bruce Arians instead of Schiano? What if they drafted Aaron Rodgers like Gruden said to Rodgers the night before the draft?
Games in the NFL are so close and you can’t get excited by close losses or what ifs. Good teams win the close ones and beat bad teams. Both Washington and the Bucs were bad.
July 6th, 2015 at 10:59 am
Joe’s first paragraph is the complete post. The rest is superfluous. But, words and clicks pay bills so life is good unless you want molder away under last year’s BUCS gravestone.
July 6th, 2015 at 11:12 am
Ander made my brain hurt… yet with some translation it makes perfect sense.
July 6th, 2015 at 11:23 am
The reason the Bucs won this game was McCown was not McClown. He was 23-15 for 288 YDS, 2 RD and 0 INT. QB rating of 137.5, It just goes to show everyone what this team is capable of when the QB plays well.
July 6th, 2015 at 11:54 am
We beat the spit outta RG that game! He was a rag doll! He was our b!tch! Thats how bad we made him look! Our d line bailed out our secondary for once and our linebackers played with speed and technique! Thats what many thought our defense wiuld play like that all year, it just took some time.
And guess what, if RG is their starter come week seven, he’s going to get it even harder! And you know their secondary is traumatized by Mike Evans! They’re on his highlights! Hopefully him and Jameis are on the same page by week 7.
Redskin fans will be in shock after we beat up the ‘Skins again!
July 6th, 2015 at 12:11 pm
The Buc beat a team whose OC is Jon Gruden’s brother. And we did it without a OC. What does that say.
July 6th, 2015 at 1:07 pm
I disagree with the notion that this is “luck.” The Bucs had 1/2 a quarterback. The Skins had NO quarterback. That’s just being a better team and it’s what football is all about. This is just proof that a broken McCown is right twice a day.
July 6th, 2015 at 2:12 pm
so what!!!! I can see we gave away 10+ games because of our quarterbacks incompetence. they got beat because they got beat bad and the defense let us score 27 points
July 6th, 2015 at 3:00 pm
We get it the Bucs were terrible last year, but even though we were the worst in the NFL there is not a lot of difference between the worst and the best in the NFL. It’s one of the reasons the NFL is so much fun. You can turn it around quickly.
With Jameis at QB I am confident we will see significant improvement for 2015.
July 6th, 2015 at 8:10 pm
If I were a Skins fan and I bought an RGIII jersey like 1000’s upon 1000’s did. I would never buy another jersey again.
July 7th, 2015 at 9:57 am
How true RO. And IF Joe’s favorite CB Johnathon Banks had intercepted that easy pass against the Vikings and hadn’t commited that stupid penalty against the Saints we would have won those games as well.
this is such a stupid story.