Lovie Defends Mike Evans
November 17th, 2015
Still targeted repeatedly.
Joe has noticed some fans squirming in their seats wondering why America’s Quarterback, Bucs signal-caller Jameis Winston, has targeted receiver Mike Evans so much.
As Joe has explained, when your next three available receivers are a special teams cat and two undrafted rookies, you’d throw a lot to Mike Evans, too.
Problem is, Evans has struggled this year, partially because of a slow start with a bum hamstring. Evans has put up some really good numbers the last two weeks, though they mask garish drops, seven the past two games.
To hearLovie Smith after the win over the Cowboys, don’t expect the Bucs offense or Jameis to scale back targeting Evans.
“Mike Evans is not a good player, Mike Evans is a great player,” Lovie said. “From time to time even a great player may not have a great day, but [Evans] came back, worked hard on correcting some things last week and he was a force [Sunday].
“It’s not hard to figure out we are going to throw him a lot of balls, but it’s a tough match-up even if you know we are throwing to him. It’s a tough match-up for a [defensive back] to have to guard a big guy like that and he came through for us today.”
No, Joe doesn’t expect Evans to be targeted less. Certainly not until Vincent Jackson returns from injury.
So the Bucs are going to have to ride the Evans roller coaster. You will get spectacular plays that stretch the field, and mind-numbing drops that will have Bucs fans pulling their hair out.
After all, it is hard not to want to throw the ball to a guy averaging 16.6 yards a catch.
November 17th, 2015 at 12:08 pm
Evans is a complete stud and we are lucky to have him and he will get better, i mean even louis murphy is not around so he has no one to throw to, i agree with st pete bucs fan and do not understand meyers not involved maybe he has lost a step, i alos thought grate seemed pretty good, but keep chucking it to evans just some more in the red zone on fades…..only complaint on evans is to stop WHINING
November 17th, 2015 at 12:15 pm
It would be nice if the Bucs could pluck some speed off someone else’s practice squad.
November 17th, 2015 at 12:15 pm
Evans catches are more than enough to make up for his drops. Winston, Evans and Martin are the Bucs yardage hogs.
November 17th, 2015 at 12:16 pm
Evans will catch the ball when the defender goes up with him.. If Evan see the defender coming to him and he is going to take a shot he will drop it… What the tape. He will look at the defender and not the ball.
November 17th, 2015 at 12:27 pm
Obviously Mike Evans is the best receiver we have. He should be taken that high in the first round and he is!
But I still don’t understand targeting quite so much. You always want to get the ball to your best athlete and that is Mike but we really do have some options here.
As Dusty pointed out what’s up with Myers. That 17 yard grab he made kept the critical drive going. And what about Sims? Why do we not use him like the old Baltimore Colts Lennie Moore. Lennie played before most of you were born, I remember watching him on TV as a grade schooler. He was soooo exciting and very effective.
Moore was both a great runner and receiver. He lined up both in the backfield as a halfback and split wide as a flanker, and was equally dangerous at both positions in the offense engineered by quarterback Johnny Unitas.
I think we substitute Sims for the name Moore and JWinston for Unitas and let’s see what we have. Sims reminds me sooo much of Moore…Reggie Bush is the next closest to Moore.
November 17th, 2015 at 12:29 pm
We don’t end up with an interception when Evans is near the ball…..he is an absolute beast….Perhaps we can line him up at Safety also…..he seems to be in pretty good shape running all over the field.
We are very lucky to have him……I think he is performing better than any of our first round picks over the last 10 years…..
November 17th, 2015 at 12:29 pm
Not counting Jameis, of course….
November 17th, 2015 at 1:09 pm
270 yards receiving in last two games.
Please don’t throw to him any less.
November 17th, 2015 at 1:31 pm
Mike Evans and Vincent Jackson have very similar traits… They will both make some amazing circus catches then drop a wide open pass that hits them in the chest on 3rd and 8… It drives me nuts but all you can do is continue throwing him the ball and hope he can shake it off…
November 17th, 2015 at 2:20 pm
his drops have been bothering me since the Houston game but I guess it is what it is…we’ll have to wait until the offseason for him to fix that…but like joe said, who else is he going to throw to? if asj can realize that its the nfl and players haven’t been 100% since week1, then maybe winston will have one more weapon…until then air it out to evans!!!!GO BUCS!!!
November 17th, 2015 at 2:43 pm
Newbucsfan Says:
November 17th, 2015 at 12:15 pm
It would be nice if the Bucs could pluck some speed off someone else’s practice squad.
—————————————————————————-
speed would be nice but I say power and familiarity. Go get Nick O’Leary who is languishing on the Bills’ practice squad. I’m sure he’d be glad to get back to warmer weather and despite what the pros say about his size and hand size, O’Leary catches well and is a beast at the run. Watch some FSU film of O’Leary. Bare hands and plows people out of his way.
I’d love to see Jameis paired up again with one of his favorite FSU targets (before their NFL days are numbered) and right now O’Leary and Wilder, Jr. are the easiest pick ups.
November 17th, 2015 at 3:43 pm
You realize if you pluck someone off of a practice squad you have to put them on your 53 man active roster..who are you cutting or waiving? Also, you do not know what they are being paid by the owning team, base pay is $5k a week, but a lot of squad guys are paid much more as incentive to stay
November 17th, 2015 at 5:56 pm
Dez Bryant had some bad drops too, so even the so called elite receivers drop some too, 1 drop last week,
November 18th, 2015 at 11:56 pm
Mike Evans had the second least amount of dropped passes of the 2014 draft class coming out of college and only had four last year. He will come back into his true form. Julian Edelman has 8 dropped passes this year and Brandon Marshall has 6. So its not like the end of the world for Mike. It is obvious why Koetter is targeting him so much, when he was constantly open against Dallas. I am disappointed that he is not used more in the red zone. That was McCown’s bread and butter last year, throwing the fade in the end zone to Evans. People also forget what a great run blocker he is as well. He is playing through an injury and we are going to need him again this weekend. What I hated hearing was when the home crowd booed him after the drop against the Cowboys. What would this offense be like if he went out with an injury?